Off Menu with Ed Gamble and James Acaster - Ep 127: Timothy Spall

Episode Date: November 3, 2021

Like father like son. Another national treasure is in the dream restaurant – legendary actor Timothy Spall orders his perfect meal.Timothy Spall stars in ‘Spencer’ which is in cinemas this Fri 5th Nov.Recorded and edited by Ben Williams for Plosive.Artwork by Paul Gilbey (photography and design) and Amy Browne (illustrations).Follow Off Menu on Twitter and Instagram: @offmenuofficial.And go to our website www.offmenupodcast.co.uk for a list of restaurants recommended on the show.Watch Ed and James's YouTube series 'Just Puddings'. Watch here. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello, listeners of the Off Menu podcast. It is Ed Gamble here from the Off Menu podcast. I have a very exciting announcement. I have written my first ever book. I am absolutely over the moon to announce this. I'm very, very proud of it. Of course, what else could I write a book about? But food. My book is all about food. My life in food. How greedy I am. What a greedy little boy I was. What a greedy adult I am. I think it's very funny. I'm very proud of it. The book is called Glutton, the multi-course life of a very greedy boy. And it's coming out this October, but it is available to pre-order now, wherever you pre-order books from. And if you like my signature, I've done some signed copies,

which are exclusively available from Waterstones. But go and pre-order your copy of Glutton, the multi-course life of a very greedy boy now. Please? Welcome to the Off Menu podcast, taking the pitterbread of conversation, putting it in the toaster of humor and burning yourself on the steam of hot, hot content. Hello, James A. Caster. Yes. Hello, Ed Gamble. I love it. The pitterbread. Thank you very much. Don't often talk about pitterbreads on the pot.

We don't. They don't come up that often, mainly because they are very dangerous. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Should have got Rob Beckett on. Does he talk about pitterbreads? Back in the day, one of the earliest Rob Beckett routines I saw was about pitterbreads and how hot they are when you open them up. Ah, well, yes. We should get Rob on to talk about hot pitterbreads. But that's it. I don't want to hear anything else that man has to say. Yes, in and out.

Cuscus as well. It's like fat sand. That was an old Rob Beckett line. Ah, great fat sand. Great stuff. That is good stuff. Nothing else from Rob. Thank you. Just those two things. Get him on to do his bits. Get him on to do his humor. Yes. Give that guy a little boost career-wise.

God knows he needs it. But we're not here to talk to Rob Beckett today and we're here to talk to someone else. And what are we here to talk to them about, sir? This is the Off Menu podcast. We live in a dream restaurant and we bring in a guest and we ask them their favourite ever starter, main course, dessert, side dish and drink, not in that order. And this week our guest is... Timothy Spall.

Timothy Spall. Spall. What an amazing actor. Timothy Spall is. National Treasure Territory. Are we in again, James? Absolutely National Treasure. This is a real National Treasure heavy series, actually. It is, yeah. It's a treasure chest, I'd call it, this series.

Yeah, really. I mean, we all admire Timothy Spall. He's got a place in everyone's hearts. So many iconic roles. And just this... So, such a delight to watch every single film. I love his performance. I love the warmth he brings to his characters, no matter who they are.

Even if they're the baddies, he brings a certain relatability to them, a certain humour to them, Ed. Couldn't have put it better myself, James. I was just slightly thrown by the fact earlier you said that we live in the dream restaurant. Yes. As soon as I said that, I know you're going to pick me up on it. Well, it's just something I didn't know that we live in it. Yep, we live there. So, we live there.

People come and create their own dream restaurant within the blank canvas that we live in. When they leave, does their stuff go with them? Are we just living in a big white room until there's another guest? Yeah, it's not even a big white room. It's like just a state of nothingness. Sounds awful. Yeah, it's not nice. When people aren't in the dream restaurant, we're in a waking hell.

We like people to be in the dream restaurant, which is why it's a shame that we've established a format point. If they pick a secret ingredient, then they will be kicked out of the restaurant, James. We're asking for trouble. We're asking for trouble, but them's the rules. It's the ingredient that we, or even the listeners, deem to be disgusting. And this week, the secret ingredient for Timothy Spall's episode is Peltchards. Peltchards. Peltchards, horrible, horrible, horrible business.

Yep, I think that's a good way of putting it. Dropping the H and saying horrible, rolling the R's a bit like Uriah Heep. Is it like Uriah Heep? No, I tell you what. No, that's fair. Also, though, I think you were more channeling David Thueless in the third season of Fargo there. That's who you reminded me of when you're doing that. I loved him in that.

But also, who was it? Was it Ben Wishaw, who is Uriah Heep? He was. In the Copperfield film, the Armando Inutui one, he was very good. Yes, he's very good. Hello, Ben Wishaw, if you're listening. We'd love you to come on. Yeah.

We wish or you'd come on. Oh, well, that's our chance it's gone. That's that, out the window. Benito Wishaw. We didn't choose Peltchards, by the way. I'm kind of like, I'll eat Peltchards. I'm all right with it. But even though they're in an horrible, horrible, horrible business.

Yeah, yeah. But it's the listeners who chose it, right? Yeah, a couple of listeners. I believe Zach Morris and AC Slater chose it. Sarah Phelps on Twitter and James Garrett on Twitter. Very nearly I got that right. It was Lisa Turtle. That's what I've got here.

Great. Thank you. Remember the other people's names? Screech. Samuel Powers. Samuel Screech Powers, yes. Yeah. Dennis Belding.

Well, the actor was called Dennis Hopper. Oh, my God. Yes. Oh, you thought you had me. His name was Dennis Haskins. Dennis Hopper. Imagine, very different career for old Hopper. That would be great if Dennis Hopper was Mr. Belding.

Timothy Spall being in so many wonderful things, including the film Spencer, which is out on Friday, James. About Princess Diana. I'm sure he will tell us more about the film in this conversation. But before we go to the wonderful Timothy Spall, James, we've been nominated for a national comedy award. Yes. We are on a long list for best comedy podcast.

We need people to vote to get us onto the shortlist, and then we will come back begging again like horrible little pigs and ask for another vote. But this first stage, we need to get to the shortlist. So you've got to go and vote, please. Essentially, we'll beg so much that if we do win it, we'll be so demeaned by the whole experience that it won't feel worth it.

We will feel dirty. We'll feel horrible. Horrible business. Have we really won? Or did we just beg people to give it to us? Exactly, but I don't mind that. I love to feel dirty. So go to thenationalcomedyawards.com,

and you can vote there. But now, this is the off-menu menu of Timothy Spall. Welcome, Timothy, to the Dream Restaurant. Well, I'm delighted to be here. I'm already dreaming. Welcome to Timothy Spall to the Dream Restaurant. We've been expecting you for some time. Here we are.

I'm sorry I'm late. Hey, no, you weren't late. You were bang on time, Timothy. We're recording this one over Zoom. We were supposed to be doing it in person, of course, but James isn't very well. The restaurant genie isn't feeling very well. James, are you all right, mate?

Are you going to be okay to do this? I'll be honest with you. When I did the sound effect just then, it really tore my throat up in a way that it hasn't before. But I really committed to it, Timothy, because I don't want to go lackluster on your episode just because I'm a bit poorly. Oh, listen, I understand how brave you're being,

and what a brave soldier you're being. Thank you. And therefore, I will bear that in mind, and I'm humbled by your sacrifice. Oh, thank you so much. What are you drinking there, out of your glass mug? A cup of my favorite tea, which is Yorkshire and Earl Grey. So a little bit of the old builder in me,

and also the layers of sophistication has happened to me ever since I've become an actor out of the parish from many, many years ago. Is it a mix of teas? Well, yeah, two bags. Just stick them in. Always, that's what we do. We get in the morning two Yorkshire

or whatever the equivalent builders is, and then a bag of Earl Grey. Let it become so strong that you can stand a spoon up in it, and then it's ready to go. I've never met anyone who's double-banked it, let alone cross-banked, cross the bags. I'll cross-fertilize in your tea. Yeah, well, then it's what I see.

You're getting your old-fashioned transport calf tea, a basic tea that I was sort of brought up on, and then the Ponzi kind of tea that one is introduced to the life and sophistication of a strolling buyer. Do you feel like if you ever let the Yorkshire tea go, then you've sort of lost something. You've abandoned your past.

Well, I think I'd lose it, because it's good, isn't it? Yeah, I think I would find myself entering into this sort of health-tune phase, and then only ignoring all that, the great stuff, the really deep-fried, the fried bread and the deep-fried shit of my youth, and all them wonderful carcinogenic meals that were dished up and enjoyed.

And still do want to go, still love them, you know. Why not? There's a mixture. So I still have a little bit of that, and I'll go into the sophistication as well, or the Ponzi, whatever you want to say, however you want to couch it. Will you name and shame a national treasure who only has Earl Grey?

Do you know of any? I know people who have far worse teas, you know, fennel and raspberry, and all them things that aren't supposed to be in tea. Those are all those teas. I don't know how they've quite come upon us. Where did they come in from? Did they come in a bit after the time

when an egg and bacon pie became a quiche lorraine? I think that's when it all started. Of course, we know here off-menu that a cup of tea is not your favorite drink, is it, Timothy? No, what is my favorite drink? I used to go right across the board, you know, bottom shelf to top shelf.

I don't do that anymore, from pump to optic via other vineyards from Spain, France and Rome. And Greece, I don't do that anymore. So all of the wonderful beauties of such delights have now been replaced by your mixed bag and your diet coke and your fizzy water with a bit of lime juice in it, or to top off the day like some Boy Scout,

rewarding himself for a lot of days on the toggle, whatever you do with the boy. I have a nice Robinson's Black Currant and apple with some lemon in it, pathetic. I sit there sipping, like, hmm, oh, that was, oh, have a relax with this now, you know. Well, there we are. That's the big reward, is it?

Well, it is the thing that's become, you know, it's not a bottle of Brunello anymore. Actually, I've become a great aficionado of the Waitrose Cranberry Big Bottle. It's a huge bottle like this, which has gone up from, I think, 72 to 75p, you know, I was a bit shocked. And I said, come on, Spork, put yourself together,

you spent 20 quid on a bottle of wine. Now you're moaning about cranberries. Do you know about 75p? I was like, no, that's, no, I've, as I say, I've had my share, and these are now my delights. Diet Coke being sort of a staple. Do you go for Diet Coke or Diet Pepsi? That sounds slightly, doesn't satisfy.

There's a different taste. I'm not going to diss it because I would take it, but I have been, you know, I've gone towards, no, all zero, I like that. I find that's a bit hyphalutic. I've done that thing now. Can I have a Diet Coke, all zero, if you happen to have, you know, all that thing, you over-explain one,

yeah, we got it, you know, I mean, you, all that, that looks, you know. If you have a Coke zero, would you add in a bit of Diet Coke just to remind you of your roots? Yeah, double bag? Well, I don't, well, you didn't have to get two, wouldn't you?

But I'd say, generally, I drink very fast. I mean, this is my sixth cup of tea of the month. I mean, I literally, I can do... 10 o'clock. So that's the problem with that, is that you have, I have to have at least six. So I usually have five, three straight off, and I'll drink them fast.

And my wife is usually on just on the one. And then I'll go in for a full, then the fifth comes in. And then, of course, if you have to go out, you spend most of the day trying to find toilets, you know, and going in, excuse me, like in this country, you can't just walk in, you have to beg and throw yourself on the mercy of various institutions, you know. I haven't got a card yet, you know,

help this poor old man, he needs a wee. But that is one of the downsides of drinking so much tea. And then, coca-cola, you're always on a coca-cola. Are you double-bagging every single time, Timothy? Are you making separate cups of tea double-bagging, or are you making a big pot at the beginning of the day? Oh, no, a big pot. Got a nice pot. Is it funny how every cup,

doesn't matter how much you try, how much you've perfected the art of tea making, every pot of tea is slightly different. Why is that? You've got to allow for the dance of the bag. Dance of the bag and you can never do it exactly the amount of time about egg timers and putting on... I mean, and putting on a timer for, as the American's got,

it's heaping a bag. It's like, I think that's a little bit pedantic, slightly, probably anal. But so I think allowing yourself the disappointment or the joy of what's going to come out of the pot is actually part of the morning's, you know, Fandango, I thought. Sometimes the disappointment is worth it

because, you know, you've got joy just coming around the corner. Exactly. You've always got another go if you've got plenty of bags. Now, we have talked a lot about drink. However, when I asked you what your favourite drink was earlier, you did get the question wrong, Timothy. Oh, did I? I obviously don't know myself.

I mean, go on. What is it? Your favourite drink is Diet Cloudy Lemonade. That's your favourite drink. You drink it all the time. Now, I know where you got that and somebody lived with me quite a long time. Yeah, no, that is true. That is true. I do like that very much, but I have graduated towards this big...

I think it's pink grapefruit or Marks and Spencer's fizzy cranberry lemonade. Oh, so I've veered off. I mean, I haven't abandoned the Cloudy Lemonade. I do love that. And that would be on the desert island. And I think I'd have to add that. I'd have to add that in a well, but...

How often, if you had a Cloudy Lemonade well, would you be going back to the well? Well, quite a lot. I do like to drink... I think I might have gills. I'll keep... Sometimes, ridiculously check. But I haven't, because I don't understand why I can drink so much. I don't know where it... And I think... And I don't know whether I believe it or not.

It's probably nonsense. It might be absolutely true. It might be ruled by the stars, but I am a Pisces as are lots of axes. And I think I could quite easily... He'd just float about in a sea of Cloudy Lemonade. Just constantly consuming it. I presume, far, far better than the constant consumption of Brunello and Barola, which would have...

I think that might have done me well. You know, I don't know, but there's probably all sorts of horrible castanets, genics and things inside Cloudy Lemonade, but probably not as bad for you as liters and liters of wine. I'm a Pisces as well, Timothy. And I think I agree with you. I think that's a thing, because, as James will tell you, I'm a glugger. I glug things down.

I'll get a pint of water and straight down. Oh, absolutely. As same with food, I eat it very quick. I don't know what it is. Maybe it's because I'm having three brothers, and you're always worried if you didn't eat it quick, they'd eat it before you even got it in your mouth, you know? But I just... I can eat so fast that it's gone. I've done. I've eaten the starter and all this mangle before my wife's even got the bread.

And will you confirm that you drink Cloudy Lemonade so much that it comes out of your eyes? It probably does. I don't know. I left a try by drinking my tears. I don't know whether that's sad, means you're ill, or whether that's poetry. I'm not sure. Before we move on to your menu properly, Timothy, can you tell us a little bit about your new film, Spencer?

Well, yes, it's a very unusual look at three days in the life of Diane Spencer, Princess of Wales, a woman that some people might have heard of. And it's set in the early 90s at a time in her life when the marriage was not on great soil, and she's there at Christmas at Sandwick. And it's an investigation of how she deals with that three days, the rules and regulations, the stringency of what the traditions are,

you know, of what she has to do, and it being, in a sense, an exacerbation of all the problems that she found in a simplistic form of what, you know, is indicative of the problems of her position in the Royal Family. And it's a view, a very in-your-face view of her psychological state, a relationship to the family, and what she's going through. And it's not as different from the crown as the born identity would be. And I play a character, Major Alastair Gregory,

who's sent to Sandwick, and to keep her in line, basically. But we started all in Germany during lockdown, so it was hell. You know, I was in Berlin for a long time, and there was a lot of time off, because snow came in and disrupted it, and I was right in the middle of all these cultural delights, and completely unable to go and see him. And I ended up having to cook for myself, because nothing was open, and my wife and I who are joined at the hip,

she couldn't join me, which was hell as well. So I had to do a cooking lesson with her over face-to-face time. I mean, it was really sad, I mean, but because I had lots of time off, I'd plan, I'd forget things in the supermarket, because I could go back to something to do, you know. It was really sad. Oh, I seem to have forgotten the bread, so I could go back later on. You know, I mean, it was really pathetic.

But I realised something. I was 64 now, I was 63 before I'd ever cooked my own pasta. Wow. Yeah, I mean, it was all right. What was the pasta? Well, it was spaghetti. I thought I didn't want to go to rigatoni or anything with all that exotic stuff, like off of one of those charts with all them things on it.

I thought I'd go in with the spaghetti, get the tomato sauce on, get that going. And it turned, and obviously I had to face time with my wife eight times, you know, just to get... And I set the alarm off in the hotel apartment four times. I'm just like, hairspray, hairspray, is there any problem with hairspray? No, I'm just cooking a pasta. Well, I like that character very much. We always start with still or sparkling water in the dream restaurant. Definitely sparking, a little bit of the exotic of and still...

I'm not that keen on water, per se, to tell you the truth. Being a fish, though, which is odd. I'm a cloudy lemonade drinking fish, not a water fish. I'm not a fresh water fish. I'm a stale cloudy lemonade fish. So it's got around the sparkling water. But I always ask, so does my wife, we always ask for a side jug of lime juice, cordial.

Not juice, none of that rubbish from real stuff. Lime, cordial. Hopefully roses if they've got it, you know. And I always say, can I have it and I mime it? Can I have it in a little jug, you know, in a little jug on the side? I've always been raffed when I was a kid. I used to say, can I have a double espresso with some hot milk on the side, a little jug, and rife used to say to me,

now, you can ask for a little jug of hot milk. Every time I ask for a little jug of... I always remember him taking a piss out when he was a kid. It's hardly surprising, because we bought them up on sarcasm as a device to stop them being bad, rather than confidence, you know. So he would copy you and mime the jug? Yeah, but Manny would take the make-up and he'd say, a little jug, a little jug. I don't know why I go up an octave, but I've got a little jug

and sort of do a little jug mime with my hand. Well, that shows it's a little jug. You've got to go up to your jug. You have to go up a little jug, yeah. Because if you say a little jug, they'll bring you a normal-sized jug if you say it. Yeah, because I have a you-a, a you-a hot milk. It's a you-a. Can I have a f***ing hot milk? No.

A little jug is hot. So is your dream water, the fizzy water, with a little jug of lime cordial on the side, or because you love cloudy lemonade so much and me and Ed going into this, that was the main thing we knew about you food-wise, is that you love cloudy lemonade. I would almost be willing to bend the rules and let you have cloudy lemonade as your water course. Oh, thank you. You sure?

Yeah, for sure. I don't want to bring the whole edifice of your structure of your show down by breaking that one figure, but if that's allowed. But I have to modify the play. It's got to be diet cloudy lemonade. Yeah, of course, yeah. That is the one. You know, it's got to have all of those things that you're not supposed to enjoy, aspartame and all them other things

that come out of probably nuclear fissions and all that. I don't know where they get them from. But if you're going to drink 14 gallons of them, that's like having seven dinners. So you've got to lose the courage so you're having the food. I feel like, because it's the dream restaurant as well, you can have a well. I think you can have a well in the middle of the restaurant, which has got diet cloudy lemonade in, and every so often you can just send a bucket down, pull it back up.

Send a bucket? Yeah, that is marvellous, isn't it? Yeah, a bucket. Yeah, absolutely. A big one and then big wooden ones with the metal rims around. Or could it be a furkin? Could I ask for a furkin or something similar to that? A quart? A quart. Yes, that would be a quart pail. So would you like the quart pail, the furkin, the gullon pail, the half gullon? But you have to do the different voices for each one of those. You have to go up an octave or down an octave or whatever.

Can I have the gullon? Do you want the American gullon, sir? Or the imperial gullon, please? Not the American gullon, it's less. But the imperial gullon, one imperial gullon of cloudy lemonade. That's perfect. You've created so many characters already, Timothy. We're only on the water course and we've had so many different voices and characters.

I mean, I'm hoping later on we're going to hear more from the worried German hotel worker. Oh, yes, yes. Oh, maybe, yeah. Oh, is this my... I really like the worried German hotel worker. They've got a good soul. Yeah, hashball. Yeah, hashball. Pop it up, it's all bread. Pop it up, it's all bread, Timothy's ball.

Pop it up, it's all bread. I do like a pop it up. Very much like a pop it up. And I like a spicy and a plain. You can just have one or the other because I like bread. You know, most people, they eat all the bread as soon as it arrives. That is the problem. You have to be very careful with how many poppidoms you eat. I once was in a restaurant, this restaurant, so I was once in an Indian restaurant in Egham.

It sounds like the beginning of a limerick, doesn't it? And I saw a table of six, all to 38 poppidoms. I thought that was a such a wonderful oar. And they came and they crunched the sound. Were they all on top of each other, all 38 poppidoms? They couldn't balance. They were precariously brought in on four different plates. But they got them down.

So I think I'll have a spice. May I have a spicy poppidom and a plain one? And can I have some really big, but Spanish crusty bread? You know, that bread, you get in Spain, all the air holds it, but it's soft and it's got a dark crust on it. I love that. And some oil and vinegar. That goes on there.

And a little relish tray with the lime pickle and the mango chutney and the onion and tomato salad. And a little bit of yogurt, not too much of that. It sounds amazing Timothy. I'm laughing because this is genuinely just like talking to Ralph again. Yeah, it's exactly like talking to Ralph again. We could almost be related. He also did what you're doing,

which is just use this as an opportunity to list as many things as possible. Have all of it immediately. Well, there's so many delights, isn't there? I mean, I suppose if I was going to be aesthetic about it, I could bring them right down. But it is a dream place, isn't it? So your dreams are about indulging. And I presume you're casting off any fear of feeling ill

after you've eaten too much. So that goes away. I always had this sense of somebody. There was a device that you could swallow a carrier bag and just leave the corner out of your mouth and eat. Eat as much as you're going to enjoy it and pull it out, empty it and stick it back in again. So you actually got all the pleasure to just pull it out and empty it

so you'd never get full. I mean, that is a pretty disgusting image. Would you like that in your dream restaurant? Because it sounds like something of a nightmare to have a carrier bag down your throat with a corner hanging out that you can pull out of your own stomach. It wouldn't be very nice for the other diners. The noise it would make when it was pulled out and emptied

would probably put people off, you know, whatever they were having, you know. You're basically going poppadobs and bread. Bread. And if I may, it's just just, well, I'm going to hold back to the starter as well. And I'll leave that as the bread and the poppadobs if I may. Also, my wife makes during lockdown, became a master baker and some of the bread she's. So I might have to bring in a bit of that.

Some of a focaccia, almost. She makes it focaccia. And we've been in Italy quite a lot. Honestly, it's up there with the best. And so maybe I'd bring a little bit of that in a sort of heated pouch. You know, you did a little, it wasn't a little jug mime there. The heated, what was the heated pouch that the focaccia was coming in? Well, the heated pouch almost came out as if I was wearing a bra.

I'm wearing a bread bar. Why are you wearing a bread bra? Well, I haven't got breasts anymore, but I used to have one anymore. But I now use them. I use my bra to keep my focaccia, my home made focaccia warm. So I can reduce it with a little fuss and without drawing attention. I don't know what you draw.

You would draw attention as if you were bringing bread out of a bra. I think that's fine. I think that's fine. I think you can have the pappadoms and bread that you described. And you can also have your wife's focaccia if you're bringing it out of your bra. My bread bra. Yes.

As long as you're wearing a bread bra and that's where you're bringing out the focaccia, then we'll allow it. Forget your starter now, your dream starter. Quite excited to see how many dishes are in this. But if I may, I'm going to go in for a meze. Here we go. A meze or a tapas of...

I think I'm going to go in for a mate. Can I have a very, you know, like a little rambican? This is a word I like. A small rambican of plain crisp with a little cubes of cheese. I would love a little rambican of peanuts. I would like some olives, if I may. And I would like... I've got great liking for these marmite crisp breads.

I'd like a little pile of those as well. I love those. And I think that would do me as a little... Just as a little nibble thing to nibble my way through the rambicans towards... We were recently in Rome and we went in this place and I'd never had before, which was a deep fried small artichoke.

At that, a tiny little artichoke. Not one of them big things. We have to peel, right? You're doing some kind of origami or something on a... Reverse origami on a artichoke like that. But little deep fried artichokes and a little goujon of fish. I'd like that as well. I love a goujon.

I don't know... Are you familiar with the delight of the goujon? I am, yeah. Yeah, I have a goujon. Just... Yeah, isn't it a lovely thing, the goujon? What makes a goujon a goujon? Well, it's just a small deep-fried fish, isn't it?

Is it a fish finger? Well, no, it's a shaped fish finger and it's usually like that beer batter type thing, not a bread coated thing. You know how fish manages to have a puffed up batter and have air between the fish itself and the batter and then a nice little bit of squashy sort of fat juice thing comes out when you bite it.

That kind, that's a goujon. You don't get the fat squidgel on a fish finger, do you? No, you never get the fat squidgel actually on a fish finger. Sometimes it squirts out and can hit you in the eye or some sort of tiny thing if you're not careful. So just to recap, you would like a ramekin of crisps and cheese. Yes. You would like a ramekin of peanuts, a ramekin of olives.

Yes. A ramekin of those marmite flatbread bites. Yes. A fish goujon and a deep-fried artichoke. And also what I'd like, maybe not a ramekin, a slightly larger bowl of padron peppers. Yeah. Yeah.

Lovely. Have we even talked about padron peppers? Has anyone picked padron peppers before, James? We've definitely talked about them before because we talked about how I say padron peppers. And I say padron. Which I think Timothy does as well. Yeah.

And you always say padron peppers. I don't think there's a right version. I think they're both right. Well, both times, yours has sounded wrong. I'll leave you to pick your about that. But I don't, as long as you get them, who cares? Or in Spain, they often say, Oh, yeah?

So who's this character? I don't know. Someone's serving you. I don't know. I think he's based on a character I played. I don't think he's a bad role, though. It was a character I played in a mad production of Love's Labour's Loss, which I did.

Ken Branagh production, where I had to sing I had to do anyway. I will leave it at that. I saw that in the cinema. You never did. You must have been four. And you must have been on earth with what's going on. Ketrin Odeon, we went to see Love's Labour's Loss.

Goodness me. I've never seen a Shakespeare at the cinema before. Tell me, what did you make of it? I think I liked it. I can't remember. I just remember the fact that we were seeing a Shakespeare film. She had a Shakespeare film before. So that was exciting.

And I didn't learn it was Ken Branagh or who Ken Branagh was two years later. How old were you, if I may ask? I don't know. I would have been probably primary school, definitely. Oh, my God, I really am old. I saw it in the cinema. I thought I was the only person who'd done that.

But I mean, it was horribly received. My wife absolutely loved it. And I think it's been what you have to put up with that, don't you? You end up in some things that people will adore. And then you end up on things that people loathe. And then sometimes they loathe it. And then luckily these days, I mean, they stick around these days. It's harder to kill a film.

Some deserve to die, but a lot don't. And if they can survive, there's streaming and all that stuff that young people know how to work to watch. And I think you might be able to get hold of it. I did look it up once and saw myself doing it in German, which was interesting. I've never seen myself being dubbed in German. What is the film that people love the most that you've done?

That they bring up to you the most? Well, it's going to have to be the Harry Potter series, which is the one that, funny enough, is the smallest, one of the smallest parts I've ever played. It's made me the most well-known internationally. I remember getting in a lift in... My wife and I got in a lift in New Mexico. It's sophisticated.

It's very sophisticated. Middle-aged couple got in. I thought, my God, was he a politician or something? He turned to me and he said, oh, my God, are you the rat dude from Harry Potter? I said, yes, I do. I do answer that tabulation on occasion. The rat dude.

Better than the guy I met also in New Mexico. I was sitting outside having a beer outside a restaurant. And the guy, the oldest guy, kind of distinguished old guy came up to me and said, I just wanted to say thank you. I said, sorry. So if we met, no, no, no, we haven't met. I just wanted to say thank you.

You are the reason my daughter is an opera singer. I said, I'm very delighted she is. But I don't think I can take claim for that. And he said, well, I am telling you, I know you're being humble. I am telling you, Mr. Andrew Lightweber, that you are the way you are. I said, no, no, thanks.

I'm a big fan. Not a good looking as him. But I would, I can't say that. He wasn't disappointed. He wasn't having anything. He thought I was fiddling. But where were we? We got Padron Peppers to Andrew Lloyd Webber

as always happens on this podcast. They always go down that road. Yeah. And then the other one is, of course, it's even kids. It's even kids with that. Or old fellas now watching our Vida Zane pets still. So I cover the, I cover the lot. I go from, you know, and now all the kids,

the kids of the kids who saw Harry Potter are now watching Harry Potter. And the sons of the people are now watching the original Vida Zane audience. And now I've even, I used to get, I've been watching that with my dad. Now I'm getting, oh, I saw that. I'm now watching the Vida Zane with my granddad, you know.

So I've covered all areas with a little bit of art, a little bit of world cinema in between, you know. I'm lucky to be tolerated on a long term basis. I don't know why I'm looking at it by the profession. So there we are. I can't complain. When Wraith was on, he said about how much cloudy lemonade you drank.

And we said about it spilling out of your eyes because you drank so much and covering you. And I made a joke to Miffy. I said, our Vida Zane wet. How do you like that? I don't know how to contain myself. I soiled myself and laughed. I'm going to have to call my wife and bring me some pants

because that is so funny. My socks are full. Yeah, an interesting use of humour. Yes, thank you. The deeply unfunny kind. That's the way I'd sum up James. If anyone said, can you describe James A. Kaster's comedy? I'd say, well, it's an interesting use of humour.

Yeah, I'll take that. Your dream main course, Miffy? Well, I don't know why it's happened, but I have become very prone to eating a lot of fish. A lot of, well, why is it vegetarian? But I've got moved. Maybe because I am a fish. I'm letting towards being a fish.

I've got lemonade, drinking fish, and becoming a fish. But the one thing I said to my wife, what do I like the most? We've been married 40 years. She said, what you really like, and it's not something you have, it's ox tail. Has anybody chose ox tail?

I don't think so. I think you might be the first ox tail. Now, luckily, I've never actually gone in a butchers and bought one because they are, you know, when you, you know, ox tail soup, it's that brown thing in a tin with little flakes of something. You go, what's that?

And it's got a sort of slightly, you know, appealing thing to it. And sort of thing you have, maybe you're forced by your nan when you're ill, or when you're young to have it. You just feel sicker when you've had it. I mean, I've always liked it. But ox tail is literally what it is.

You know, it's a huge tail from an ox, cutting slices into like rings. So you can see the mark of the ring. And then it's all got meat and sort of gelatin and thing around. And then you cook it for about 11 years. And then it is the most exquisite and my wife does all sorts of magical things to it.

I don't know what she adds. I think she's just... I mean, but I don't know. I never asked because she's a magician with food. And what this amazing sort of vat, like a huge bowl of meaty kind of dark sort of almost medieval type thing comes out with this beautiful, soft meat

that just falls on. And then you're left with a very strange sort of gelatine-type bone thing. It's almost like, well, I suppose a tail is an extension of the spine, isn't it? But that's... I remember you couldn't have them during a mad cow disease because anything from the head to the spine

to the tail was banned, you remember. You couldn't delete it. So, but it's an rare occasion because it is a little bit, I suppose, one of a better word, disgusting in some eyes. But it's quite anachronistic, quite old-fashioned. But I highly recommend it, really. I really do, you know.

Timothy, I think you're the first person to bring Oxtel to the dream restaurant. And also, you're the first person to use the phrase extension of the spine during describing their main course. Well, I might be wrong technically. And I hope to be disabused, eventually my ignorance on this about whether a tail is an extension of the spine.

I mean, there is evidently the coccyx, which is the bottom of our spine, used to be where we had a tail. Now, is that an urban myth? It can't be an urban myth because there weren't any cities where we had tails if we had tails. But is it? I don't know.

Well, you should look. Yeah, I'd take your advice on tails more because you were the rat dude, of course. Well, exactly. Yeah, yeah, exactly. I was the rat dude. And I've been it more than once because I was a rat in chicken run as well.

So, I am an authority. But I also have played Winston Churchill more than once, and I'm not an authority on him. But I think rat is Norwegian because I can claim to have some inside knowledge of. Yeah. All rat is rat is depending on whichever one you want to go.

Was the extension of the spine a single by Body Tyler? Do you know? Extension of the spine. Body Tyler. How would it go? Sing it, mate. Sing it, please. Go on.

Nothing I can do, a total extension of the spine. I like that. Yeah, I think that. Yes. Yeah. Bye-bye, my wife's just going off to get socks tails. Yeah.

Just reminded her. That was very sweet. I think James missed that. Your wife came and ruffled your hair to say goodbye there. Ruffled my hair with a butt going off, yeah, to buy ox tails. Yeah, but that, and because I live very near Smithville,

which is an interesting place to live, and you're never far from our ox tail. They don't lead the cattle up here anymore. I've read the statistic once, evidently, when there was a cattle, when they did lead the cattle to the market, where it was also slaughtered here. The guys that worked here,

the bales or the beetles, used to have to wear leather, sort of a treated leather waist high waders because there was a million beasts here and there was so much shit that they had to wear waders up to the, and to know where the fleet, which you can no longer see it was,

Fleet Street, which is faring, where Faringham Road, they used to tip all the offwall down in there. They used to use it like a big drain, so there was a river there, and they slowly got covered in bridges, and then they'd start chucking all the guts and all the things after they'd sort it down,

and the stink was so horrible that it became a health hazard, so they eventually covered it and piped it off. So that's why the fleet is under, under the Faringham Road. It starts up somewhere up in Amsterdam, and you can hear it some, I can hear it, a lot of old and viaducts sometimes.

You can hear all the offwall? You can't hear the offwall bubbling. I think that's all decomposed because it was at the 14th century they did that. Who knows? There might be a spleen wobbling around, you know, stuck in a battle gate sewer outlet.

You never know. Hopefully none of that makes it into the Cloudy Lemonade Whale. That would be an absolute disaster if you pulled the bucket up and there's a spleen in there. No, if there was an infiltration, that would you dip in your furkin

and pull out a lump of medieval spleen. Talk about what the foot-and-mouth crisis was like for you. Well, not being a farmer, it didn't really affect me. I'm not having any farming. Being from South London and now living in the centre of the old Londonium, farming is a little bit of a,

a bit of an exotic sort of other planet. I mean, the only thing I was deprived of was Wogstale. I mean, that's how it hit me. That was a great answer, Tim, to what I think from James is the weirdest question he's ever asked on this podcast. He's never ever asked anyone,

tell us what foot-and-mouth was like for you. Well, no, because it's all about COVID and it's nice to have a blast from the past, isn't it? Ask me about how's your coronavirus? It's so boring, so derogatory. To ask about something like that, I mean, I'd love to talk about the blitz, but I only know it from secondhand

while talking to my name, you know. I mean, I could do you a, an impersonation of Lord Horhor. Germany calling, Germany calling. Give up the war, British Tommy. We ask a period. How would Lord Horhor ask for a little jug? Look here, you young foolish English person

supporting your army. Ask me a little jargon. A little jargon of lime juice and we will spare you one of your ovens taken over. Your dream side dish, Timothy. Well, with this, do you know, I don't know how it's done. My nanny's to do it, my wife can do it,

but if you ask her, she doesn't like doing it. Overboil potatoes. They get a sort of fluffy quality to them. They got a bit dry and they got like bits of fluffy and they got a, then that with them, because you stick that in the, any dry fluffiness becomes in the lovely mixture of the sauce.

That goes in with that. I've on the side and do you lovely put it in there to change the color of the potato. And I also may be, if I may have another potato which is like a crispy roast potato, maybe a Mediterranean one, you know, done in the pan like that, or just a roast one covered in some kind of good fat or some fat of something.

And then I think some, I would say frozen peas. I like, I do like frozen pea, but sometimes with, if you're going, maybe if you're going back the marrow fat pea, tin of marrow fat peas, which is another thing. I don't quite, do you think marrow fat peas actually have marrow in them? I've never heard of marrow fat peas until you just said them.

You've never heard of a marrow fat pea? No. I've heard of a marrow fat pea, but I couldn't, I couldn't draw you one. Well, it's a pea. Picture a pea, picture a pea. Invariably in a tin. And I think they must have,

unless it's the type of pea that grows, I don't know whether they put marrow fat in them to give them a, or whether it's a type of pea. I'm tempted to look it up, but I'm not going to because it will be distracting. But I always like to think, because it always tastes like there is something else in it. I don't know whether it's the pea itself

or whether it's gone that tinny taste because a tin pea does have a particular tang to it, doesn't it? Yeah. And it's old and it's kind of marinated and it's in its own penis, you know? Oh, in a penis. That's an interesting word, isn't it? The penis, the being of a pea,

type of pea, being penis, sounds like penis. Marinated in its own penis. Marinated in its marrow-fatted penis, penis. So you would like the peas marinated in their own penis? In their own penis, yeah. You have to spread it out, don't you? Well, actually the worst thing for a penis to have is penis. Yeah.

You don't want your penis to have a penis? Yeah. No, you don't want it to be, no, you don't want it to be pea-like or no, it would be out of control, wouldn't it? You don't want it to have that tang that you mentioned? No, you don't want that tang. I wouldn't mind it just to hear a doctor's try and say,

a penis, penis, because that's getting towards a Latin, isn't it? So it might even actually cut me like, you know, anyway, I'm actually starting to feel a bit tired. I'm starting to love myself, talking about it. Self-loathing's never far. You know, if you've got verbal diarrhea like me, you go, oh, shut. You know, when you do a junkie,

which your job is to constantly talk, you know, I wanted 36 interviews in two hours, one after the other, the other junkie. And I kept saying, who is that horrible man going on and on and on? Shut him up, for what sake? You, it's useful. It's you, you're constantly going on.

What was that for? What was the film? That was for denial, which was, yes, about the Holocaust. My dad loves that film. Does he? I have not seen the film denial, but I have heard my dad describe the plot of the film denial to me upwards of 10 times, at least 10 times. He has described the entire plot.

We've got Fluffy, overly-boiled Fluffy potatoes, really nice Spanish roast potatoes, some maro fat peas. Oh, I tell you what, I've got, I mustn't forget this, but maybe possibly nine chips, fact-chips, nine chips. No, no more than that, because you don't want to overdo it. You don't want to spoil it. I don't know how about it, but nine chips.

Nine chips. Triple cooked? I'm never sure about that. I think that's overdoing it. I've always, I like it. I had it, but I had it. I think it was it not Eston Blumenthal, who sort of said that made that all the rage.

I think so, yeah. And I did go there and have them there. They were absolutely delicious at the Fat Duck. Only the once. It was delightful. But I think they were slightly over, you know, over it, over duck. You know, you just, I think just a deep-fried bang, whack it in, you know, in a chip pan.

One of them things that, you know, used to, where the Fibre gave us the word, Chip Pan Fire, you know, there was a Fibre. What's that? Chip Pan? Jimmy Fire? I don't have them anymore. Or Chip Pan Fire?

Little Fugits. But I think, I don't know whether this is a side dish, but is an absolute, and it goes way, way back to what I did as a kid. A slice of thick or medium slice. Home-pride, mother's pride or whatever the equivalent. Some blessed all these trade names for white bread that tastes like a choc pillow, that kind of thing, you know. And then you make sure you've got not too much,

you want to drown the bread. What's left, you've eaten everything, and the bones are pushed to the side, possibly maybe even put on the bone plate, where some of the Pad Drone Pepper ends, still left, you could make a nice little bone, circular bone Pad Drone Pepper, hair on a circular bone face, several of them.

And then you get the bread, and you've got, you know, possibly an eighth of an inch of gravy, and then you put, in dead center, you put the mother's pride or equivalent, it would be some blessed or, you know, into the bread, and you watch it slowly, the bread and the gravy seep in,

and turn slowly, but surely in slow motion, turn into another color and another thing and another piece of matter entirely. Oxtail juice soaked mother's pride there, and you eat it delicately and with precision with a knife and fork. It finishes it off lovely. You leave it a little bit to the side,

and that maybe hasn't got so much soakage in it, you then get that and you put that on your fork and you wipe that last little bit. So, it's a completely clean plate, which reminds me of when I was a kid, when I used to lick my plate after my nan, who lived with us, my mum was hairdressing,

and I go, look Nan, look, I'm giving me any dinner, Nan, Nan, where's my dinner? Look, there's nothing on it, you're giving me an empty plate, Nan, that's it. You know, I could still do that. Like a stupid, foolish self-regarding, comedic nine-year-olds of my wife. Look, look, Sam, look, look, look,

you haven't given me dinner, where is it? Look, I completely clean plate, give me a clean plate. You lick it. Pathetic, isn't it? I love it. I love it, and I love your... You've already referenced the self-loathing. Yeah. And I love now being able to see it as you're saying it.

As soon as you started saying you're giving me a clean plate, I saw in your eyes, you're going, oh, this is perfect, it can be absolutely perfect. It is. I mean, it's joyfully pathetic, isn't it? I love it. I mean, I love that.

I mean, I'm trying to perfect the, you know, the chronically irritating and the sympathetic. I mean, it's a bit of a forte, really, in a sense. You know, you've got to... The bizarre, the deeply sad, and the very funny, and the unison, really, it's a thing. It usually got the best kind of drama comedy has that, isn't it? You know, that great word, basos.

Where something, when... Something that is deeply moving and gets you to cry, and then it just becomes pathetic, because somebody's overdone it. Well, they used the wrong word at the wrong time, didn't they? I mean, it comes in and spoils it. Basos is such a wonderful thing, isn't it?

Do you think your entire acting career has come from you trying to convincingly sell to someone that they've not given you any dinner and that they've given you a clean plate? So, like, when you were nine and you were trying to just convince your nan, and now, still, you're doing it to your wife, and one day, you'll be such a good actor

that someone will go, oh, sorry, Timothy, yeah, that's a clean plate. I haven't given you any food. There you go. I'll give you a second meal. What a brilliant, brilliant... It would probably have to be them, either with Amnesia or some kind of

goldfish concentration of thoughts of them to have done that. That might help. No, I think it needs to be... The ultimate performance is someone who's completely sharp. You know, they've got all their faculties, and your acting is so good that they truly are convinced

that you didn't have any dinner. Yeah, I mean, that... That's better than the Oscar. That is good. No, that's a very good notion, because there would have to be tears, wouldn't there? There would have to be silences. You'd have to say,

okay, I think I agree with you. You did cook it, but I'm only doing that because I don't want to hurt your feelings because you actually, you know, you are suffering from possibly memory loss. I wanted to say, because it's unfair, and, you know, I'm crying for you because I know you're not right,

and you forgot me. But, yeah, I'm going to pretend... All right, you did give it to me. Then they'd start questioning, wouldn't they? Yeah. They would start questioning. You'd have to really lay it on. And you might have to go out and come back and say,

hi, thank God that was an episode. We've got through that. I'm hungry. Yeah, you'd have to make sure that you'd cleared away your plate that you'd made with the oxtail bone and the ends of the padron peppers into a little face, because that would give you a way straight away, wouldn't it? Well, you'd have to eat them.

So there will be a sort of... You'd have to eat the marrow in middle, wouldn't you? That kind of gelatinous thing. But that is all, you know, that thing that everybody that became that... Do you remember when recently gaslighting, everybody started talking about being gaslighted? Nobody talked about that for a long, long time.

Interesting that that term should come along from that old, you know, from that play Gaslight, which was, you know, a Victorian, wonderful Victorian play that all of a sudden these anachronistic words have come back to explain some kind of modern, you know, unequalitarian abuse. Yes. But that's what you would do.

You would gaslight someone into thinking they hadn't given you any dinner, and then you would get the Oscar. Well, yeah, well, the equivalent, yeah, of the gas... I don't know what it would be, but, yeah, but, I mean, that would be... Would that be...

I suppose, in a sense, all acting is a form of gaslighting, isn't it? Yeah. You know, it's a con, you know. I mean, you're just... You're trying to convince somebody that you're somebody else, and they've got to forget that, you know, particularly if you've been around a long time,

they've asked him, you know, goodness sake, oh, God, he's doing a character. You know, you're either not thinking that, oh, pure, oh, love, oh, to him, relax, then, funny, well, oh, dear, you're hopefully not thinking that. You hope they're convinced by it. But, in a sense, that's what you're doing. You're saying, this is a bloke, I've turned up with him,

and, believe me, for a while, and you might laugh, you might cry, I don't know, I mean, but, in one form or another, it's a con, isn't it? It's a very sophisticated, deeply elaborate, very largely fault-free con, with others, all conning people, who are willingly paying money to go and be conned

for entertainment, entertainment. We come to your dream drink, Timothy. Now, are we sticking to diet-cloudy lemonade? Or should I go in, or is it very much a should I go in for the evening drink? I don't know, I don't often have that before six, but I might make exception. You know, I mean, there's a whole list of,

you know, all the wonderful wines I used to drink, and so on and so forth, and all those wonderful things that all go that I've, you know, that I've enjoyed, and I was thinking about that this morning, people say, oh, did you miss that? I say, well, I haven't espoused you, I thought of that one, all those wonderful, big Tuscan wines, your Brunelos, your Tigernelos,

your Chablis, and your Vivabrobra, and your Finlandia Vokkas, and the Chateau, and the Trimontresches, and all these amazing things that you could, and German beers, Czech beers, all these things. I think, well, actually, it's a bit like being a sort of cage fighter for a while, you know. Drink is cage fighting, isn't it?

If you like it, you love it, and you explore it to such a degree that I did, that it's a certain shelf life, where you can't carry on, because that is a bit like seeing a 60-year-old cage fighter, unless you're a superhero, would be wrong, or a downhill racer. Something you have to just say, that was what I did.

Yeah, yeah. And I'll leave that. So all of those things I listed with a certain, not regret, not missing, with a certain tinge of nostalgia. I would say they're there, I've had them. It was a lovely time. It was a beautiful time, but this isn't the past. On that note, I'd probably be able to get another,

maybe a Marks & Spencer's Cranberry, Fizzy Cranberry Lemonade down. I've really liked them. Or I might go in with the Robinson's and the Lemon Juice. Boiling up, though. It has to be. I sometimes forget, and I drink it, and I'll scald my throat.

And then I think, I feel like I've got throat cancer. I think, I'll start talking enough on it, and I'll know I'm going to have to go and get tested. I've got to get, you know, this is, you know. So the scalding, sometimes, you know, you just have to have it so hot. But coffee, you can't have good, you've got to have good,

what is it about posh coffee shops? Really posh coffee shops, called things like Nink & Poop and Coughbone and all that stuff. Why is the coffee cold? Why do you have to take it off it hot? You know, I don't know why. It was nice, but it's cold. You've got to have a coaster or something.

Boiling hot, scalding, you know. And then I ask if it's hot. It's got to be hot. But then again, I found out the Italian don't have their coffee hot. They like it a bit tepid, so they can taste it. So I suppose maybe I'm the peasant. I don't know, you know.

How often when you're having your hot Robinsons, do you think I've got throat cancer and I need to go for a test? Is it every time? No, it's usually after when I feel... I start talking to this whole man for a while, I'll say, this is the beginning. I've got throat cancer.

No, actually, I drank water, boiling blackcurrant juice straight out the kettle. You haven't got... Hopefully you've got throat cancer. You've got boiling blackcurrant and lemon's throat, not sarcophagus cancer. You never know. I mean, you know, I noticed when I was ill 25 years ago,

it wasn't being a hypochondriac. It wasn't the one I thought I had that got me. You know, I've got over it, thank God, but being a hypochondriac is no excuse for not getting cancer. I mean, you don't want to hear that, do you? You know. No, last but not least, you want to tell the hypochondriac. Hypochondriac can get cancer.

Because hypochondria is a way of heading off illness at the past, isn't it? You think you've got it. If you've got it before you've got it, then you haven't got it, you know. Has it ever got to the point where you've been at the doctor and said, I think I've got throat cancer. Can you do some tests?

And then they've gone, we think you've just been drinking hot Robinson's. Yeah, I do. I have to pull myself together. One of the other things about being an actor is that you tend to have an inflamed, possibly a comedian as well, an inflamed imagination.

And if they do, you know, years ago, I said the imagination is a beast that needs to be caged. You know, I mean, that's slightly punty, isn't it? But, you know, if it can get out of control, you know, and you can get all sorts of terrible things if you allow yourself. I mean, having been seriously ill now, I do get myself a break, you know.

But there is the lingering ghost of that childhood. You know, I had to go to, I was taken to hospital, to CSR car just by a mile because my hypochondria was so bad as a child. There was a bloke who used to walk down our street, who had a huge nose, big red nose. And somebody said to me, you know why he's got a red nose like that?

And I said, no. And they said, because he had cancer in the nose and they had to use a piece of his bum to stick it on his nose. Three weeks later, my mum caught me crying in the scullery. Not a kitchen eye here. I'm not digging.

I'm not in the digger's double in the scullery. He said, what on earth is the matter? He said, I've got cancer in the nose and they're going to tuck it off and put a bit of my bum on there. He said, well, this is it. He referred me to a psychiatrist at St Thomas' Hospital. We went and my mum was very smart.

We went there. And I didn't really know what to expect. You know, what you've got to realise is that I also was at that time, I was 12 but I was a skinhead. So I had state breast trousers quite high, Ben Sherman's shirt skinhead, cutting part in, braces and Doc Martin's.

OK. You're the kid from Mrs England? Yeah. But one, you know, when skinheads were skinheads then, this was in 1971, the original skinhead. I wasn't really a skinhead. I mean, it was like a kid version. And I didn't realise, I was shown into this room

and it was a lecture theatre full of medical students and I was on a stage. My mum was sitting next to me and I was conscious on a stage and when I walked in, all the medical students started laughing. LAUGHTER

And then when she said, this is Timothy. He's 12 years old and he's showing signs of hypochondria. They all started tittering again. I thought, even then at the time, I thought, it's just a little bit outrageous. I remember thinking, don't think that you're supposed to do that when you're a medical student, apart from being really humiliating.

Then every time I asked a question, there was titters. There were stifled titters from the audience. And then I was examined and about 10 of these titters came in. I was lying on a table. Maybe this is where the acting started. I don't know.

Oh, maybe. Maybe, Timothy. Maybe. First on to a stage. I'd say there's a 100% chance of that. Yeah. It all comes from trauma, clearly. Yeah.

I mean, this is not the word. I mean, I didn't, obviously. I am growing so slightly bulbous. No, I think that's just age. But I know it's not me bum being put on there. No, I've got through that. But I did have a worse piece of hypochondria. We had a very small cactus in our bedroom.

My brother and I shared it when we moved to a council flat. And it fell on me and it pricked a little bit. And I spent an hour just thinking I was going to turn into a cactus. I thought in the morning, I started to cry my brother. I said, what the fuck? What's the matter with you? I said, cactus is falling on me. I'm going to be a cactus in the morning.

I'm going to wait. I'm going to just be a big cactus boy. A big cactus boy. I'm going to be a cactus boy in my bed. Imagine going in. I'd have to go put me, stay pressed on my bed. Go back to the stone. And then they would stop laughing.

They would be frightened, wouldn't they? If you were a skinhead cactus. A cactus boy had turned up in his skinhead. The last thing you want from a skinhead is to be a cactus boy, right? Well, for a start, you couldn't be a skinhead because you'd have big spikes sticking out the top of your head. Boy, I suppose you could cut a part in between the prick.

You thought of that. I'd tell you what, people would. They'd be a bit scared of you, they wouldn't know. I mean, I suppose you would probably be a quite intimidating skinhead if you were a cactus skinhead. Yeah. The last thing you want is to be nutted by a cactus, right?

Yeah. Yeah, exactly. But then you become a cactus, if you were a hyperconductor, you become a cactus too. Do you think it was likely that all of the medical students have been told before you walked onto the stage,

next we've got a little boy who thinks that he's got nose cancer and they're going to put his bum on his nose. Do you think they knew that before you walked out onto the stage and that's why they were tittering the whole time? No, I think they laughed because there was a boy coming in

with an acute neurosis who happened to be a chubby little skinhead. So the incongruity of a chubby little skinhead showing the signs of hyperconductor neurosis was too much for them to bear. Let's get onto your dream dessert because I love dessert. It's my favourite course.

Although you haven't really mentioned sweets much during this, although your drinks are quite sweet. I trained myself off them really, being someone who's always had the diet thing, you know, and going up and down. I spent a lot of time as a big guy, chubby fat fella. I became thin, you know,

I wanted to get rid of it. So I kind of trained myself off puddings and got away from all that, you know, all that stuff and cake. So kind of, you know, I went away from that. But just before, can I have... I did forget, because you remind me, Rave chose so many things,

just to finish you off. Can I just have a tiny, a little bit of tandoori chicken just to finish off that for just little three little bits? Yeah. Maybe a tiny little skewer chicken shashlik, just to finish off, because I don't want to think, oh, shit, I should have had the shashlik,

not the oxtail. So that is a palate clogger, not a palate cleanser, to clog the palate. I'm doing a little, I'm doing a mime with my hand of a skewer. You know the rules, if you mime it, we have to bring it. Chicken shashlik chaser. Although I'm getting a bit nervous now,

because it sounds like you're not going to order a sweet thing for dessert. So we have carflanchia, immunity, I believe. Punishment immunity. I have discovered, since the remarkable breakthrough of the low-coloury ice cream, I do treat myself to ice cream,

which reminds me, there was always down our street, Waiklifro, which ran off of Lafender Hill when I was a kid, the ice cream van. And there were two. There was Notterianis, which was the Italian old-fashioned ice cream made down the bottom of Battersea Park Road,

brought up in Tubbs and Bowel, big spoons. That was a big, and there was Tony Bell, which was the soft one that came out like a big, Mr. Whippy, the original Mr. Whippy. And at one point, there was an ice cream debate as to whether which was the best, the Mr. Whippy or the old-fashioned. And it culminated in the kids in the street

shaking poor Tony Bell's van so hard till he went away to allow Notterianis to come up, Mr. Nociani with his old-fashioned tub of ice cream. There was a turf war. There was an ice cream turf war. Yes, a little bit. We had to take sides. So, yes, well, I found myself part of a group of young, seven-year-old Ruffian,

shaking the Tony Bell van to make sure it didn't come down. Were you worried that the Tony Bell van would fall on you and then you would turn into a Mr. Whippy? Yeah. No, they do look like. You remember that, well, you're young, but those ice cream vans were slightly top-heavy, particularly if they had a big ice cream on the top

and a bell in it making a noise, which they did, you know. We're more from the era where the ice cream van would maybe have a terrible picture of the little mermaid spray painted onto it. Yeah, I mean, ice cream. I mean, I do love it when I hear an ice cream van. I mean, I don't hear them around here, but where I live in the city,

but that is something incredibly evocative about that, isn't it? Particularly when you hear it on a sunny day in December, you think that's brave. Someone's going to have had a bad summer. But the other thing was about that, was Sunday lunch. They must have timed it beautifully. We'd have our big roast as a family,

and then you'd hear the ice cream, come on, Dad, can we get it? We get a big dessert bowl and run out and queue up and get them to put the ice cream, make a huge bowl of ice cream in your dessert bowl and take it back and have a tin fruit salad or something, or tin peaches, you know? I mean, that was...

So you used to take your bowl, you used to take your bowl out? The biggest dessert bowl you could get, yeah. Going, we'd all run out and queue and get them, then they'd just put loads together. Can we fill it up, Mr Notriani? Please fill it up and then go back with this big bowl of old-fashioned Italian ice cream. Really different relationship you had

with these two ice cream men. Please, Mr Notriani, oh, this is so nice. Fuck off, Tony Bell! Get the fuck out of here! Yeah, there was a little bit. I mean, Tony Bell did give it a few weeks and came back and all was forgiven. It was justified. Notriani going, yeah, so we'll fill up your bowl

as long as you go and kick the shit out of Tony Bell. I've just got the image of you and all the little kids shaking the Tony Bell ice cream. Well, I'd like to draw a veil over that piece of seven-year-old delinquency, and I actually now, all of a sudden, feel very sorry for the person inside that being shaken. They were frightened, I should imagine,

and feared for their lives. You know, I mean, there's a lord of the flies all of a sudden down there of the lavender reel. Is your dream dessert the Notriani's ice cream? Well, I think it is. A real beautiful, I think, very sizable slab or mound of vanilla, old-fashioned ice cream, and then of equivalent mound, a barrow, you know,

like a long hill, like an earthwork of ice cream. A chocolate ice cream and a barrow of vanilla. And then, I think, to go exotic, because it reminds me of going to the seaside down to Marga as a kid, I think I'd have a banana split. You get this thing, you cut a slice of banana long way, put it in either side of the ice cream. I can't remember.

And then with some chocolate, there's kind of a zigzag pattern across that, and that would be, particularly with the taste sensation of the childhood of that ice cream, the wonder of the ice cream after a Sunday lunch, you know. That would bring that memory back. But the ice cream, I mean, what is it about ice cream? There are certain things you put in your mouth,

and as they go down your throat, you go, this is magnificent. This is almost spiritual and biblical in its sensual pleasure. Well, also, it's good for you because you've just burnt your throat on some Robinsons. It would help, yeah. It would be a good idea to have a little jar of ice cream

next to you every time you're going, or get in there quick. Trouble is, when you keep your ice cream in the freezer, there's a horrible, how long do I let it get it out for before I start eating it? You know, many a time, I've actually injured myself by trying to eat frozen ice cream in the top of the slimming ice cream

and going through the top, this, going through the punnit and into my finger, you know, I've made a hole. Oh, no, it's going to be, you can't let it melt, you've got to put it back in. I'm very, very happy that you've chosen a banana split. It has a very special place in my heart. I remember when I was a kid,

going for a big meal with my cousins and everyone, and everyone ordered banana splits, and these humungous banana splits came out, and I was the only one who finished mine, and then I even helped other people polish off theirs, and I was very proud of myself. I love banana splits. I love that you've chosen it.

I love the cream on the banana split, because you said about the chocolate sauce, but you didn't say there was going to be cream in there? Yeah, the cream, the sort of squirty cream, the aerosol cream, squirty cream, I don't know what that was. Why that accent for the squirty cream? I don't know, it's just squirty cream,

I don't know, it just seems to go well, doesn't it? I don't know, the word cream and squirty do lend themselves to the wirral. I don't know why. Can you please do the will character asking for a little jug of squirty cream? I don't know if I can do it. I don't know, can I do it?

Liverpool's difficult, I learnt it. I'll tell you what, mate, I don't want the ice cream, I just have the squirty cream. The squirty cream. You can then go up and up and up, squirty cream, up and up, and nasal. Squirty cream. I love it.

I think in the study corridor, if you go up too high, the same square. I mean, throat enough. Oh, gosh. You'll be out in front of the medical students again. They'll strain your vocal cords because you're trying to say squirty cream too high in a Liverpool accent,

they'd be absolutely pissing themselves. No, imagine going to the dot, how did you get this throat? Well, I had heart romances and then I said, squirty cream. No, I don't want squirty cream because the actual cream itself interferes with the

mutation of the cream in the ice cream because ice cream is a mutation, isn't it? It's a scientific eventuality of a form of cream and milk and so on and so forth. So in itself, I think bringing in the cream itself exposes its mutation

and its bastardised version of the cream or another form. So I think these juxtaposition and cancels that one or the other. You know, when you go to Italy and ice cream, you get something like that big. They have got the cream machine so you can, you know,

an ice cream is half a meter high, you know, which is I know there's a delight in that. To me, I think the chocolate sauce and maybe done about the red sauce well, I don't quite know. I think just chocolate, don't want the red, no, too sweet and that's that part

of the dessert. Lovely. It's another phase, which if we're all in the same community here. What's the other phase? What's the other phase? Cheese board. You've done something very clever here, Timothy, because if you just picked the cheese board, James would have gone mad.

But because you've paired it with a banana split, I think you're going to get away with it. I am delighted. This is what I've always wanted people to do. Are you not allowed cheese board normally? People are allowed it. But I personally think just having a cheese board as your entire dessert is sacrilegious.

However, I always say to them, why not just have it after your dessert? And they're like, no, no, no, it's my whole dessert and it really winds me up. And the fact that you've chosen a banana split which is very close to my heart and you followed it with a cheese board shows that you respect the rules and I'm very happy right now. And then that was something

to discover as I got older and then became more aware of other food. To discover things like breathe a bear or breathe a turd as I like to call it

because that's what it smells like. And breathe them or breathe a meurre which is also a French shit which sounds very breathe them which is that exquisite Roddy and Camembert and Eumenthal and Sage

Derby and Colston Bassett still I'm speaking my language. Gorgonzola, when I was a kid I remember the only experience I had of Gorgonzola was my nan who lived up in the top of our house when I was in

she lived with us all our lives to which we moved and then she got her own little flat. But she'd have a cheese dish like a funny and my brother and I used to run up there and lift it. Look at the little piece of Gorgonzola and scream and run downstairs again.

So I thought Gorgonzola was a hideous kind of piece of mass that was under it. So when I discovered Gorgonzola and Camberzola and then mascarpone and Gorgonzola together it's all the

aorta clogging substances one for each aorta and then cream crackers cream crackers to go with these things. And since I've got older the wonderful array of

having the privilege of traveling the world from my work and from boating all the things you discover you didn't realise that rivita was just the tip of the iceberg there are rivitas in Sweden that are the size and the thickness of duvet, stiff duvet

I mean they are like eating tile but you know I mean they are amazing. You'd like one of these big thick duvets to go with your cheese? Canaka bread, you need or you need it? Or I don't think you can beat

your simple Jacobs cream cracker but there's something so pure so simple about that it's like the king and the simple biscuit is either the digestive or the rich tea simple, unsophisticated in their simplicity but

all the more glorious because of their simplicity and I think the cream cracker has that mixture of Christmas fat clogging us to the palate which helps clog the cheese in the mouth. So, I'm going to read your menu back to you now

Go on then. See how you feel about it. Water, you would like an imperial gallon of diet cloudy lemonade. Yes. Popped onto a bread, spicy poppadon and a plain poppadon with all the relishes and Spanish bread with olive oil and balsamic plus a bread bra of your wise focaccia. Yes

breast heated bread focaccia from my own bread bra. Mese, ramekins of plain crisp with cubes of cheese, ramekin of peanuts, ramekin of olives, ramekin of marmite crisp breads, a deep fried artichoke fish, goujons and a big bowl of padron peppers. Yes.

Main course, oxtails stew with a little bit of chicken shashlik at the end. Side, fluffy boiled potatoes crispy roast potatoes, a tin of maro fat peas, nine fatty chips and some mother's pride white bread. Yes to mop up the

juice, the sauce. The grapefruit. Drink. Mark Suspenser's fizzy cranberry lemonade and a boiling hot Robinson's apple and black Coen squash with lemon juice. Yes. Dessert, Nocciani's ice cream vanilla and chocolate banana split followed by a cheese

board. Yes. Yes. Beautiful, beautiful stuff, Timothy. Feel good? I do. Yeah, I'm a bit peckish now. A little bit peckish. Thank you so much for coming to the Dream Restaurant, Timothy Spall. Well, it's been a delight to talk to you and fellow's really very nice. I hope your cold gets better. I'm getting one. I didn't want

to go on about it. Well, I'm not sure if you are getting a cold, Timothy, after everything we've heard about you. I think you've talked to someone who's got a cold over Zoom and now you think you're getting a cold. Yeah, exactly. Thank you, Timothy Spall. Well, there we are, James.

What a wonderful time we had meeting the rap dude. What a great rap dude he was. A delicious meal just like his son. Loads and loads of extra little bits and bobs going on in there. Those are little loopholes he found. Not even loopholes just saying, if I may, a lot. Yeah, turns out we fell for that. Just say

if I may, we let people have whatever they want. Yeah. But no, great, great episode. Some lovely revelations in there and some things, James, that Timothy told me he's never told anyone before. I really appreciate that. I love an off menu exclusive. Can't wait to read that. Absolutely

butchered to fuck in the tabloids without a mention of where they got it from. Yeah, completely changing the story so it sounds like he's a maniac or something was wrong with him. How do they sleep? How do they sleep at night? But Timothy can sleep soundly because he didn't say Pilchards. He didn't say Pilchards.

He's allowed to stay in the restaurant but not kicking him out. We can all breathe a sigh of relief there, actually. Yes. In which case, we can also plug his film because he didn't say Pilchards. He's in Spencer, which comes out on Friday. Go see that. It sounds absolutely fascinating. Yeah.

I'm very much looking forward to seeing that. Also, Ed, everyone's got to vote for us tomorrow in the Comedy Awards. Yes. You've got until tomorrow to vote. That's what I would say. Do it now. Don't wait until tomorrow. Otherwise, you're cutting it fine. Go to the NationalComedyAwards.com and you can vote for

off menu in Best Comedy Podcast. How you vote in the other categories, completely up to you. I'm not involved in any of the other categories. I think James is involved in all of them. But it's very much podcast, which is the important bit. I think we're involved in one other one. Hypothetical. Hypothetic, I call it.

Hypothetic. What? Hypothetic. What do you call it? Hypothetic, I call it. Highest in HI, comma, pathetic. Hypothetic, yeah. What the hell? Hypothetic Al. That's what I call it. I imagine a guy called Al. Is there anyone called Al who works on the show? I don't know anyone's

names who works on the show. I just quite like it. Done it three times, I know. Done it three times. I thought you liked it. I didn't know you thought it was pathetic. I do like it. You know why I like it? Because it gets come on there. In any situation I create, I get to make you do something horrible. Yes. Yes. Once you made me hold a tube to your anus.

Hold a tube to my anus? Did I make you suck off a mannequin in the last one? Well, probably. Yeah, yeah, you made me put... Yeah. I don't think that stuff makes the edit. It's too hardcore for Dave. Yes. Well, that's me. Too hardcore for Dave. Apart from every night when I'm on Dave.

If you shout out, James, to some people who've sent us some things. The Scotch Whiskey Society sent us all the lovely little sort of flight of mini bottles of whiskey. Really appreciated that. I mean, I'd say appreciated. I'm halfway through them. Oh, yeah. You have little spirits at home, don't you?

You like your little spirits? Yes. We've got a bottle of vodka in the fridge. I won't say what vodka it is, but it doesn't have any additives and it's very clean tasting, James. Oh, lovely. So we have our little whiskeys but clear at home. Vodka, as it's known.

So thank you to the Scotch Whiskey Society. Thank you also to Sax Pants, James. Jamie Oliver put us on to them. And when I say put us on to them, literally had some scent to us from the people at Sax. Yeah. And we were like, well, we'll see about this, Oliver. And I know we've talked about it

briefly over WhatsApp. We've all said different things at different times. Right now, I'm literally in a stage where I look forward to putting them on. Me too. And for me, I don't mind saying love the Sax Pants as well, because that technology means everything's scooped forward

and popped at the front. Yeah. And, well, it tricks the eye. Before Ed got his Sax Pants, he used to walk around the room and his crotch area was like, you'd think he had a jacuzzi going on underneath there because it was all bubbling around

and everything was just going on all over the place. It was like a fight in a cartoon, but it's a, you know, a dust, a cloud, a cloud of dust. Yeah. Occasionally, you'd see a chicken's head poking out of there to see what was going on. Yeah. I'd be like, oh, man. So it all needs to be scooped into one place.

And finally, it's collected up all my feathers and feathers and scooped it all into one place. So thank you, Sax, for controlling my cartoon fight, penis and testicles. Yes. Also, we've got... When we first started this podcast, way back in

20, I want to say 18. Correct. We are the first logo that we put out there for our podcast was the words off menu on a jar of marmite. Yes. And I believe we've stuck with that. We've kept it over the years.

I actually don't know. Yeah, you believe that, though. That's fine. And now the people at Marmite have sent us a jar of marmite that says off menu instead of marmite on it. Took a while, but we're very happy. Means a lot to us. And it sits in the office at Plosive Productions. Yeah. Where Benito runs his evil empire.

And now, again, if he has guests over, he makes them lick marmite off his finger and say, you're the boss. OK, well, we should probably wrap this up, James. Oh, well, fair enough. Party is such sweet sorrow. Lovely. Poetting. I should have said that to Timothy Spool. I bet you would have respected that.

Yeah, he would have got that. Too late. Too late. I bet you at all, mate. Thank you very much for listening. We will see you again next week. Goodbye. Bye. Hello. My name is Rob Orton, and I do the Rob Orton Daily Podcast.

The Rob Orton Daily Podcast is a daily podcast that is quite short. Some are two minutes long, some are 10 minutes long, and they are stories and poems. And basically, it's a daily podcast

that is quite short. Some are two minutes long, and basically, all the thoughts I've ever had that I like enough to want to share with people. And the Rob Orton Podcast is available on Apple, Acast,

Spotify, all the other places where you normally get your podcasts, and on social media it is at Rob Orton Podcast. Thank you. Hello. It's me, Amy Gladhill. You might remember me from the best ever episode of Off Menu

where I spoke to my mum and asked her about seaweed on mashed potato, and our relationship's never been the same since. And I am joined by... Me, Ian Smith. I would probably go bread. I'm not going to spoil in case...

Get him on, James and Ed, but we're here sneaking into your podcast experience to tell you about a new podcast that we're doing. It's called Northern News. It's about all the news stories that we've missed out from the North because, look, we're two Northerners, sure. But we've been living in London for a long time.

The news stories are funny. Quite a lot of them crimes. It's all kicking off. And that's a new podcast called Northern News we'd love you to listen to. Maybe we'll get my mum on. Get Glittle's mum on every episode. That's Northern News. When's it out, Ian? It's already

out now, Amy! Is it? Yeah, get listening. There's probably a backlog you've left it so late.