Taskmaster The Podcast - Ep 13. Alex Horne - S1 Ep.1

Episode Date: January 7, 2021

On the Taskmaster podcast this week Ed takes it back to series one, episode one! Once again he is joined by Alex Horne and the pair discuss the origins of the show and how the first line up came about.They go through each task and Alex explains what the Series 13 version of 'paint a horse while riding a horse' would potentially look like - a lot faster! If you would like to watch along as Ed and his guests revisit the early series of Taskmaster then go to https://www.channel4.com/programmes/taskmaster/episode-guide where you will find all episodes. Get in touch with Ed and future guests:[e-mail] Visit the Taskmaster Youtube channelwww.youtube.com/taskmaster For all your Taskmaster goodies visit www.taskmasterstore.com  Sales, advertising and general enquiries:[e-mail] the podcast is produced by Daisy Knight for Avalon Television Ltd   Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It's winter, and you can get anything you need delivered with Uber Eats. Well, almost almost anything. So no, you can't get snowballs on Uber Eats. But meatballs, mozzarella balls, and arancini balls? Yes, we deliver those. Moose? No. But moose head? Yes. Because that's alcohol, and we deliver that too.

Along with your favorite restaurant food, groceries, and other everyday essentials. Order Uber Eats now. For alcohol, you must be legal drinking age. Please enjoy responsibly. Product availability varies by region. See app for details. Hello and welcome to the Taskmaster podcast. We are starting from the beginning, baby. This episode is about Series 1, Episode 1 of Taskmaster, Ground Zero. We are going to proceed linearly. Is that a word? We're doing Episode 1 today and Episode 2 next week. That's how it's going to work. We're going to be chatting to a special guest about that episode we're going to go into detail

about the tasks we're going to discuss our memories from those series we're going to go through everything it's going to be very exciting indeed uh i'm ed gamble by the way should have mentioned that not richard herring there was a lot of chat about maybe the ownership of this podcast changing hands to richard herring winner of series 10 no that's not how the podcasting world works I will hold on to this podcast with an iron fist until the day I die thank you very much now obviously a lot of us are in a lockdown situation at the moment uh so why not watch along and then listen to this podcast it's really exciting what you can do you can go and watch episode one series one of Taskmaster now then listen to this podcast and get some cracking insights and then next week we're going to be talking about episode two of series one of Taskmaster so you can watch that before

you listen to that it's going to be a very exciting journey and I want you to join me on it now obviously you'll need access to those episodes where will you get that well all four where else all four go to channel4. Where will you get that? Well, all four. Where else? All four. Go to channel4.com and you can find every single episode of Taskmaster so far. Watch, enjoy, listen. We are going to have a lot of fun.

So, special guest this week. It couldn't be anyone else. Alex Horne is back on the Taskmaster podcast talking about the origins of Taskmaster and this first episode and all of that stuff. He's got so much to say about it. There's so much I didn't know. And if you have any questions for our future guests, Taskmasterpodcast at gmail.com. Email in your questions. But without further ado, let's get on with this. Here's Alex Horne. Alex Horne, welcome back to the Taskmaster podcast.

Thank you, Ed Gamble. It's lovely to be back. It's great to have you here. I'm thinking of calling this maybe Taskmaster podcast rewind because we're going all the way back to the beginning. Do you like that? That's such a cool name, actually. We're going to be discussing series one, episode one of Taskmaster, Alex. Wow. There was an episode before that, which no one has ever seen.

There was a run through, a show zero it's called in the biz. But I guess that we filmed it, so I guess it's out there somewhere. That would be good, wouldn't it? It feels like you should have sent me that, so we could have done an episode on show zero. That's for after this set of podcasts. We'll do another rewind. We're going to re-rewind all the way back to the true beginning i see i see and then we'll go back to edinburgh 2000 whatever yes because that's that's when it that's when it started you did it as a as a live show at the edinburgh festival which i i think

people sort of generally know but i'd like to hear the story in more detail please well i'd love to tell it again painful detail please yeah well i haven't told it for about a week so it'd be nice to tell that story again it's the thing when you have to do publicity for the show that you have to trot out but I like telling the story because luckily it's all true so the story is that my wife had a son in May 2009 with me so I didn't go to Edinburgh that year. That was the year that Tim Key won the Perrier Award. Congratulations, Tim Key. Yes, sort of. I found out whilst

at the Greenbelt Festival, which is a Christian festival, which was quite peculiar. But actually, I had a very nice time. There was a thing called Hymns and Beer, and it was brilliant. Everyone just sang songs and got drunk. Anyway, so I found this out and felt very unchristian. I'm not a Christian anyway, but anyway, I felt very envious of Tim. So I was at this festival and I decided that I would set up my own...

I wasn't allowed to go to Edinburgh that year because we had this newborn to look after. The following year in Edinburgh, I would do a competition and Tim would be in it, but he wouldn't win it. That was my plan, to get revenge on him. So I think two weeks later, I sent an email to 20 comedians, not including you. I don't think we knew each other at all at that point. We didn't really know each other. That's why I'm willing to let that go. Fine.

Greg has not let that go. He's reminded me this many times. Because one of the comedians was Steve Hall, who was also in We Are Clang. I think Marek was probably involved somewhere. So Greg was deliberately left out because I was scared of him and I didn't really know him either. Yeah. So he is scary still to this day yeah um 20 comedians

if they wanted to take part in this thing called the taskmaster i had a zert in those days uh i was going to set them a challenge every month and they wouldn't know who each other was till halfway through for some reason that was a surprise and they all said yes except for one person do you want to guess which comedian didn't say yes that other was till halfway through for some reason. That was a surprise. And they all said yes, except for one person. Do you want to guess which comedian didn't say yes? That's a little tidbit for you. And they didn't say... Because you did this twice, didn't you? You did it for two years in Edinburgh.

Did they say yes the year after? No, I didn't ask them the year after. But they have since been on Taskmaster, which is a bit unfair on some other people. Yeah, and they're great. They're one of my heroes. Oh, Frank? No. No? Who're one of my heroes. Oh, Frank? No.

No? Who's one of your heroes? Definitely one of my influences in terms of my live shows. Oh, interesting. We're sort of the same person. Quite rude, offensive, edgy humour. Blue. Blue humour. You're sort of edgy humour. Blue. Blue humour.

You're sort of the same person. Yeah. I can't guess now. I'm desperately trying to scan through the previous contestants and I can't. Gorman! Gorman! Gorman said no?

Gorman said no. He was very polite and said, I'm just too busy and if I did this, I would have to go all in. That was the height of Gorman's crazy shows. I don't know who came in as a substitute for Dave Gorman. The rest said yes. Then in Edinburgh, I did a summary of the 12 tasks.

And it all got very messy and drunken. It was three hours long. I think it started at midnight. And it was a really fun evening. And that was meant to be that. But we did it again. It was a really fun evening, and that was meant to be that, but we did it again.

So at what point did you think, I feel like this has TV potential, or was that someone else telling you that? It was the mighty Avalon telling me that, our management company. But they were completely right, and they weren't pushing at all. They just said, you know, that was interesting. Let's put some cameras on it.

But yeah yeah we filmed the next one deliberately to try to use it as a pitch to tv companies it was still meant to just be fun i don't think i saw it as a tv thing but uh they did and they were right to do that and it's funny edinburgh i don't know about you but i never thought of edinburgh as a tv testing ground it was always just a live thing everything Yeah, to experiment and have a laugh. And those late night gigs are the funnest thing about Edinburgh, I think. Yeah. The drunken late night experience.

Was there any reluctance on your part to sort of format the show? Because obviously it was formatted to an extent, but it sounds like a pretty loose live experience. Because obviously when you're making something for TV, you then have to go, well, we're going to do this every week. This is what's going to happen. We've got a rigid structure to it. Did that sort of feel weird doing that initially? No, I think I was so young and naive that I was just excited by the idea.

Also needed to pay for this baby. But I think by the time it went on telly, I'd had three babies. You should never buy a baby when you don't have the money already. Well, I got a loan. I got a sort of baby pension or something. The formatting of it was quite fun.

Andy Devonshire was in it from the beginning. Oh, wow. Who was the director. So he was in the pitch meetings and he was very helpful. We designed all sorts of weird things. There was going to be ten people in it at the beginning and then there were going to be a sort of hive

structure above the stage. The five contestants were going to be sort of up there and then brought down one at a time to do tasks. So it went through quite a lot of different versions of itself before becoming pretty much what The Edinburgh Show was. So how did you pick these Series 1 contestants?

What was the thinking? Because the chemistry is excellent, as it always is, but I think you sort of nailed this series in particular because it's a good set of people. I suppose it's a bit like life, Ed, in that when you look back at it, you think, well, I think, God, if something had gone wrong in the casting there, probably nothing, there may well not have been any future series.

And equally, it was a bit of a house of cards because Greg wasn't dead cert. He was only going to do it if the cast was, you know, it was all up in the air, really. So Greg was only going to do it if the cast was right. Frank was going to do it if Greg was going to do it and if the cast was right. The rest was fine. if greg was going to do it and if the cast was right the rest was fine but even tim wobbled about it because he doesn't appear on panel shows

he doesn't particularly enjoy panel shows so josh roshin and romesh were our sort of dead certs yeah but they weren't big in those days you know romesh wasn't romesh ranganathan back then he was just someone who he'd been nominated for the Perrier, I think, but no one could pronounce his name. He was that guy. And you knew he was funny, but yeah, he wasn't as huge as he was. Josh was reliable,

but he didn't have a sitcom. And yeah, I guess we were mates. The four of us knew each other a bit. Yeah. I did get nominated for the Perrier that year and didn't win, but Frank was presenting the award to John Kearns and then came over to me and said, I'll do Taskmaster.

So I felt like I'd won. So you were the real winner that day? I was the real winner. And once he said yes, Greg signed on the dotted line. Everyone else said yes, and we were off. So the casting was just get Frank. Yeah. So I think once you've got Frank.

It's a good rule for life. Just get Frank. That's comedy royalty on Dave.'ve got Frank. It's a good rule for life. Just get Frank. That's comedy royalty on Dave. You know, Dave is such a brilliant channel, but it's sort of a leap for Frank to do a new program on Dave, I suppose. Yeah, absolutely. He trusted me, which is very nice of him. I had to have lunch with him to talk about it, which is horrible.

You're nervous. I was really nervous. I was nervous about how I was eating I had to eat and talk at him and he just said just talk to me Alex oh god how did you in the early days when you were trying to convince Frank to come and do the show for example how did you sum up the vibe of Taskmaster because we all know it so well now we we love it we know we know the sort of show it is but how did you sum it up to people when you were pitching it when you were uh when you were telling people about it i think i was able to use the edinburgh shows as examples of the sort of thing but obviously it had to be

um telly friendly so it's not they wouldn't have a month to do these things they'd have 20 minutes or an hour i think and i might be wrong and this is probably a bad secret but i think i remember telling all five of them one task that was going to happen. Right. Just to give them an example. I felt like I had to give them that because they, you know,

the show didn't exist at that point. So I think I told them all about the crying task, which was, yeah, get as many tears as possible into an egg cup, but not one of them remembered or did any planning as, as was obvious on the show but um yeah i think that was a good example that i love that task and i think it's a really good example of a

good taskmaster task yeah so i told them that to persuade them and that sort of pricked their comedians antennae yeah why not So, prize task one, the most unusual thing. It is funny watching this back and seeing how far these things have come and how specific they have become. You did all the general ones, series one, most unusual thing. And now, certainly in my series series we had thing you most like to find in a field yeah

I can't tell you my favourite ever prize task was in series four which was get the best signature on the most unusual piece of fruit I think

yes and Noel Fielding got David Suchet on a on a broad bean on a broad bean I believe

but I think that lot pulled out of the bag and he actually got David Suchet on a run of bean. On a broad bean. He's on a broad bean, I believe. On a broad bean. But I think that lot pulled out of the bag and he actually got David Suchet to sign a run of bean. A broad bean, sorry. Yeah, there's no way 80% of the comedians would go to those lengths. You would, I think. You know I would. All right.

Most unusual thing. It's a very broad category. Very broad. And so slightly disappointing results i mean i'd forgotten these so frank kicks it off doesn't he frank's the first ever person to bring in a prize on taskmaster yes it's always alphabetical which people have started noticing they sit in alphabetical order and the first episode we go through them alphabetically and then it changes after that. So Frank's up first.

Grape scissors. Quite unusual. I mean, I'd never heard of grape scissors. Yeah, I think typical Skinner really. It's quite a classy item and he has got a breadth of knowledge that no one else since Skinner in all the series has had. He's got an anecdote about everything and they're all funny and he's got a lot of things. So yeah, pretty good from not a bad start, quite an odd start to a comedy series but yeah i think it does sort of mark it out as

different straight away that you've said bring the most unusual thing frank's brought grape scissors i think in any other show you'd email frank and you say what are you going to bring in he'd say grape scissors then a producer will go yeah it's a good it's a good starting point maybe maybe a dildo yeah but no in taskmaster you say what you're going to bring and yeah that's what you bring josh brought in a plymouth argyle signed football and learned very quickly that you should never mention football in Taskmaster. It's not a sporty audience. Greg's not particularly sporty. Greg just hates sport. He hates football and doesn't get it. And it does make him angry. And it's one of his go-to areas. He has, as we know, go-to areas.

He hates youth and he hates football so yeah one point for josh and i think that was an immediate one point um which is amazing because roshin's is a picture of greg on a bench yeah i mean it's nice to see i'd forgotten this that uh roshin is the originator of bringing in a picture of greg rod gilbert did it time and time again in series seven but uh bringing bringing in an offensive picture of Greg was in Episode 1. Should have been punished more heavily for that, I think. That's quite how much Greg hates football.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's not very unusual. Greg does sit on benches. Romesh has got three points for his snow globe. How did he argue that? I think there's more a case of Greg hated Josh's and Roshin greg hated josh's and roshin's rather than romesh's because it's not that unusual it's his kid it's it's a personalized

snow globe with his kids in it i mean you're right it's not a great start to the prize task is it it's not great but then tim key did bring in the reindeer skull and there were two points in this show where i remember greg going yes that this is what the show is about yeah one. One comes in the next task, which is a very obvious point. But yeah, the reindeer skull, it's an unusual item. It's from Tim's life. We always try to make things. We encourage the contestants to bring something in from their world. Yeah.

Tim had just done a short film about Santa with Tom Basden and had brought home a reindeer skull. So yeah, five points to Tim and we're off. Tim Key, what did you bring in? Reindeer skull. reindeer skull so yeah five points to tim and we're off tim key what did you bring in reindeer skull that my friends is how to play this game and now let's talk about the first task proper in the lab there is a watermelon eat as much watermelon as possible you have one minute your time starts when you open the door to the lab now quite rare to see a task that starts in

one room and then you've got to go through to the other room that's yeah i'm thinking about that we should do that again soon because it it's a good one because it means they can prep as much as they want that was the idea that they would think about it which obviously roshin didn't do um but yeah they had as much time to plan. In theory, they could come back the next day. But yeah, I like it as a task because of that. If it was just eat this watermelon and they could see it, then you don't have to build up.

I hadn't even thought they could come back the next day. That's the thing. No one in this series is really thinking outside of the task because it's a new thing, because they've not seen the show before. So it's a true control experiment in that you are seeing people's true personalities and how they would actually do things

because they're not operating in a world where Taskmaster exists. All true. Although, do you know this fact about Taskmaster that somebody did road test some of the tasks? Should we leave that as a little secret? Do you want to leave it as a secret? One of the comedians who has been in the show since

was our, he was a newer comedian, he was a newer comedian at the time. So we got him in, and it was the only time we've ever done it, to test some of the tasks. And I think we stopped it after about an hour because it was obvious it was going to be fine. Yeah.

But you're right, yeah, these guys were the control. It is, also, this is just a small point, it's mad how bare going to be fine. Yeah. But you're right. Yeah, these guys were the control. It is also, this is just a small point, it's mad how bare the sitting room looks. It's because there's nothing, there's not really anything on the walls because I guess you sort of build it up as you go through the series. There's the picture of Greg,

which has stayed consistent in that it's based, it's always based on an artist. Yeah, so we've moved on to themes rather than artists. So it was Andy Warhol, wasn't it, in in series one it was indeed um but you're right they had a chance to prepare josh really prepared uh and got quite a lot of implements uh but attacked it like an old woman like you can't i mean spoiler warning josh wins this series but you could not guess that from the first episode the way he gingerly does everything very average in all the tasks he was mid well he lost the prize task but middle of the road for all the rest of them yeah really was in in episode one for sure um and the

other thing we noticed is that your measuring metrics uh are in place from episode one as well that's good to hear yeah you use mice as the metric. So you do however many mice there, watermelon weighed, apart from Roisin, who gets so little that you have to transfer it to Rolos. It's one Rolo she gets. Rolo's a good choice by me, I think. That's a funny thing. Mice, I'm slightly disappointed by, because as you will have seen in the New Year special, I've gone back to rodents to measure a very similar amount of grams in that

episode but it's hamsters hamsters i've gone on to after 10 series that's okay that's okay you move on to hamsters that's fine uh you've still you've still got plenty of choices um roshi thought there would be a melon buffet and that gives us the first the first title uh of the first episode um when did you make that decision that it would be quotes from the show that would be titling the episodes? That's a good question. I don't know the answer.

I imagine it was the Andes who came up with that idea, not me. As usual, I get all the credit, but don't deserve it. I think it was in the edit. I think it was definitely, you know, not a decision at any point before we filmed it. Yeah.

I think it was going to be called episode one or not have a name at all. But I it. Yeah. I think it was going to be called Episode 1 or not have a name at all. But I think we thought, I think it was Andy Debrichier who thought it would just make the show stand out and look a bit more interesting to give it a name. And so it has consistently been a quote from the show and ideally not like a big moment, something you have to search out for.

The New Year special, actually, you barely hear, I think I say the title and you barely notice notice it i quite like that when it's hidden um so yeah let's give andy the credit for that it also adds um an extra layer of uh competition to the show i think um certainly in my head where when i went into the show um i was very happy to have won already knew i won knew how i'd done in the tasks. But when it was broadcast, I set myself a new thing in my head of going, please, can I get at least one episode named after something I said? That's interesting.

I think we do try to spread it out. We don't want people, you know, we don't want it all to be Bob Mortimer quotes, which would have been very easy. Yes. So how many did you have? Did you have a couple? I think it was only one, you know. That's a shame, because normally people have two. Yeah, i think it might have been only one no one's about right

because greg it's a good one greg and i would normally have a couple or one so yeah one's fine ed i think a cast i got like five that's why i was angry really angry about that um romesh romesh's attempt let's let's talk about it, because it's often the thing that is used as a byword for Taskmaster, and the moment that watermelon hit the floor is often talked about by people as the moment the show really kicks off and establishes itself. I think talked about by Greg in the episode as well, really.

Yes, that's what this show is about. So it was our very first filming day, and it was the last task of the day with romesh i think in those days we only filmed about three tasks maybe four or five tasks a day not not you know nowadays we do maybe eight yeah um because we didn't know what we're doing and there's only six episodes so um it was the last task of the day and he inhaled the watermelon and then went to the toilet for 20 minutes but leaning over it being sick. And he'd got this massive bit lodged in his throat. And I think we filmed it all,

so there's footage of that somewhere. But we thought he was going to die. He thought he was going to die. And it was so horrible. And we thought that was going to be it. We're going to be pulled off air. Well, we weren't even on air. It was awful.

Can you believe that a universe exists where Taskmaster was cancelled before it got to the air because Romesh died choking on water? Yeah, well, a lot of shows cancelled, I suppose. Almost every comedy show cancelled. Yeah, it was awful. I mean, we definitely knew it was funny when he was doing it, when he was doing the eating,

because he was sort of a bit sick in the room. Not really sick, but what do you call that? Regurgitating? Bile, sort of some pink bile it was horrible and i loved him on the back and yeah i wasn't very sympathetic i didn't know what to do to be honest um so rubbish often gets credited with that but i think we need to talk about how good it is for taskmaster that roshin did nothing because it's the comparison with roshin that i think sums up task master the most the fact that everyone does it differently and roshin dithers for the for 56 seconds i think it is and gives her four seconds to eat it couldn't have been better and then she

puts her face into the watermelon and just i believe she says i've just scraped it grazes it she said i've just grazed it. Yeah. Yeah, no, I mean, this is definitely classic Tossmaster stuff in that she does that one extreme. Romesh does the other. Josh and Frank sort of in the middle, pretty ordinary stuff, which is great. And then Tim cheated. So that's perfect.

That's what you want. That is a full spread. Yeah. Did you know as you were filming the task that it was going to be the opening task, or did you look at all of them in front of you and decide that was the one that sums it up? People do often ask me that, how we pick the tasks,

and it's never to do with points. It's always to do with balance and what will work in the show. But I guess we probably decided fairly quickly that's a good opener. Yeah. Because there's some cleverness to it in that they can plan their assault on the watermelon. But also it's just visually.

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You know, it hopefully grabs you. If you don't like it, then that's fine. You know, the show's not for you. If you're in any doubt about the tone of this show, now you know. There's five comedians being forced to eat as much watermelon as they can whilst wearing a white boiler suit.

Task two, another absolute classic. We've had Richard Osman on this very podcast say that this is the definitive Taskmaster task for him. Paint the best picture of a horse whilst riding a horse. Yeah, I often say that it's my least favourite because... Really? Well, I think it was, thank God, that Roisin refused to get on a horse

because without that, you've just got five people on the same horse, painting the same horse. For me, there's no real variety to it and there wasn't any room for the comedians to do anything inventive. They could be funny because it's funny to see them on a horse

trying to paint a horse. But I think we were doing all the funny and they just had to go along with our joke, really. I guess the variety comes from the results and their paintings I much prefer a task where we're doing half the work coming up with a scenario and they have to complete the scenario yeah they're filling in the gaps yeah yeah and we literally had to they have to be trained how to ride a horse before doing the task just for 20 minutes they had no choice about anything to do with it, really, except for Roshini refused. And that was brilliant that she did

because it lent it much more variety. So why did Roshini refuse? Let's get some behind-the-scenes gossip here. Why wouldn't Roshini get on that horse? I think she was well within her rights to say, I'm scared of horses. I've never ridden a horse i don't want the first time i ride a horse to be whilst also painting a horse on telly

horses are terrifying and we have to invent this weird gauntlet system and it was quite heavy this canvas on your arm so um yeah no she just said i don't want to do it and but she never said i don't want to do the task she said i don't want to do it that way she never said, I don't want to do the task. She said, I don't want to do it that way. And so they did have to learn on that horse that she rode. They all rode that little horse, first of all. Okay, so you didn't have to bring in a horse simulator. That was something that was on site anyway. No, it was such a lengthy task. I think that's why I don't like the task either.

There was not much spontaneity to it. Well, they didn't know the task before they had to learn how to ride a horse. Right. But it was a lengthy sort of process of ride a horse then ride a real horse then get off then open the task and then do it again so the whole thing was four hours i think see that's that's mad because that you gave that gave them that much training to ride a horse i did a task on a steamroller and you pretty much went that that's go press this button yeah press this button to go. Oh yeah. Yeah. Good point. No,

I think, I guess horses are slightly more dangerous, but, um, yeah. And it was also, it was snowy on Romesh's day. It was,

yeah. Fiddly task, but I mean, definitely it's, it's the task that we use to describe the show and to, it was on all the posts. It was a poster campaign that year. I think the picture of all the contestants and me and Greg and a big horse in the background,

and then just the line. So it, you know, it does sum up the show, but for me as a purist, it's not my favourite. I 100% cannot paint a horse whilst on a horse. I don't know if I'm going to get on it. I'll meet him,

but I've met loads of horses. That's what I do. I meet the horse and decide not to get on them. It's my history with horses. Is this the only task ever to use a live animal? No.

There have been chickens and dogs. There was a task in series four where we did chickens with Lolly and then bird flu came so we had to move to dogs. Yeah. There may be a live animal in a future series. That's exciting to know. And there was a child called Nell in one of the series. I don't know if you'd call her a live animal in a future series. That's exciting to know.

And there was a child called Nell in one of the series. I don't know if you'd call her a live animal, but she was a toddler. Yes, live animal. Yeah. Also, this is really geeky now, but interesting way of presenting the paintings, which I don't think you do now. You present the paintings and don't tell Greg who did them until he's scored them.

And then you show them doing them on the horse. So you don't show the actual task happening until we've seen the results of the task and you don't tell Greg who did them until he's scored them. Really? That's really interesting. I've completely forgotten that.

So we should do that again. Do you lose the moment of funniness when you've seen how bad they are doing the task and then the flashing up of the picture you definitely do but also it's still funny when you show all the paintings because just the variety of them and how bad like tim's is for example that never stops being funny weirdly i always find that weird when you when we say let's see them all at once yeah it's always funny. To me, I'm not saying to the audience. To me, I just...

Yeah, the art tasks, we always do them and think, is that fine? And they're always good. There's a really good one in the future series coming up. Also, before we get into the scoring, Greg, in this task, says he's seen The Matrix. He makes a comment that he's seen the matrix and in series seven he claims that he hasn't seen the matrix i love it just a quick shout i mean that could

just be his brain yeah forgetting that he's seen the matrix just forgotten the matrix i've got a little bonus fact if you want a bonus fact for this episode yes please tim's tim's portrait of the horse which looks more like, is it a rat? I think Greg says a rat or a mantita, he mentions. Well, that made it into the trailer for Series 10 on Channel 4. Really? We had to dig up the original picture. We've kept all the artwork, and, yeah, that is in the trailer.

So if you look that up on YouTube, you'll find his picture there. So do you keep all the artwork in like a a special storage place have you got like uh is it like the the arc at the end of uh indiana jones sort of i think it's big yellow storage company it's one of them anyway and it's all just piled up in a heap but yeah we never throw stuff away and i don't really know why i do find them fascinating to look at, and they do bring back nice memories. Obviously, this is very culty sort of stuff. Most people wouldn't care at all. So Frank Skinner wins that task with a quite beautiful picture of a horse.

And what's lovely about that is it marks a real moment in his life, because he says after he did that task, he then took up painting again. Yeah, and then presented the portrait program he is a real artist connoisseur um and yeah it did light a fire in him that he didn't know was kindling yeah no that's lovely and the picture was really good considering he was riding a horse not at great pace but there was no rules about that so i think that's what i would do differently now i think i'd probably say you have to be painting at a certain speed.

Did we say the horse has to be galloping while you're painting? No. No, because the horse is not galloping in any way. The horse is just going around and trotting in a circle. Yeah, see, for me, if that's Series 13, I've got a speedometer and when it hits 15 miles an hour, I'm shouting paint.

Romesh gets four points. Josh gets three points which i was surprised by i thought he'd be more scared of the horse than roshin um and i only know this because uh once i had to get a uh get on the back of a motorbike taxi uh to get me between places it's the coolest thing in the world it's the coolest thing in the world i had to get from a a television show to a corporate gig and then and you felt like you were the guy of course i did yeah and the guy the guy riding it was so cool and he can chat to you through a little microphone in your helmet yeah and he was telling me about all the comedians that he's had on the back of the motorbike before and he said he had josh widdicombe on the back of the motorbike and josh demanded he go about three miles an hour because he was so scared well that thing you're not actually that cool you're just clinging to the back of a cooler man just holding on to a

nice dad yeah uh so three three points for Josh uh two points for Tim Key for the anteater and I think quite harshly given that it was because of a fear uh Roisin gets one point for not completing the task properly yes and that probably set her tone for the series as well she was last in this episode and last throughout task three empty the bathtub uh which another simple top line task yes it's an interesting task this uh yeah i would happily have this again if we ever repeat a task, just because I think there are definitely

clever ways of doing it. I think now you'd be smashing the bath. Someone's going to be taking a sledgehammer to that bath, aren't they? Now, that's what I thought, but included in the task is you must not remove the plug tip or damage the bath.

Oh, God. Maybe we put too many caveats in that task. Because you're not... Yeah, it's fastest wins. You must not remove the plug tip or damage the bath time starts now oh maybe it's fair enough what so what would you have done you i think you've just got to go for it i think in that scenario you've basically got to do what tim or romesh did again they sort of took their their melon technique to it um tim obviously tim's first thought was getting the bath i mean he shows where he gets in a bath right yeah i really remember saying to the crew tim's getting that bath there's no doubt about it and i was so pleased when he did um and yeah another another

cheating uh moment for tim he got reduced to one point did he yeah he got one point because he uh i think he accidentally took the plug out uh and then saw the plug after he'd finished the task realized that that would be an issue uh and then and then surreptitiously popped it back in yeah and i think won a lot of fans for that people like a cheat in this show people do like a cheat but we'll come to dave gorman in series three i'm surprised jim got any points for that. Nowadays, you wouldn't get anything, I think, for that, for cheating. Yeah, I think Greg was still finding his feet with how harsh he could be. Yeah, yeah.

And obviously, Tim cheated twice in this episode. But Romesh gets the full five points. Now, at this moment, you'd say that Romesh is sort of streaking ahead in terms of the series. Yeah yeah yeah strong you won two of the tasks came second in one of them yeah yeah interesting i think actually sorry in retrospect i don't think that's a very good task empty the bathtub it's pretty basic stuff maybe it's a good task for series one but uh i see what i see i see why you put it in series one though because it's it's a simple uh idea and it's a simple task that seemingly open-ended and it shows you what sort of people they are because that's true roshin sort of very uh gingerly approaches it and is sort of a

bit a bit bewildered by the whole thing which is very funny and tim dives in and starts thrashing around so it does yeah it does provide variety. Yeah you're right. But I think now we would put in more layers again. That's partly because we have to now. We've run out of the broader ones. Do you ever look at things like this like empty the bathtub and wonder how you got from

there to put the wellies on the giant spider? When I think of a really good simple one now i'm so pleased with myself it's like a joke isn't it if if a joke you can tell in 20 words then it's a great joke so yeah same with tasks i think i i don't really like it when the audience has to struggle to remember what all the rules are although sometimes that can be funny if it's overly complicated. But if it's one line, it's a winner. What had you picked up there, Tim? Picked up...

Sorry? I was just wondering what you... Sorry, you picked something up there. Pick the plug up, mate. And then put it back in the bath. You did do that. You picked up the plug and put it back in the bath, but you disguised your action.

What? Of course, because it's cheating. Now, the studio task is pop up the tent, get in the tent, zip up the tent, pop on the onesie in the tent and emerge from the tent wearing the onesie fastest wins. It's one of my favourite tasks, I think, still. One of my favourite live tasks because it's so stupid. I remember the reading out being really funny. Yeah.

And there's such a sense of waiting for it to happen when they're all in the tent and you can't see anything. So I talk about Big Brother quite a bit because i used to be a runner on big brother yeah and uh or a logger even so i used to sit in the gallery and type up what happens and some of their games were brilliant and there was one game of big brother where they had to sit in a sack for as long as possible i think or not in a box in a cardboard box and it was the person who stayed in the box longest won the food or something yeah because it's big brother they could be in there for hours and hours so you just saw boxes and then they and heard the voices and it was so funny so i think that was probably an influence on this just uh it is very funny

that moment where they're well they're not all in the tents this is why it made me laugh as well is because there's three of them who get in the tents to put the onesie on you're just waiting for them to emerge and whatever they come out in is funny so i think josh coming out third in the in the pink unicorn uh onesies is very very funny but rosh roshin and romesh never get in the tent so they the other three realize you can erect the tent and then pull it over yourself and it's still zipped up but for some reason you pan along and roshan and Romesh are just behind their tents I do remember screaming you're not in the tent you're not in the tent and it's a very rare angry and flustered Alex yeah they weren't in the tent but normally I think normally now you would just let that unfold yeah and then at the end you go well

you weren't in the tent you don't get any points but during it you're very you're gonna get in the tent why aren't you in the tent they're not in the tent. You don't get any points. But during it, you're very, you're like, get in the tent. Why aren't you in the tent? They're not in the tent. That definitely panicked, thinking, well, the task won't work if you're not in the tent. What do we do? We can't redo it. Because the studio tasks are really,

they are nerve-wracking because you only have one shot at it. And it's the climax of the show. And sometimes they don't work very well. And you can rescue it a bit in the edit. But if they don't work, they don't work, really. So they're an odd moment in the show. They're the bits we do road test.

The team road test them heavily. It's very intense doing the studio tasks sometimes. And obviously, I've done it with a studio audience there. I can't imagine what Series 10 was like doing it. No different. Crisp silence. Really? So weird.

No difference, because it's all about the competition. You know, you're up against the four other people. So, yeah, they honestly didn't miss the audience at all. Yeah. I mean, I missed them in general. But in that task, I didn't miss them at all. Really weird. So who won?

Oh, Tim was out first. He was very pleased with himself with the tent. Yes. Another little fact on that was that the choice of onesies all comes down to what we could clear. So there's plenty of things we wanted them to come out dressed as, but we weren't allowed to. Frank is in the Union Jack onesie, of course. Yeah, I guess we thought that fitted his persona somehow.

He's British. He's old-fashioned. I mean, in the show, we paint him as a sort of pensioner. Yeah. Well, he doesn't help with the grape scissors. Can I say I'm 58? I might never come out of pensioner. Yeah. Well, he doesn't help with the grape scissors. Can I say I'm 58? I might never come out of the tent.

Let's chat about the tie-break. So it's a tie-break between... Between Frank and Romesh. Yes, that's correct. And it's a good bit of folklore that Romesh comes second overall in the series. I hope that's not a spoiler,

but never wins an episode. Wow. One of the few, but never wins an episode. Wow. One of the few people who never wins an episode. And yeah, even though he did tie first place in the very first one. So he must have lost the tiebreak. What was the tiebreak? I can't remember. Find Alex, fastest wins. That's funny because that's one of the few tasks we have done again.

Oh no, we didn't do that again. We did hide from Alex later on. Yeah, you did hide and seek in series four. Yeah, which is a legendary lolliotophobia task, which we will come to discuss in a future episode. again we did hide from alex later on yeah you did hide and seek in series four yeah the yeah which is a legendary lolly adephope task which we will come to discuss in a future episode yeah oh that's that's funny that was a tiebreaker i really enjoyed that one i remember sitting by the tree waiting for them to discover me i'm surprised that didn't make it as a real task it's nice to have a little break isn't it now and again yeah so skinner found me quickest interesting skinner found you in one

minute 50 uh and romesh found you in 2 minutes 27. What a close race. Very close race. Did you know after you'd finished filming that episode that it was going to take off in the way that it did? No, not at all.

No, I think we didn't know until after series 4 probably because I think they commissioned two series after the first one, but they were both five episodes each. So they were really short, and it's a real shame looking back, I think, because we have such good contestants, but they only got to do half

a series in my head. But I think once we did series four with eight episodes and that worked, I think we thought that we were on to something. And also that series we had Noel Fielding and Mel, as well as the other three, Lolly and Hugh and Joe Lysett. So, you know, really good names.

So at that point, I finally thought this could keep going for a bit. But no, after episode one, you're just wondering if it's any good. I remember my brother afterwards, I was up in the bar in the Grand, and he was very surprised and said, I think it's any good. I remember my brother afterwards, I was up in the bar in the Grand, and he was very surprised and said, I think it's quite good.

And I was pleased he said that because I really didn't have a clue. But it is remarkable how much work and how rare it is to do something that's quite good. Do you know what I mean? It's rare that you come out of something and go, actually, that format works. Yeah, I mean, you've done lots of stuff as well,

and you're just so grateful, if anything, for anything in life. But yeah, we do put a lot of effort into it. It takes six months to make a series. So I think that's probably one of the keys to it working, is that we put loads of effort in. We try really hard. It takes six months to make a series. So you want it to... I think that's probably one of the keys to it working is that we put loads of effort in. We try really hard.

And just think there's universes that exist where Taskmaster is 10 contestants or a hive of contestants hovering above the studio, come down one by one. But yeah, it could have been very, very different. down one by one. But yeah, it could have been very, very different. So these emails don't necessarily relate to this first episode. This is from Liam. Does the iPad that you use during the show actually do anything, or are you just tapping away at a blank screen? Liam. Maybe this is not such an interesting or creative question, but I've always wondered.

Liam, it does everything. It controls the VTs it controls the cameras it I'm calling up camera to zoom in on Greg's face it controls everything Liam thank you and I never ever check the football scores during a record I quite often like it if there's a big match on during a record. And it keeps me on my toes, but I do wonder sometimes if people in the gallery can see that I'm checking the scores on the camera. Well, there's the gallery, but then also there's a balcony behind you as well.

So there's definitely people who can see what you're looking at. Yeah, I mean, I only do it once or twice. I've never told anyone that I check the scores, but I do. Was it in our series or a previous? I think it was in our series where there was a running joke that I'm not sure made it that you use it to look at pictures of muscly women I'm amazed I didn't make it if it didn't um here's a slight difference in series one you've got the iPad on a little um branch robot arm yeah that was definitely a difference and I really felt freed up by holding the iPad in future series.

So that was, yeah, that's a subtle difference. I don't know why we said, it looks so weird, doesn't it, on that stick on a throne? Doesn't make any sense. It does look weird because it looks like the sort of thing you've just panic-sordered off Amazon. Well, we did. Yeah, that's exactly what happened.

I guess we thought, I don't know what the logic was. We thought, I can't be holding something throughout. Pretty weird. Weird logic there. Yeah. This I can't be holding something throughout. Pretty weird. Weird logic there. Yeah. This is from Tess in the US. Aside from Richard Herring, what contestant has been the most excited to be on the show

and what task went the most awry from what you expected? So that's two questions. That's a double question from Tess there. From US Tess. I think James Acaster was probably the most excited other than Richard and maybe yourself, Ed. But James knew it inside out and was a little puppy dog,

you know, walking into a room full of toys. He was desperate. And also, I was desperate to have him on it. So it was a symbiotic relationship. And yeah, he lived up to it. Although I reckon, sneakily, he would quite like to have another shot at it. I don't think it's that sneaky.

But I think everyone, the majority of people who've done it would like to have another shot at it. Sure. Yeah, well, that's good. I don't think it would help. I don't think him doing it again, he'd be better at it this time in terms of getting

points because you're only as good as your last task, right? It's task to task. Are you saying that you're better than him? Well, I mean, history has shown I'm better than him. I think, yeah, I mean, I like all contestants, but I would love to see him in a

champion of champions. Well, you can't because he's not a champion. He came second bottom. You can't even do loser of losers and include James. You'd have to do second bottoms and second bottoms. Kerry was the winner. Kerry was the rightful winner. And actually, no one begrudged her of it. She was great. So, the other question was

which task went the most awry? Great word, awry. I haven't got a great answer, Tess, in the US. I really enjoyed the team tasks with rod gilbert when he sort of managed to sabotage his own efforts so the one where they had to build a shelter or an extension to the house yes that's been he split off from the group and made his own one uh or maybe james split. Anyway, I've got one. No, Rod split off to try and make his own one using the garage,

and that's when he shut the garage of all the stuff you needed to build an extension. That's right. Yeah, that's a good example. There's a moment in that where Phil and James are getting on with theirs, and then Phil wanders over to see what Rod's doing, and then it goes missing,

and James has to come and find him, and he started helping Rod. Yeah, that was really funny because we couldn't control those three. So I think in that situation, the director is probably thinking, we can't film two things at once. It's a small crew.

Yeah. And they're either ends of the house building big things. So it's difficult to film. Plus they're arguing. So it's very difficult to capture all that. And we did, yeah, that's a good example of something we really didn't expect to happen, but we couldn't do anything about.

But it's all the better for it, I suppose. This is a question from Ivy. This will be our final question of the episode, Alex. Why did you only wear a tie for Mel Gedroich's tasks? It's been bugging me for years. I'm asked that reasonably often, and my answer is very simple. It's because she is Mel Gedroich.

Yes. She deserves respect. Correct. No one else has done yet. Alex Horne, thank you very much for coming back on the Taskmaster podcast. Could you please rate your experience on the Taskmaster podcast again between one and five points? This time, it's a 5

I think it was a 5 last time wasn't it? doesn't mean it's not 1 this time that's true thank you very much Alex it's a pleasure well there we are then we'll be back next week with another

brilliant special guest chatting about episode two of Taskmaster Series 1 and we'll be proceeding as such from there. Don't forget to watch along. Email in your questions, taskmasterpodcast.gmail.com. Don't forget the Taskmaster Shop is also a thing. Go and have a look at that, taskmasterstore.com and also the YouTube channel, youtube.com forward slash taskmasterstore.com and also the youtube channel

youtube.com forward slash taskmaster go and check out all that content uh i've been ed gamble i'll see you next time. Yes, we deliver those. Goaltenders, no. But chicken tenders, yes. Because those are groceries, and we deliver those too. Along with your favorite restaurant food, alcohol, and other everyday essentials. Order Uber Eats now. For alcohol, you must be legal drinking age. Please enjoy responsibly. Product availability varies by region. See app for details.