Taskmaster The Podcast - Ep 134. Greg Davies - S9 Ep.5

Episode Date: June 15, 2023

The Taskmaster himself returns to the podcast to chat about Series 9! Greg and Ed chat best defunct things and team task dynamics. All of this plus some Series 15 reflection. Watch all of Taskmaster on All 4www.channel4.com/programmes/taskmasterVisit the Taskmaster Store for all your TM goodies!taskmasterstore.com Visit the Taskmaster YouTube Channelyoutube.com/taskmaster Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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It's Ed Gamble here and we are very excited to be talking again about Series 9. It's back to the history books. We are continuing to talk about Series 9, the series of course that i took part in and won uh fact fans uh but a great lineup great fun time and we are very excited to be talking about episode five of series nine today with the taskmaster himself greg davis always knew that i wanted greg on this particular series because i wanted to talk to greg my performance. Of course, because I'm a desperate teacher's pet. Very excited to have Greg on. Look, we'll pretty much just get straight to it because, you know, why not?

We don't have to tell you when to watch it or anything. It's all out there and available. Go on all four, give it a little watch. Thank you very much for yet again tuning in. This is Taskmaster Series 9, Episode 5, as discussed by the Taskmaster Greg Davis. Welcome back, Greg, to the Taskmaster

podcast. Thanks. It's lovely to have you back. Is it? Yes, it is so nice to have you back. It's not just rhetoric, is it, Ed? No, it's not just rhetoric. It's a genuine treat to have you back. You've not been on since December 2020 can you believe that? Yes I can

yeah but we thought we had to get you back on to talk about series 9 of course because as we all know it's the greatest series of Taskmaster of all time well you know I re-watched some of it in preparation

for our chat today because as you you well know, I have the memory of... I mean, I was going to say goldfish, but I think that's an insult to the fish community. So I re-watched it, and I did think you were a good bunch, actually. We were nice. We were, yeah. In context of the gangs, I thought, yeah, you're a pretty good gang. We got on pretty well immediately, I think. I think we all had our roles were very clear within one episode.

They were. What do you think your role was? Sort of a furious child. Competitive, whiny, just arguing every single point possible what i found fascinating is competitive whiny certainly yes occasionally genuinely angry oh yeah yeah definitely definitely genuine anger there's a couple of moments in this episode we're going to talk about where there was some genuine anger that i then realize how bad it looks and um like smile afterwards oh my god you're an open book

the emotions you go through are so large on your little face i love it would you say that's because you know me quite well or do you think it was obvious to everyone oh i think most people would have picked up on it for sure but i'm attuned to it because we've spent so much time together yes absolutely um and and i and my reaction to it interestingly is a mixture of things i wouldn't be able to say there was one emotion i feel yeah could you take us through the top three emotions that you feel unnerved right and giddy with excitement yes and paternal

yeah and paternal yeah so if we combine those yeah un uniddy uniddy-ternal uniddy-ternal

that's how I feel towards you and I could you know that's writ large on your face uniddy-ternal Iiditurnal that's how I feel towards you and I could you know that's writ large on your face uniditurnal I think everyone could probably see that it is it's my

it's my rat name the giddy the giddy with excitement bit definitely comes across I think you do that when a lot of people get angry if people get really

like flustered and angry yeah you hold your tummy and kick your legs around I do I do.

It's not necessarily a pleasant feeling. No. I've never been... Ironically, given my role on this particular programme, I've never been very good with confrontation. Yeah, genuine anger. You don't enjoy that.

It does not sit well with me at all makes you squirm yeah especially when it's you who's caused it as you quite often do yeah yes as a as sometimes arguably i willfully do yeah but i think it's that's why your role is quite interesting on the on this show greg because obviously you're coming in um to score it and you're gonna have fun and you know you're scoring very silly tasks and you're just giving your genuine opinion yes but then the people who've done the tasks it means everything to them sometimes is this this is you isn't it this is you saying this yes sometimes some people on the task have given their everything yeah they've given everything

and it's, you know, it's the thing they've wanted to do for the majority of their careers. Those people. All those people. They've put so much effort into it. But Ed, it's something I've said to you before and I think it's something that people, something that's levelled at me as the taskmaster quite a lot.

It's that I'm careless with my point system and sometimes there's this in my opinion myth that some of the points uh given out by me are are the sort of ill thought through whims of a of a grumpy old man. And they're not. I refute it. I try and score it correctly. Yeah. And I really do give it time. And you wouldn't believe the debates Alex and I have in between shooting breaks where we're going,

yes, yes, but he did touch the egg with his fingertip. We have such intense debates about fairness. But the truth is, I just get it wrong sometimes. Sure, you're fallible. I'm a fallible human being. I am. But I really do try, mate, to get it right. Oh, look, I think that comes across.

You know what? I think of all, you know, you have to score a lot of tasks. I'd say the majority of the time, I think you get it right. Do you? Yeah. What percentage? I think so. I mean, it's 77%.

Right. And whenever someone gives seven out of 10, they've always added one out of politeness. So you actually think six. I said, no, because I mean, all of the, on every episode of this podcast I will occasionally go oh I don't maybe that should have been but it's never like it's never someone getting one point who I think should have got five or vice versa it's always very pernickety like four points

I welcome the debate and when I've listened to the podcast I welcome the debate. Yeah. And when I've listened to the podcast, I enjoy the digging down into the minutia of it. I just would like to put it on record that I make, this is what I would say, I make absolutely catastrophic errors sometimes. Yeah, sure. But they're not done lazily or without due thought and process. They're just massively wrong. And you do always explain why you're giving the points as well.

You're not just handing out points and then not letting people chat about them or you're always saying, I thought this or this made me feel a certain way. Yes. Even how it's made you feel and influence your point scoring has absolutely nothing to do with the uh the task itself yeah but the thing about taskmaster is you know it's not an a it's not an olympic event it is it is to some degree the the sometimes the responses have to be emotional yes absolutely, absolutely. I'm making value judgments when someone brings a thing in.

What appeals to me? Just before we came on air, you've ridiculed me for the fact that I've hung all my hats up on a door. You've got a little pegboard with all your baseball caps on. I've got a little pegboard with my hats on it. I like it. And to some people, that's a good system.

And to others, it's... I think I've made my point. Yeah. You know, after Christmas, for Christmas, my nieces bought me an earring, Ed. I beg your pardon? They bought me an earring. Yeah, a proper one, a real one.

Yeah, a hoop. Yeah. Because they'd seen me wearing a hoop earring on my BBC show, The Cleaner. Yes. And they liked it, so they bought me one. And I thought, well, why shouldn't I wear a hoop earring from now on? Yeah. How big a hoop are we talking, by the way?

So like a normal size, not like a big pirate hoop or anything? No, not some ludicrous pirates of the caribbean thing just a little one yeah i used to wear one when i was a teenager and i thought well why should i wear one and i wore it and my family all agreed why not wear it and then i met my friends and they all said stop wearing that and i think that's what taskmasters like sometimes yeah i mean if we could just go back to the hoop hearing briefly yeah um i'd say it was pretty much the absolute nailed on straight down the line sign of a midlife crisis there isn't and and you know what's really tragic

is if it was a midlife crisis, that would suggest I'm going to live to be 108. And let's get it on record now. That's not going to happen. That's not going to happen unless science really fucking ups its game. well let's look we established my role whiny child um obviously david i don't know i think you're being a bit harsh on yourself what whiny child but i think you you know in friend speak i'd say you were the competitive one from yes yeah i think so yeah um rose very competitive as well but managed to do it in a more dignified way i think i think slightly competitive yes in many ways is worse. You know,

pin your colours to the mast. Badil, obviously his role was clear from the beginning. Absolutely fascinating. You know, and in the Petri dish of this series, you know,

it wasn't very long before all eyes were pulled towards david every time was it yeah i mean outstanding just i just can't i can't wrap my head around some of the things he does i mean we'll talk about uh one of them later just some of the decisions he makes i bet it's i bet it's to do with cutlery yes it is to do with cutlery. Absolutely. We'll talk about that shortly. And Katie is so... Katie wasn't here for this episode. This is one of Katie's illness episodes.

She was poorly, yeah. She was poorly, which was a real shame. But we had Kerry standing in, who's not a... She's not a wallflower. What an intriguing stand-in she is. You could meet two more different people, could you?

No, absolutely not. But also within, you know, within two tasks, Kerry has completely abandoned her job and is just insulting what Katie's done. Nice. Yeah, she can't keep it in. Let's crack on. Let's crack on with the episode itself, Greg.

The prize task is best defunct thing. Now, a good category, I think. Constantly pulling out good new categories on the show. I like defunct thing. Because it's debatable, isn't it? Well, there was a huge debate in the studio as Rose had taken it to mean most defunct thing. Yes, incorrectly.

Incorrectly, and everyone else had tried to do best defunct thing. And as is typical of Rose, once she is in an argument and she knows she's lost it, she'll just put her head in her hands and go, Oh, is that her modus operandi, is it? She just sort of collapses wilts in on herself because she brought in a sharp spin full of disused syringes

belonging to her flatmate who has arthritis I know I'm so grim I think it's the only show on television that that would be the opening thing that happens the first thing that you see is a sharp spin full of disused syringesringes disused syringes in an entertainment format yes yeah all of life all of life is there yeah i mean clearly not the best defunct thing is it defunct yes you know and it's just she made a

knee-jerk reaction and went for something sensational yeah just got the word best yeah you see in that situation my job's really easy i breathe a sigh of release of relief because uh if you've if you've misheard and not brought best in then you're gonna get no points or yeah you'll be at the bottom of the ladder yeah just just the one point for us i mean i also breathe the sigh of relief at this point, Greg, because on a couple of occasions, my prize tasks were very bad. And you can tell mine's very bad because Rose does hers and it cuts to me and I'm all nervous about having to present mine. It's all there on your face, all right.

Yeah, yeah, there it is, open book. Because this, I mean the i brought a guide to the millennium dome which is yes a defunct thing yeah it's just it was never gonna it was never gonna make our our imaginations and hearts sore no and i tried that you knew that i tried i had a little joke about it and using it to get around the O2, which is all fine. I'll tell you when I thought you might have been back in the game in terms of me jiggling the points around in my head was when you revealed how much it was.

Yeah. 18 quid. I thought there was a degree of finesse about spending 18 pounds on that. Yes. I mean, so the thing about this one and i i have said this on the podcast before but i don't know if it if it's ever made the edit i can't remember that was very much a scrabble together second option um because my original option and it was the first price task that i uh had decided on what i was going to bring in and I'd already bought the things for best defunct thing

was a collection of Kevin Spacey films on Laserdisc wow which would have got five points yeah yeah we were you told you weren't allowed to do that yes I I believe correctly I think that it's not really the vibe of the show too. It probably isn't, but my God, it's a lovely offering. In Taskmaster, too hot for telly, that would be good. I should probably reframe it, not too

hot for telly. Too controversial. Too controversial for telly telling i bet if frankie boyle had suggested bringing that in for his series he would have been allowed i don't know also i should have just gone with another sort of laser disc i'm sure i could have thought my way around it and used so use someone else who was defunct and their work on LaserDisc. I'm sure I could have done that. Yeah. Like, who's the karate guy who lives in Russia and looks like a big swollen fruit?

Steven Seagal. Steven Seagal, yes. Yeah, Steven Seagal. Like if you presented a collection of Steven Seagal films. Yeah. Five points. But instead I went with The Guide to the Millennium Dome, which is weak. like if you presented a collection of steven seagal films yeah five points but instead i went with the guide to the millennium dome which is weak it's so weak it is weak yeah not happy with that but thank god rose was there ed i'm going off on a tangent just briefly

have you ever seen uh on deadly ground starring um steven seagal i've not no i i recommend to you and all the listeners as if this is going to make it in um to go watch it yeah because halfway through in a in a bar room fight stephen seagal has a game of slaps with a big muscly man you know when you put your hand out yeah i play with my nieces yeah but inexplicably during an argument he instigates a game of slaps with a big roughy tufty guy in a bar and they play slaps for a couple of minutes and then all of a sudden out of nowhere steven seagal breaks the rules and slaps the guy across the face yeah the guy starts crying and Steven Seagal leans in really close to him

and says, what does it take to change the soul of a man? And the man who's been slapped against the rules of slaps, slapped in the face, looks up at Steven Seagal

and says, I need time to change. Right. Well, I need time to change. Right. Well, I've got to see that. That on laser. If I brought that in on Laserdisc, Greg. Five points and a bonus point. And a now defunct bonus point.

But I didn't bring that. As we all know, I brought the Guide to the Millennium Dome. Very disappointing. Let's talk about the top three now, because i thought they were all pretty good uh joe brought in uh a margaret thatcher nutcracker amazing yeah amazing double double layered double layered it's sort of quite current uh and you, you can get into a real debate about that device's place in history. Yes. The way we view women.

Yeah. These days compared to how we viewed women in Thatcher's day. Yeah. Thatcher was seen as a, you know, as a freak of nature for, for being powerful. Yeah.

Back then. Which is fascinating. Hence the, hence the producing nutcrackers of then. Which is fascinating. Hence the producing nutcrackers of her. A nutcracker. Yeah, she must be... Fascinating. Although she famously didn't like women very much. It's probably too political for the podcast.

Go on. But of course, it was a double-layer defunct because Joe was saying Margaret Thatcher is defunct, a.k.a. no longer with us yet. But then Joe claimed that people don't crack nuts anymore, which caused a lot of debate in the studio, though. It caused outrage, and rightly so,

because one of our Great British Christmas pastimes is the hand-based destruction of nuts. Yeah, exactly. Which is exactly right wrong maybe she stopped breaking nuts in her house but yeah i i crack a nut at christmas you do i crack i agree you know i crack a nut at christmas greg you love a nut actually i love a nut at christmas yeah i love cracking another christmas you and your mum having a little nibble on some nuts i wouldn't do it the rest of the year, though. It would feel weird.

Well, of course not. Nuts are disgusting. Nuts are one of the best snacks. If they're covered in salt and fried. Sure. Sure. You give me a raw almond, you're going to get yourself into a fist fight.

What does it take to change the soul of a man? I need almonds to change. But it was a very, very good prize. But I think it was the debate around the cracking a nut at Christmas that probably cost Joe the points there. Absolutely. And that's, you know, if you indulge in the flights of fancy on this show, sometimes you have to pay the ferryman as a result. Yeah.

That's part of the joy of the show i think you know you can dig your own grave on a flight of fancy yeah yeah and you you lead people down those paths as well greg of course because that's where i dance and i feel free yeah that's your your catchphrase that doesn't often get spoken about as a catchphrase but i believe it to be one which is is let's dig down into the narrative. I use it far more often than I realized. Someone pointed it out recently and I don't plan to use it. Yeah. But I do love the narrative.

I do. I do love the twisted narratives that, that clearly have gone on in people's minds in response to a task. And they're, they're, they're sometimes hidden, but they're always there. Yes. that clearly have gone on in people's minds in response to a task. And they're sometimes hidden, but they're always there. There's always been a theatrical process in people's heads, which I find so funny. Do you notice sometimes that when you do that,

I think you have a narrative that you want it to be, which you sort of, you reveal to them slightly, and then quite often people go, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's exactly what what i mean yeah yeah of course yeah and sometimes i'm wrong and uh i've read the narrative wrong but their narrative is even more disturbing yeah can you can you remember out of you know in all the series that you've done of this show i can't remember anything just who but can you remember maybe just from a sense memory, who has the best narratives?

Who always had a little story about what they were doing? I mean, often David Baddiel's thought processes, the logic narrative of Baddiel was often fascinating, I would say. Yes, absolutely. Kerry is sitting in for Katie Wicks, of course, and Katie had presented... And Kerry is a good example of the most Route 1 narrative every time. Kerry was fascinating to me,

and she ended up calling her tour Bosch. Yeah. It's so great to spend time with a pragmatist who knows what she wants in life. Yeah, absolutely. I envy that.

Don't you? That sort of, yeah, no faffing. Let's just get things done. Yeah. Yeah. And that's,

that is what she's like in real life on stage in Taskmaster. There's consistent, it's a consistent persona. Bullshit. Yeah. Anyway, carry on. Um,

Katie, uh, has left Kerry to present a £5 Woolworths voucher, which you seem baffled by the audience reaction of. What was the reaction? Remind me. Ooh. Well, I think it's a childhood thing, isn't it? It's a nostalgia factor. For people of a certain age,

we remember skipping around Woolworths and buying sweeties. Yeah, but it's only pick and mix people remember from Woolworths. And they don't, no one, you know, confronts the fact that the rest of the stuff was shit. Oh, tat. Yeah. It was a horror show of a store that was, for some reason, considered a national treasure.

But we do that a lot in britain i think we latch on to something shit and go it's good yeah and then only after it's rightly gone yeah no people clearly weren't using it enough because it had to shut yeah no people were just going by and going oh i remember this when i was a child but i'm not going to buy anything yeah and then it goes and they go oh no i loved it um a good defunct thing i think uh and play really good strong very strong i would have been five points had david baddiel not brought in the ashes of his dead dead cat monkey it would have been five points and if i think about it it probably deserved the five. It would have been interesting to have heard Katie justify it.

Yes. It's the sort of thing I imagine Kerry bringing in, but she didn't bring it in. Yeah. That's why she didn't sell it so well, I think. What Katie would have said about it. Katie doesn't strike me as someone who suffers nostalgia, particularly. No, I think Katie, knowing Katie and how she was on Taskmaster,

I'd imagine she would have said something very very cutting very sarcastic and very quietly yes well it's funny you should mention that about being quiet about her saying things quietly because i was very aware throughout the whole series that katie was um quietly muttering at all times. Yeah. And Rose said to me once, there's a whole narrative going on with Katie that you can't hear. Yeah. And I would love to have known what was being said.

Occasionally on episodes, you can hear, it picks up on her mic, obviously. Yeah. And she's just saying absolutely hilarious stuff but is she yeah she's just is it related to the show though yeah now and again yeah it's it's you know it's a comment about something someone said but she doesn't feel the need to actually broadcast it or say it to the person she'll just quietly just yeah she'll just riff her own stuff off the back of it she's so funny so she's her own performer and her own audience.

Yes, absolutely. Right. David, yeah, so David's cat monkey, I think coupled with that professional photo shoot he had done with... Of him holding a cat down. And he's had his hair done. That made me laugh the most. He's had his hair done. That made me laugh the most.

He's had his hair done all fluffy. Who else? David. His hair's all up like a sexy rock and roller. That man thinks about his hair all right. But I think if you're bringing in the ashes of your cat, there's no way you're not getting five points, right? I think it's a bringing in the ashes of your cat, there's no way you're not getting five points, right? I think it's a good tip to people going forward with the show.

A sensation in the first round often scores highly. Yeah. You know, bringing something as emotive and shocking as the remains of a live creature. You know, I'm going to score it highly, aren't I? I'm not going to say, oh, your pet cat that you clearly cherished. Nothing. Yeah.

Well, in terms of people bringing in emotive prizes, in the last series that's just gone out, Jenny Eclair brought in a picture of her grandchild uh which you scored very low very lowly and she was genuinely but but you see the thing is she tipped over there from uh from sensational to mawkish yeah and it's good to make that clear because i'm always going to punish mawkishness yes her grandchild's fine and living a happy life and they have a wonderful relationship i'm not going to celebrate that am i that was one of the moment that's the kicking your legs around because you're so excited at the idea of scoring jenny's grandchild one point that it's a it's a heady hit

you're gonna give low points to an actual child that's why i can't that's why i can't be trusted to do Junior Taskmaster. Oh, my God. I mean, you know, just imagine, there's a world where you do do Junior Taskmaster and it lasts for one episode. Yeah, and then I'm never seen again on telly. Joe, what defunct item have you brought in? It is a Margaret Thatcher nutcracker.

It is? Wow. I mean, I have so many questions. Is it defunct? Yeah, well, she's defunct, for starters. Also, I think, you know know people don't really crack nuts anymore That's the sense in which I think it's defunct because you can just buy nuts in a bag You still can buy nuts in a shell I've cracked enough for Christmas you

My granddad used to be able to crack a walnut just with his hand. No. Yeah. Other than that, he wasn't a very nice man. We can wait for clean water solutions. Or we can engineer access to clean water. We can acknowledge indigenous cultures. Or we can learn from indigenous voices. We can demand more from the earth. Or we can demand more from the earth or we can demand more from

ourselves at york university we work together to create positive change for a better tomorrow join us at yorku.ca write the future task one lasso alex you must stand behind this line at all times. Fastest wins. I really enjoyed that one. Now, we've got to talk about, I mean, again, this is probably something I've banged on about on the podcast before. We've done a lot of episodes. This is controversial, Greg.

Do you know why this is controversial? The lasso? Yes. The task in general? Yes. I do not. Okay. So I was the first person to do this.

I was told this is a tie-break task. So don't try and find ways around it. I didn't know that. Yeah. So this is what Alex told me. Don't try and find ways around it. You just do it properly and it's going to be timed. And then we'll only use it in the event of a draw at the end of an episode oh well i didn't know about that at all no yeah this is news to me this is this is hot production goss the next person to do it was david baddiel yeah he

then did it in such a weird way as we'll discuss that alex immediately knew that they had to find a way to broadcast it so they changed it into a proper task and everyone else did it as a proper task. Hence, everyone else is moving the line because they're finding a way around it immediately. Whereas I moved the line when I just, I couldn't imagine doing it any longer. Wow. I mean, the sense of injustice that you still feel.

I was walking over. We did that. Went into the break. You break have been fuming i was fuming because they showed i think they showed mine and a couple of other people's and then you went to the break and david's was going to be after and i marched over to alex during the break and i went you told me this was a tie break task you told me to not find any way around it and he said yes but we had to make it real tough because you'll see what David does. And I was like, yeah, but everyone thinks I'm stupid now. Of course I would just move the line straight away.

When did you have this confrontation with him? During the recording. In the break. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Wow, he didn't even tell me. And normally him and I would be chattering furiously about such things. But Alex likes to be fair as well.

Yes. So that's interesting. Look, it's all fine because I won anyway. I won anyway. If I'd lost on the basis of these points. What if you'd lost by that amount of points? You'd probably not be doing comedy anymore, would you? No, I certainly wouldn't be doing this podcast.

You'd be in France or something. Yeah. But you can see why he did it. Because David has... Yeah, because he wants a TV show to be good. Yeah. Why do people have to think about that

first and not about me getting points? David, obviously... I find your competitiveness on this show really endearing for the record. Oh, thank you. You know, you need a competitive person, don't you? Of course. It's a vital role.

It's a vital role. And that's all part of the casting because you don't know how competitive someone's going to be really until until the studios start right uh i i knew how competitive you were going to be yes yeah of course me apart from me um david uh so bear in mind now david has been told it's a tie-break task. Yeah. And to not find any ways around it. And one of the first things he does is tie wooden spoons to the rope.

Oh, that's funny. I presume that he... No, because it was only after what he did that they changed it. Wow. It's fascinating what David does in that he ties two wooden spoons to the rope and an American football yeah there's some logic to the American football yeah because that is that is something you traditionally throw in an accurate way yes so I get that but the two tying the two wooden spoons to it is fascinating. And, you know, I don't know how David would respond to – I mean, I know how, you know, in studio he sort of laughed these things off

and went along with the narrative that David's a stupid, clever person. Yeah. narrative that david's a stupid clever person yeah and what i find interesting is how will i don't know how willful something like that is from david i genuinely don't know if david thought the two wooden spoons would help him do what he needs to do or whether david thought it would be funny for me to tie two wooden spoons to this. I think he, I think it was a, a, maybe a mixture of both, but I genuinely think the fact that that was at the forefront of his brain to

do. Yeah. Regardless of whether it was because it was funny or not is worrying. If you had to, if you had to place your chips on one or the other, it was a deliberate thing to be funny or, or it was, he believed that the weight of two wooden

spoons would help him achieve the task yeah you'd put it on the latter would you yeah that one yeah i think i would yeah because if he was trying to be funny there's other stuff you wouldn't go spoons wouldn't you no spoons spoons wouldn't be anyone's first port of call unless you thought no he's doing something else for humour, I think. There is a desire to do well because the rugby ball shows a desire to laterally think and to get the points. Yeah.

And, you know, he eventually gets it, but it does take 24 minutes. Jesus Christ. If they showed that clip after David's documentary or during the launch of one of his books, it would ruin him. Yeah, totally. No one's buying a serious book. No.

No one's going to get absorbed in Jews Don't Count, brilliant documentary, then see a man tying two wooden spoons and go, okay, he's got no credibility. Yeah, I mean, it's amazing he's managed

to keep those two streams of his career separate. You know, and some of the stuff he's done post Taskmaster is amazing. Yeah. It's amazing.

I felt sure it would ruin him um like we say i took nine minutes 30 because eventually i just thought i'm just gonna have to move the tape but i just want people to know of course i know that you just moved the tape that is taskmaster 101 it's the sort of thing it is i mean to the extent that in in more recent series increasingly that you may not move the line has yeah has become part of the yeah part of the show because finally everyone's caught on that's basic lateral thinking sometimes helps so yeah so really we've sort of this is one of the last shows where we moving the line uh exists as a thing it's like watching the evolution of a sport in many ways yeah because once once you know at least three people in five catch on to do that it gets very boring doesn't it very quickly if everyone's

moving the line it doesn't have to be stopped it's the equivalent of um athletes from the 80s being told they can't gobble drugs anymore there's not yet but that being that revolution in taskmaster the sort of steroids uh revolution but i'm sure it's coming i'm sure that's one of our equivalents for sure no more line moving no more line having to be more strict with the rules. Fascinating, isn't it? On a show like this, that grown adults are sitting in a room saying, well, we're going to have to instigate a rule where people can't move the line anymore. Fascinating. Do you ever think we'll see a time on Taskmaster where people are so competitive

and so desperate to get on the show that they will roid up? In terms of actually taking roids? Actually, yeah, yeah. Well, all I can say is they won't get marked down by me. If someone turns up to the studio, hench as anything because they've taken roids I'm going to look I'm going to put it on record

I'll look upon that very favorably so any comedians listening you know what you've got to do oh dear me just to be clear taking roids is really detrimental to your health. Yeah, funny though.

But it would be funny if someone was physically pumped up because they were coming on to Taskmaster. And I would. I would score them highly. And, God forgive me, if I found out it was because they'd been taking roids, I would like that. Katie doesn't move the line, though. Katie does it in 7 minutes 30.

It takes a while, but it is difficult, is what we all found. Actually lassoing Alex. Lassoing, yeah. Even though it wasn't proper cowboy rope. Well, allegedly. But it was. It was proper cowboy rope. I think Alex did say it was proper ranch rope. He started saying words that I didn't understand about it being proper ranch rope.

Yeah. Funny though, isn't it? We've all watched cowboy films over the years, and you sort of, I think subconsciously, all of us just go, well, I could easily do that. Yeah. I could do a steer. Yeah.

You know? You don't watch a cowboy film and go, well done. How do they do it? You just say, yeah, well, I could do that, obviously. Because they're all up to it all the time, right? They're all up to it. So, yeah. Amazing.

It's become a thing, isn't it? Throwing some rope around a cow's neck. What are you on about? Rose and Joe both moved the line. But this is very typical of Rose. She found a way around it. But didn't fully commit. But didn't fully commit because she still has that bit in her brain that says,

no, I need to have done something slightly impressive or I need to have not broken the rules too much. Yeah, it's a sort of non-commitment to lateral thinking. She moved the line, but like by a foot. Yeah. And then spent ages trying to get, spent another minute or so trying to get the lasso over Alex's head. Fascinating.

Fascinating. What do you think that is with her? Is that deference to the format? I think so. Deference to the format. And she wants to play the game properly. I think she probably, there's some level of guilt that she made it too easy for herself right she she wants to win in the confines and rules of the

cage yes exactly that's exactly what i was thinking thanks for vocalizing it um your observation of joe absolutely perfect on the show that joe read the task and then did not move. But isn't it wonderful when someone knows who they are to that extent? You knew early doors with Joe Brand. There was not going to be a lot of physical effort in this whole show. And, you know, as you know, that's a way that I live my life as well. So I'm always going to look favourably upon someone who's just gone, no, I'm going to do it like this. But she was right too in this instance.

She just moved the line straight away, straight over Alex's head. Bang, five points. Easy. Lovely. Five points to Jo, four points for Rose, three points for Katie, two points to me. And of course, one point to old Spoonie David. Old Spoonie.. Old Spoonie. Interesting with Jo as well.

There was never any sense of excitement when she did do well. Yeah, if she ever got five points, it normally cut to her and she was sort of sarcastically making a face like, oh yeah. Yeah. I sort of enjoy that.

But again, that's the interesting part of the alchemy of choosing contestants. You can't have five people who don't give a shit. No, of course not. You know, and don't give a shit is always an interesting person to have on the panel. We've just had Frankie Boyle on.

Yeah. Wow. David, I would argue that there is not one other person on the planet who would think that the way to improve your chances of lassoing something is to tie wooden spoons to the lasso. I mean, I honestly thought that was the way forward, right? But the clues were there, Dave. Why didn't you stop at two spoons? It's just to get inside David's mind when he goes,

I'm going to put another spoon on it. Do you want to know how long he took? Yeah, what was my time? I'm interested. You took slightly longer than all four of the others combined. Goes out of the way. That's great. Well, it was 24 minutes. 24 minutes, right.

Let's talk about task two. Make the most accurate and inventive egg timer. You have 10 minutes to plan your egg timer, then 20 minutes to make your egg timer, after which Alex will boil an egg for as long as your egg timer lasts. The taskmaster likes his eggs runny, but not too runny.

You may not use any pre-existing time devices. True, by the way. Is that true? That was going to be my first question. Yeah. That's exactly how you like your eggs. but not too runny you may not use any pre-existing time devices true by the way is that true that was going to be my first question yeah that's exactly how you like your eggs i i like them runny but any hint of gelatin gelatinous quality in the the white yeah god you're gonna get thrown out of my house why are you making eggs in my house um so this was on our first day well certainly my first day yeah tasks uh and if any eagle-eyed uh viewers want to go back and watch the whole series again you can tell when a task

is on my first day because i've got a massive spot on my forehead i didn't notice that but i did make observations about you in this particular task that I want to drill down into. Please. But I didn't notice you had a big spot. I had a big spot. It's covered up with makeup, but you can see it if you look at my forehead.

Big old honker. Did it hurt? Oh, it was a bad one. It was throbbing, yeah. Funny, isn't it? Yeah. Funny how we still get those in adulthood. Yeah.

I had a big eye I went on holiday recently, and a big old spat. I'd also just, I was quite tired because the day before I had been flown to Milan, Greg, to play in a pro evolution soccer PS4 tournament for an indonesian football website that i am 100 sure was a tax thing because i've never seen any evidence of any filmed content i mean it sounds like something you might have imagined while you were ill i i this these are all excuses as to why this was so bad i think it was it almost might have been one of the first tasks that i did so i

think straight away they were like oh we'll do this one we set it up now and then you come up with ideas and then we'll do it at a later date and i was just baffled by this task i had no idea what to do i really panicked um and then i just decided to go down the route of trying to torture alex in some way well that's why i why I was going to ask you about it, because as someone who really did want to win, I thought you were just willfully silly in this. Yes. Your Malteser system was, you know, I loved it as a result.

And I always genuinely love it when people humiliate Alex or make him physically uncomfortable because I said I'm not sure I've ever said this there's an amazing thing I've learned about Alex Horne as our friendships developed is especially if he's had a drink or two but also at all times even when he hasn't if you ask him to do something, he'll do it. And I find that amazing. So I said to him at a wedding once, eat that pat of butter, and he did.

And on a night out, someone else, well, Rosie Jones specifically, asked him, we were all having a drink in a bar and there was a stuffed owl on the side. And Rosie Jones told Alex to go and get the stuffed owl, which is in a giant display case, really heavy, clearly not to be moved. And this is how quickly he responded. So he was sitting there drinking his drink and Rosie Jones went,

go and get that stuff down. And he just went... And came back with it. And then all of the staff of the club gathered round and started shouting at him for picking up the goal. Amazing. That makes him a great taskmaster's assistant,

a great person on the ground, because you can exploit him in that way. You can, but he does filter it out when he's the assistant, though, because sometimes you ask him to do something to help you with a task and he's like, no. Oh, no, he won't unfairly advantage people. Yeah, but if it's funny, if it's a ridiculous thing to do, he will do it straight away.

Always. Yeah. Fascinating. So he ate all the things, which I was very impressed by, but he didn't do them one a second, which I would argue means that I had created a timer and then he'd broken the timer. Yes.

And I really enjoyed it when you got really angry and and demonstrated how to eat a malteser every one second yeah because that's when i that that's when the the whole folly and uh flight of fancy of making alex eat a lot of maltesers in time left your eyes and the competitive head came back in. Yeah. Because when you were demonstrating that it's possible to eat a Maltese every second. Oh, dear. Yeah, I mean, but massively overcooked egg, 18 minutes, 32 seconds.

Awful. I wouldn't like that. It'd be too hard. It'd be too hard and grey and weird. David tried to make his own egg timer what did he do remind me he tried to make his own egg timer big egg timer and there's

amazing footage of him trying to put it together in the lab just a man who's lost his mind just sand everywhere keeps dropping it spent ages testing how much sand he needs but in the end it lasted 18 minutes six seconds but but he did try and make a traditional timer so that's good yeah he did um but it was bad

um katie also went down the road of trying to torture alex uh but with chinese water torture this time uh had the bag wasn't it and Quite disturbing, wasn't it? And again, when you get to know Alex, you can tell when he's genuinely uncomfortable. Yeah. And I've worked out how you can tell. And it's on and off screen. If there's something done or said that he's genuinely uncomfortable with,

his reaction is always preceded by him saying, oh my God. You should watch for it. And it happens occasionally on the series when he's like, oh, okay, this isn't funny anymore. Always, just to himself, oh my God. Also, it was quite scary quite how sort of calmly and quickly katie decided that this is what

she was going to do it's quite disturbing because it's hard to read yeah she's hard to read and the fact that that popped into her head is it was uh yeah it was disturbing with the fish in there as well the fish was effective how effective was it uh it was better than me the fish in there as well. The fish was a nice touch. How effective was it? It was better than me and David. I'll say that much. What a surprise. It was still quite a hard yoke, but with a little bit of custody give in the middle, I'd say.

Yeah. You want that little custody give. You do. But Rose and Joe, both really good. Rose had a birthday cake. She decorated the birthday cake. Happy egg day. Cut the candles to the right level.

So she knew that they'd burn flush with the cake. And then that's when you take the egg out of the pot and put it in the ice, which was such a good touch. Oh, she displayed great knowledge of eggs. Yes, great knowledge of eggs. And really a perfect Taskmaster response in that it was creative and funny, but also it was a woman on a mission.

Yes, absolutely. That's to be applauded and recognised with points. Yeah, it was very, very good. But you still preferred the aesthetic nature of joe's egg and i suspect you also preferred the method as well which was alex calling up having to call joe up as soon as the water started boiling so she could sing jerusalem down clearly clearly from the back of the car that she was being taken home home in after that day's filming. Correct. And I suspect she had left set earlier than production would have liked.

And I think that too, going back to what I said about Joe originally, is that confidence in who you are will often get rewarded on Taskmaster because i'm beguiled by someone who goes this is me take it or leave it yeah yeah she's clear i mean if she probably yeah she got through a lot of tasks quickly i think so she was probably home after lunch oh no doubt and um but also there was a lovely there was a lovely bonus thrown in. She made a really strange noise at the end of the... Well, I mean, nothing's going to play to your tastes more than a strange noise within a stupid song.

You had it in the back. Yeah. And the perfect egg, really. Yeah. The absolute perfect egg. Runny but not too runny. Yeah. I was entertained and fed lovely lovely stuff uh of course five points for joe four points for rose three points for katie two points for david and one point for me not a good episode

oh not a good but also very good because you were funny nice boy i'll put the egg in the cold water. Just before it's boiling, call Joe Brand. I've been to the ancient times Along the bodyguard's mountain streams I've won the world We live on gold In England's best I've won Bring me my something else I've got my book, my poster, and so

Build it here, among these dark satanic mills Yay! it's runny I don't think it's too runny task three is the team task part one get to know this person you'll be tested on your knowledge of this person in ten minutes time this was a lot of fun

you may not write down anything or leave the lab you must take it in turns to ask a completely different question the person will tell the truth lie then brag in that order but not necessarily starting with the truth your time starts now and then of course we had an exam uh on it um now very quickly we found the pattern in the in our team of three you did and the other team willfully ignored the pattern yes i mean it did of course because we were all really excited to be there we wanted to get it right so we're planning straight away we're going right well we rose brilliantly says we should ask him if he's sitting on a chair and then we'll know if it's a lie or the truth uh and then yeah and it's always the same every time because there's three of us.

Yeah. And we somehow found some of the answers that we needed. So biggest fear, who knew that was going to come up in the exam, right? Yeah, right. You know, sometimes we do get deep. Well, Katie gets deep. Katie asked him if he got on with his parents or whether he was in therapy. Whether he was having therapy.

I remember filming this all was so much fun. In the exam, they had to cut it out. I don't know why it ended up happening, but we got the giggles so badly in that. Did you? They had to cut because we were crying with laughter and I can't remember what made us laugh so much. Do you think it's a return to school days and the,

and the joy of a forbidden laugh? Yeah, I think so. It's the joy of a forbidden laugh, but then also just suddenly you're aware of your surroundings and you're sat in the taskmaster house with two friends and Alex is up on tennis umpires chair. You're like,

what the fuck's going on? I think, I think we, we often do transport people back to their childhoods. Yeah. We got three and a half out of five because we didn't ask him about his party trick. He was funny, by the way, wasn't he? Yeah, he was a good sport.

He was really good as a magician. Yeah, to being asked if he got on with his parents. And it seems to remember it's not in the edit. He's quite honest about that. David and Joe, I mean, if he got on with his parents. And it seems to remember, it's not in the edit, he's quite honest about that. David and Joe, I mean, I get really angry with Joe because she tries to claim that the fact there were three of us gave us an advantage in our system. And then I get very angry and say,

that's not why you didn't have a system, you didn't have a system because you didn't give a fucking left again. They didn't. But I think that David did give a fucking left again they didn't but but i think that david did give a fuck yeah david did give did care she didn't care but david was as incompetent as her she was willfully incompetent yeah that's interesting she had all the tools necessary to implement a system that would have been successful, but didn't want to.

All David wanted to do was implement a system, but he has absolutely no tools at his disposal. Amazingly, he doesn't. It's worth saying that throughout that series, your occasional but genuine fury with David when you were paired with him was one of the great delights of the series for me yeah well i think that the drawing on the back task um which gets tweeted to me every day i'd say manna manna from heaven for me that was that was proper kick your legs around wasn't it kicking his legs around rubbing his tummy in that one. I love it. Of course, there was also a

bonus point for Big Tongue. Why wouldn't there be? And it's interesting, the bonus point system. I scrapped the bonus point system as a result of a very controversial bonus point I gave out that I'm not going to shine a light on.

No, I'll leave it for Taskmaster Obsessives to work out what killed the bonus point system off. But it's a shame because that bonus point system of showing how big you can make your tongue is very much to be celebrated, I think. So with something like, I mean, I'm sure you don't remember, but with the celebrated i think is that so with something like i mean i'm sure you don't remember but with the big tongue is that something before you go into the record are you chatting about that with people and going i'm going to give a bonus point for big tongue or

is that on the hoof i think that was on the hoof yeah i'm almost certain i i just thought i'll give a bonus point for a big tongue And that works out because there's a genuine element of competition in it. But I subsequently have given bonus points out for things that weren't fair competition. And hence, I had to retire the bonus point system. Because people complain too much. No, I just realized, you know, we do have to try and be fair because people do because people have made such an effort in some cases yeah the points you know you you can't be too uh cavalier with uh the system no fair enough um and just to show you how competitive i am i've looked back at the

footage and my tongue my tongue was way bigger than joe's and i should have got the bonus point well it was it just about size though yeah flatness and size in all areas i did better than joe in the tongue in the big tongue bonus point is that right i think so personally because i remember hers as being quite impressively dish like maybe it was the functionality of Joe's tongue that appealed to me yeah but just I mean I don't know I could imagine being stranded on a desert island and her retaining rainwater better On her big lily pad tongue. On her big old lily pad. Frog on it. Well, Joe gets the bonus point.

So it was three points for Joe in this task. I stand by it, Ed. I stand by her getting the bonus. Fair enough. Two points for David. And it was four points for me, Katie. And Rose. Have you ever had any therapy?

I'm really getting to know you there. I'm just doing my task. Do you live in a flat? I live in a three-storey house on a farm. Do you live with some farmers? No. Do you farm? Yes. There's a doctor and a farmer. Yes. Certainly some lying has gone on.

I've never seen someone on a tractor looking that way. Have you worked out a system yet, you two? Is there a system? Are we meant to be the system? No, we are, but we're not using it. Have you ever been in a play? Have you got on with your parents? You're getting to the deep stuff. Have you ever been to Penge?

Er, yes. Do you have a library card? Yes. What do you do? I'm a magician. Ah, that sounds true to me. So what is it, truth? Lie, Brian. 20 seconds left. Um... Do you have any tattoos? Yes, I do have tattoos.

What's your best trick? My best trick is a stage trick whereby I end up taking my clothes off. I'm on stage wearing women's underwear. I think that's not true. Is that a brag? It's a strange brag. What? What are you doing? So, we were supposed to actually find out real stuff live task now i've noticed in the live task in recent series greg you seem a lot more involved in the live task there's more you sat in you know you're sat with your back to

the live task for some reason or on your spinny or on your spinny chair or they're trying to shoot balloons at you yeah and i and i like that and i think it's good i think it uh enhances the live task to get me involved because i'm normally quite passive when it comes to tasks so it's quite fun to be uh you know i say a bit more physical but like Joe Brand, I barely move in life. But I do think it's a nice, not all the time, but sort of a couple of times a series. It's nice if I'm a bit more active. Yeah. I mean, the one that really sticks out in the mind, I think it was, I mean, people are going to kill me. I'll get the wrong series i think it was series 12 maybe with the the the balloons that were slowly inflating oh it scared the shit out of

me yeah i'll tell you a moment i don't think celebrated enough is during the nappet incident yeah when jessica nappet fell off the now named nappet stage yeah when she started to fall my reaction was so heroic it was like backdraft i was i was up and out of my chair to save that woman and no one's ever commented on it. Now, I didn't get to her in time and I in no way saved her, but my intent was there. Yes. And I've not seen one comment ever across any platform that recognises me as being heroic in that moment. Yeah.

Well, I'm glad finally we realised that real heroes, they wait to see if they get the acclaim that they deserve and then if they don't, they announce it on a podcast correct if if someone doesn't give you the award you deserve in life give yourself an award i should also mention the live task that sticks in my mind that you you were involved in i think it was series 12 um where everyone had to make noises um davis is the wow monster wow monster oh my god oh my god i just i loved and hated that i really felt the pressure of that yeah when it was happening, all I could think was, I can't think of anything that's more up Greg's street.

People making stupid noises. And there's one specific moment that I love, watching the show back. And it's that Alan Davis makes the wow monster noise. And then he's surprised and delighted by a noise he's made yeah and it's that thing that that you and I throughout our friendship have done when something comes out you weren't expecting it's this yeah yeah yeah yeah Alan Davis almost is having a conversation with himself. Yeah.

What's that noise I made? This live task, though, is looking at your mirror and facing forward at all times. Build the highest tower of bricks on the table behind you. You must stay on your spot and use your litter pickers at all times. Highest tower after two minutes wins. Infuriating, this task. It's one of those tasks that I am so glad that i'm sitting in the throne for yeah i would just find it annoying yeah it would make me sweat and um it would make me feel

physically uncomfortable so i i was glad i was sitting back watching you all yeah and it's it's one of the ones where you can really see everything writ large on on mine and rose's face where you have to focus so there's no chance to even make your face look like you're trying to be cool about it it's just so and you're looking at your face in the mirror as well you can see how sort of desperate you are to win this and it's it's one of the tasks that i know that when alex was sitting in his little hot tub coming up with that but when he thought of it he will have gone because he knows how annoying it'll be for everyone yes very annoying and unfortunately

i end this task by in in a voice higher than i knew that i could manage um start having a go at rose for still doing stuff after the the whistle and appealing to Alex. The annoyance, your voice was high on the annoyance register. Very, very high. And interesting, isn't it, that, you know, as a fairly physically big man, that genuine annoyance is displayed

in such a feminine whistle. She's still going after the clock. Yeah, but that's not fair though. And then I've got to sit down and try and compose myself and don't manage it and end up shouting at Kerry for not really being on the show. Yeah. Pathetic.

So enjoyably pathetic. Oh, nice. It was two points for Kerry slash Katie and David, who only got one brick on. Joe cleverly put one brick vertically, highest tower. And then me and Rose. You can be clever. You can think laterally and can't if you don't care.

Yes. Me and Rose, both with two two bricks both got five points meaning it's joe's first victory on taskmaster 19 points what a waste of points um do you think that there was a because you and rose are friends yes and you and rose are both into the task element of this show yeah was there a competitiveness between you two, unspoken or spoken? Yeah, definitely competitiveness but in a fun way. I don't think it ever felt

like it was going to spill over and ruin our friendship. It wasn't going to spill over into ugly violence? No, I don't think so and I can't speak to what would have happened if she'd won and I'd come second I just put some hand cream on

like a man that's how Greg always signifies the end of recording a podcast I don't even know why I've got hand cream got hand cream. Greg, obviously, Series 15 has just aired by the time this comes out. Do you have any sort of summing up

thoughts about the line-up or the series? No, only that I enjoyed it very much. I enjoyed all of them. It's so funny, isn't it, how the pack comes together and how they are individual and yet a sort of group identity is formed. And the only thing I would say is they're a very different group to, say, your group.

Yes. They're very different. And I was confounded by some things. And lots of people have asked me about frankie boyle already and said you must have been prepared to you must have steeled yourself for combat with frankie but and i did yeah and i was ready to be uh out angry but of course he confounded us straight away because Frankie Boyle is actually quite a gentle soul lovely gentleman yeah we've had him on this podcast yeah yeah so it's interesting every group is different but it's the group identity I find fascinating they're very thoughtful

bunch in many ways less action more consideration I I'm very excited. The next line-up, I'd be absolutely intrigued to see what their group mentality is like. Well, I mean, that is a fucking car crash waiting to happen. Sam Campbell and Julian Clary. Who's going to be the person who doesn't care on that series? Probably, don't you think Julian? It's going to be Julian. Yeah.

What is it? You think he's going to get into the tasks? Oh, I can't wait. Greg, thanks so much for coming back on the Taskmaster podcast. We always ask our guests to rate their experience on the Taskmaster podcast

in your style, Taskmaster style. So you love giving out the points. Please tell us how much you enjoyed the podcast today between one and five points. One and five, five being the best. Yes, you should know that really. Oh, I see. Yeah, I didn't realise it was the same system as Taskmaster. Well, before I give my score, I'm going to contextualise it and tell you that I didn't sleep very well last night.

I've got to go and do an irritating piece of filming this afternoon. I don't want to. My coffee machine didn't work. And I'm not wearing any trousers. and I'm not wearing any trousers. And I think that's a bad start to a day. Yes. And the fact that I've laughed and enjoyed my little friend so much.

Five points. Oh, good. I didn't know what way that was going, actually. I was worried that the... You've saved a bad morning. Okay, good. i'm so glad to hear it greg thank you so much for coming back on the podcast thank you oh bye see you in three years thanks so much to greg for coming on the show we will undoubtedly have him on again at

some point in the future although we're edging to that point where we are nearly caught up with the historical episodes we've been striving for that moment for a long time but hopefully when the new series comes out we might get greg back on or for future series look taskmaster's gonna run and run we have plenty more content to give you thank you again to greg we will see you next week to talk about episode six of series nine with paul chowdhury very excited to have paul back on the will see you next week to talk about episode 6 of Series 9 with Paul Chowdhury. Very excited to have Paul back on the pod. See you next week! Every veteran has a story.

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