Taskmaster The Podcast - Ep 64. Aisling Bea - S5 Ep.7

Episode Date: January 20, 2022

This week on the podcast Ed is joined by the wonderful comedian, actor, writer and Series 5 contestant - Aisling Bea! Aisling shares her memories of her task days and the joyful moments in the studio with Bob, Sally, Nish and Mark. Watch all of Taskmaster on All 4www.channel4.com/programmes/taskmasterVisit the Taskmaster Store for all your TM goodies!taskmasterstore.comVisit the Taskmaster YouTube Channelyoutube.com/taskmasterGet in touch with Ed and future guests: [e-mail] the Podcast is Produced by Daisy Knight for Avalon Television Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly, host of Under the Influence. Recently, we created an episode on cannabis marketing. With cannabis legalization, it's a brand new challenging marketing category. And I want to let you know we've produced a special bonus podcast episode where I talk to an actual cannabis producer. I wanted to know how a producer becomes licensed, how a cannabis company competes with big corporations, how a cannabis company markets its products in such a highly regulated

category, and what the term dignified consumption actually means. I think you'll find the answers interesting and surprising. Hear it now on Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly. This bonus episode is brought to you by the Ontario Cannabis Store and ACAS Creative. Hello and welcome to the Taskmaster podcast. It's Ed Gamble here, the host of the Taskmaster podcast. We are about to talk through another episode of Taskmaster from the back catalogue, going through it task by task, reviewing chatting about said episode and today's episode is series five episode seven the penultimate episode of series five it's only eight episodes which feels feels like we're being cheated really because after this it obviously went to 10 episodes and this is one of those series where you really really wanted to see

another two episodes of them because they're such a good lineup but we will chat about it nonetheless very excited that our guest today is ashling b ashling b of course star of series five of taskmaster she was there she remembers man uh so we're very excited to chat to ashling so let's get on with it but before we do i'm gonna tell you that taskmaster has been nominated for best comedy entertainment tv show at the british comedy guide awards of course it has of course it has and you can vote if taskmaster is your favorite comedy entertainment tv show which i hope it is if you're listening to this podcast you can go on to comedy.co.uk and you can vote for it in the awards and vote for stuff in the other categories as well if If you'd like, maybe vote for This Way Up

in the Best Sitcom category, which I'm sure is in there. So without further ado, let's go and chat to Aisling B about Taskmaster Series 5, Episode 7. Welcome, Aisling, to the Taskmaster Podcast. Thank you, Ed, for having me on the taskmaster podcast the taskmaster podcast for all you need when you need it now that's lovely ashling's here to advertise her own sort of voiceover skills uh so if there are any advertisers listening who want to use the sort of warm the warm irish tones of ashling B then do feel free to get in contact.

Yeah, for things like, pay your taxes! Or, you know, like HMRC or something like that. Pay your fucking taxes! Nah, or... What would you give the good voice over? What would I be more likely to buy if you... Well, I mean... Because you've got a direct, understandable voice.

At the moment, I mean, look, Aisling's in LA, guys. We're going to put that out there. So she probably doesn't realize the impact of my, my voiceover work on Kazoo, the secondhand car app. Which of course has been smashing it for a really, I'd say about a year now, Aisling. So really. I've rarely bought a car from elsewhere. I go straight to Kazoo. which of course has been smashing it for a really i'd say about a year now ashling so really i've rarely bought a car from elsewhere no i feel i feel like i would buy something uh something

yeah that i trust from you something something a little more a lot more uh something a lot more soothing i think you could do soothing very well i do I remember I had a radio four show with my friend Yasmin and we would do like mythical mythical stories it was called Irish Mix and Legends and it was really all titting about yeah and I remember and my sister was on a job and her boss said to her oh I was thinking about you last night actually because I normally listen to radio four to sort of help me fall asleep and then just as I was about to fall asleep these really annoying Irish girls were on telling stories and Sinead was like that's my sister and it was us going welcome to the show la La la la. And it was just. But yeah, maybe dulce tones.

I do sometimes do things like in, in Ireland for like makeup brands for the la la la la la. Or, or I did one for a ferry. Like why not cross the ferry? Be in the sea, get on a boat, that sort of stuff.

Yeah. I mean, that's not the exact script, right? Yeah. Well, it was the one I did. They haven't used it though.

Get in the sea, people. It's the opposite of an advert for a ferry. Yeah. Go for a swim. Oh, it's adjacent. Well, of course, we're not here to talk about your voiceover career, Ash. Oh, okay. We're here to talk about your career on Taskmaster,

Series 5 of Taskmaster. We've chatted to Mark. We've chatted to Mark, we've chatted to Nish, two of your, two of your co-competitors. I hesitate to say opponents. Yeah, okay. Enemies, that's fine. Absolute, absolute enemies,

evil people. Now, all I've got written down here is notes to ask you about are memories slash highlights of recording Taskmaster. God, you did a real bit of work there this morning morning didn't you edge i look i remember the big bucks for this sort of journalism i remember do the work yourself

but you've told me before we started recording that you've i mean you're one of there's a few people we've spoken to who don't necessarily like to watch themselves on things or well i have never other than like little clips come up online and editing my own show This Way Up, series two, now available on all four. And series one available on Netflix in the UK and Ireland

and on Hulu in America, Stan in Australia. You're doing all the work for me. That was me doing my own voiceover work for myself. And I owe myself 100 pounds. I want to be on a ferry now you've said that.

No, get in the sea, not the ferry. Have you heard about the sea? It's wetter than the ferry. But other than having to edit my show and seeing clips, I have never, ever watched myself in anything. I've never seen an episode of 8 Out of 10 Cats that I've been on. I've never seen a QI. I've never seen an episode of eight out of ten cats that I've been on I've never seen a QI I've never seen a taskmaster like I've seen when people when the

clips are up or I'm advertising so there's something put together I've never seen my Netflix special I've never like I'm I won't uh I'm trying to stop self-deprecating but I would rather do anything than watch my own face and listen to myself and and yet i have a career and other people having to do that may i say you're missing out you're very good uh and you were very good that's the cold dead eyes of a killer ed i'm gonna have to go for another take and this time can you mean it you're very good well that was me trying to mean it unfortunately and especially especially good of course on on this uh series of taskmaster and i know loads You're very good. Well, that was me trying to mean it, unfortunately. And especially good, of course, on this series of Taskmaster.

And I know loads of your memories and highlights from Taskmaster because I watch it religiously. Even when you did that voiceover, little voice initially, when we started the recording, that made me think of your cuddle bot, which was the first pre-film task from Taskmaster where you had to give Alex a special cuddle and you dressed as a sort of robot and said quite sort of sexy things to Alex. Or did I make a robot that was so convincing

it had human capabilities in it? Maybe I was inside it, Ed, or maybe it's actually a very complicated machine. Wink, you just don't know. Could you tell? This is something we didn't consider when we talked about that particular task on the podcast, that that wasn't actually you,

that that was just a very sort of, I mean, I'd say semi-convincing. I constructed an entire machine, a working machine. I managed to construct it in so little time and I get very little credit for my, what's it, Frankenstein-esque machine. Yeah, that was yeah that was that was that was it

was what i broadly remember from being sitting down in the studio i remember someone saying to me have you watched this show taskmaster katherine was katherine's one and people were like whoa Catherine like the way her brain works is nuts she is so clever and I remember when we did all the tasks I was like there's a bit before we do the studio so before we watch them all back where I'm going to have to exist as normal Aisling before everyone thinks of me on a different level of playing field of thought as a genius like the way they talk about Catherine. I remember thinking like, oh, that's just enjoy these few months where Mensa doesn't call because once they see and everyone sees and I knew like Greg and Alex would look at me differently. God, she's brilliant. And so the opposite of that happened. I remember when I did the task,

I don't know if it's in this episode, where I had to balance something and I tied the balance. I brought in Alex's car and I got a string and I tied the sort of seesaw through. And in my head, I could even feel people in the crew going, wow, wow. Like who else would be such a genius to have done it and I went

inside the house because you don't know if you achieved it I went inside the house and I was genuinely like oh my god um wow oh my god Aisling like you could have worked as an engineer maybe an architect with very little training and when I watched what actually happened and as soon as I shut the door the whole thing slammed down I actually couldn't the amount of mistakes the amount of not listening the amount of not reading the instructions properly I still I'm I was mesmerized by myself for all the wrong reasons we talked about that in the last episode actually and it is I think I think your instincts were right initially that when you were doing it I was thinking wow this is actually a great idea no one about that in the last episode actually and it is i think i think your instincts were right initially that when you were doing it i was thinking wow this is actually a great idea no

one else has thought of this this is very clever maybe she does exist on another plane of thought and then when they tested it and the washing line just simply slipped out of the car door i was like oh no not even with like a wind could have also blown it off like there was no it was like the same way a child thinks it can build a sort of like bridge or something like that and you're like yeah no the idea of you like things on top of each other of course but then there's maths and science and reason people have degrees in this sort of thing yeah there must have been moments though that you uh can you does any uh do any of the tasks stand out as as ones where you thought actually i did

completely nail that and maybe i maybe i am as clever as I've decided everyone is going to think I am. There were moments I was very annoyed that I'm sure you couldn't tell where I felt a little bit cheated. Because what I like, I remember, you know, the one with the cans and having to put them back in and out of the trolley and name countries. and having to put them back in and out of the trolley and name countries. And Alex didn't tell me something happened early on in it where I clearly like said something wrong or or or went too far or there was a rope or some it was a trivial thing at the start. But Alex didn't tell me. So I named all of these countries or capital cities or whatever it was going back and forth with the can and I got through so many but none of it mattered because of an early technicality yeah that's where I was like oh I do feel I was technically clever but in the wrong it's like being a really good

swimmer in a running race yeah yeah you I think to be fair I think you was completely screwed over that one and I think Alex knew he could get away with letting you do all of that and then tell you a later date because he knows that you wouldn't have stormed out of the studio, but you look like you're on the verge. I was on the verge. I think, I think because like, why didn't you just tell me like those are the things like, why did you let me, it was a running on of energy. And those were long filming days. So I was like,

why didn't you just tell me, let me go on for ages. And also sit in the idea that I was clever for so long um but I can't actually remember any moment I was like you bloody genius like it was nearly all the absolute opposite like I thought that throughout the whole filming of the tasks but when I saw them back I cannot recall one single moment where I was like well done that's actually quite clever actually I was like oh it's a constant trail of disappointment and amazement of my own silliness did it all did that all start to come apart as soon as you saw the first one back was it that was it day one in the studio where you had all that thing built up where you were like it's going

to be great I can't wait for people to see my genius I mean the creative stuff I enjoyed because that's still in the world of silliness. Like my opus, my movie, Spoonie Neeson, I thought was heartbreaking and heartwarming at the same time. We rooted for a lot of the lead characters. And in many ways, it was just like a test pilot for this way of my series. The story of a woman with depression, which is what was going on behind the scenes quite a lot, maybe. progression um which is what was going on behind the scenes quite a lot maybe um and and even the cuddle bot and stuff like that things like that are creative I was like oh this sits in the sort of world of where I am a bit of an architect I suppose this stuff that relies on like following

instructions or maps or or any sort of sport like throwing the the paper behind into the bin like when i eventually got it even though it took like i think like 17 two million um tries i did think you are a great sportsman but yeah anything that requires skills that someone else would be trained at better they're they're they're with those women's where i was like oh lads or when I thought I was outsmarting because of a loophole like I technically did like my business person because I hated the idea of a businessman

so I enjoyed my coconuts with the guns and that was actually a very layered what I was asking them to go to the shops and get me sounded mad but I actually didn't know what I was pulling together yeah because you had the men you had the men drinking yeah drinking which i don't know enough at the time so the coconut for example it was that they were being forced to drink her blood so because the coconut water that they were being forced to drink like that is a coconut's blood

so they were being forced to drink the blood of this powerful business coconut woman coconut person which i don't think is that story's never been told in any fiction that there's someone who's so powerful that she makes her subordinates drink her blood her blood exactly until that very day and so with that i was like great i'm i'm I stand by my usurping of the loophole yeah and with other stuff and I blatantly didn't listen properly to the instructions and thought I was being clever like there's one bit and again I'm not sure what series um episode it is but when I just turned the the cone upside down to get the water out or the ping pong ball out and I was like you see sometimes you just

gotta think outside the box and then it turns out at the start they were like you cannot move it and in my head I was like see I didn't even move it I picked it up turned it upside down and put it back down again yeah I couldn't have moved it more in my head I was like that's right you I think you had decided it was a loophole because the tube was attached to a tray yeah even in the studio I think you tried it you were like I was actually moving the tray and then as soon as Alex went but the tubes on the tray you went fair point but the whole time even thinking about that was like, no one else is going to be clever enough to do this. And also that I was was was like clever than the people who came up and thoughtfully came up with the game in the first place that I could somewhere outsmart or outwit, which is this.

Not only I couldn't outsmart them, but it was being super stupid to think that I could. So I was double dumbing myself without a doubt I also thought my I was I I remember thinking this little green outfit of mine is kind of sexy and um it really like I kind of thought it might be you you know, like hot girl at Halloween. It's so not flattering to any part of my physical body or like I didn't even know. Like I remember with the dignity intact bit where I jumped out of the boat and took off my trousers to Alex. Like I do stuff so impulsively and I really don't like I don't remember those things. I don't remember what I said or the joke. So to watch me take off my trousers on camera with I mean it was

very obvious as I think Sally said on the day those were not knickers I ever intended the world to see or I would have absolutely worn something lacy or just something with a bit of fun my sort of yellow and gray colored knickers were not the ones for like the horns for the dads and and to see myself with my little irish art dancing around in my gray and yellow knickers it took a lot for me to go don't be embarrassed you're actively in a comic show it's okay but you did not want to see that and now everyone's going to see it but also you really didn't want to see it like that's how i look oh no but that that impulsive stuff and just throwing yourself into it is what is what uh makes you a very good contestant i think so um and don't about the tracksuit if you were going for sexy

no one no one thought that that's what you were going for so there's no there's no embarrassment but again it's like oh that on camera that's a big green tracksuit tuxedo and that hat that baseball hat you have, he doesn't fit. You look like a truck, like you look like a right wing trucker from America who owns a dirt bike. You look like,

have you seen my dirt bike, Hank? So I can put it in the truck for when I want to be free. So let's talk about episode seven. The prize task was the most surprisingly expensive item oh yes yes yes mine was the belfast airline lounge it was it was it was uh the voucher that you bought to get into the business lounge at belfast international airport for 13 minutes to have a nap nap um i think it was now you made the mistake it was it was 25 pounds but you made the mistake of asking greg what he would pay first of all for a 13 minute nap in a

first class lounge or what he thought it might be and he said 40 pounds so that immediately undermined that's yeah that's um that's an awful thing when you do that in any story like you never believe how late mary was one hour no 10 minutes and it completely takes the air out of the balloon of your anecdote yeah that absolutely happened there as well and your face when greg said 40 pounds so you're obviously initially disappointed because you knew it had completely taken the wind out of your sails. And then also, you seem like you're about to funnel that disappointment into really laying into Greg for spending too much money on stuff. And you decided to just reel it back in. You had that face of you're about to go, oh, well, I'm so Mr. Fancy over there spending all his money. Yes, probably because my reaction to realizing I'd lost there was probably to lash out yeah but it's actually turning into a therapy session now I'm like yeah yeah it's something that I do 20 25 pounds to me I mean now right for a first class lounge or

business lounge that sounds fancy how fancy are we talking is the business lounge at the belfast international airport absolutely not fancy at all right good to know this context so 25 pounds is expensive because what i was buying for was like uh basically a nap on like a sort of a lightly larger couch than the one you would have gotten outside of the lounge which you could hear because the door was just there it's a small airport um so yeah i was basically it was a lot for what i got as well yeah that was the element of expense it's not like i went into like a snaz lounge i was like oh velvet cushions well you said look you got three points for it it's pretty good uh i think uh and um you also got the same as bob mortimer, you got three points for it. It was pretty good, I think. And you also got the same as Bob Mortimer. You got three points there.

Who brought in his complete World Cup 2014 sticker book. Oh, yes. Yes. Which he decided was surprisingly expensive. But you can buy them for about £10. So it's not hugely expensive. I think very generously scored there. I think Bob occasionally, because Bob was so good at this game sometimes when bob brought in something slightly underwhelming

he just got the points anyway because he was just broadly very good yeah yeah yeah yeah and he'd give us details about his life like he can he's he's got a hyenas did that end up in the show it did oh that's one of the best moments of all time yes because you don't know like you say like what i remember from the show didn't always make it in or like from like chats and stuff like that so you're not sure but the bit about his hyenas you're like you are giving us so much for this you deserve all the points because that's the sort of detail i won't be telling about myself anytime soon oh yeah no i got a high anus no i actually have to turn around and sit and and pull backwards on the door and it just gave me so much joy that because he when he says things they're so dead pan yeah and so my hiatus and so you're not sure if what you're hearing is believable true real silly

yeah but when you realize he is telling the truth it's an absolute glory glorious fantastic it's fantastic but you know you you bring different things to the show he we all actually got along gorgeously well like it was one of those things where on on on those things you're never sure how it's gonna pan out but myself and nish and sally and bob and mark were it was a really lovely gang actually um we all i think we all really enjoyed each other's silliness which was great you know yeah when i heard that lineup i thought there's no there's no rogue elements in there there's no one who i i mean taskmaster is very good at booking no baddies i'd say um but But that lineup especially, I thought there's no one I'd be worried about if I was on the show with them.

Yeah, yeah. I remember when we were doing, it was funny though, us not watching each other's work, but when we had to work together, that was not tricky, but more different silly brains trying to be on the same silly page yeah you know you're trying to get three different dogs to sort of decide around a bone who will you know this is such a bad metaphor i'm in the middle of it working out if i can back out of my metaphor i want to hear all of it my point would be like say who's going to be the cat

someone has to be the cat you know out of the three dogs you know like when three creative people come together like when we were writing our song myself and Sally and Bob wrote Rosalind's a fucking nightmare and when we were

writing that like we had so many ideas but we only had 20 minutes and I found myself like having to be the person who was like right we've got four sentences now we need four more and and I was like how am I the admin guy here like I'm the admin guy it's a bad day and and it was like one of those things where like and Bob but Bob had like some previous music and stuff so he was really good with that sort of stuff but and he came up with brilliant stuff and so did Sally but like they'd forget to write anything down that's why I was like right I'll get my laptop and I'll actively write this down then because there's lots of stuff that's great

but no one's getting it down and I was like oh I don't want to be the guy who writes it down but someone has to be Aisling but someone has to be and we were running out of time and i found myself becoming like serious sally not sally but like that's confusing yeah the whole silly sally which is different to silly sally um but i'm sure people must have found that with me at certain times as well but when you're like oh i'm the i'm the serious one now it's it's quite hilarious in a way and i'm what you're having to be serious about writing a show writing a song about rosalind like to be a bit like guys about that it's so silly well i don't know what this says about me ashling i've worked in numerous

groups uh in collaborative uh scenarios and in i say three or four different double acts and i'm always the admin one oh ed that makes'm always the admin one. Oh, Ed, that makes sense. Always the admin one. Never the bride. Yeah, no, I can imagine because you do have, myself and Sarah Pascoe were talking about this about you the other day, actually, where like Ed's got a great dad energy, a kind dad. There is a quality about you that's like, come on now.

I'm sure it wasn't that bad you're like yeah maybe maybe it wasn't it wasn't it was that bad like you were very i suppose much like the ferry that i did the advert for yes you were a good solid ship in the sea the sea um but yeah so you have that i can imagine that I'd trust your admin even if it was like absolute pig scratch you know come on now it'll be fine

I'll take that now Nish we can't move on without talking about Nish Nish brought in 100 euros that was surprisingly expensive because it costs 91 pounds this is one of the only times that Nish tried to do some of his satire on the show mmm

but a fair point a fair point you know the economy at the time yeah right Sally, Silly Sally Silly Sally brought in one of,

you probably remember this, Ashley, one of Bob Mortimer's turds that she was going to. I don't remember that. Okay. She was, she'd got, she'd sourced,

she'd got Bob to give her one of his turds, I believe. And she was having it placed in a resin sphere and then putting it in a poo museum in the UK. I mean, absolutely amazing that our job if that was said or done in any other workplace you'd be like i will never ever forget the moment my co-worker said she was going to take one of our my other co-workers poos put them in resin and put them in a museum whereas for us it's like no i don't i remember that one i genuinely have no memory of that yeah so apparently the whole process costs 800 pounds and then the owner of the poo museum estimated that then bob's turd would be worth between 10

and 15k and then there's the element of it being mentioned on the show so it's not just bob mortimer's poop it's the actual one that was mentioned on the show yeah which might add a bit more value i've been watching a lot of property shows recently so i'm like it's all about the you know pricing it when you decide to sell it you know i mean that seems insane to me for a number of 10 to 15 grand for one of Bob Mortimer's stools. We're in the wrong business, Ed. The wrong bloody business. Well, I mean, if that's the business you want to get into,

I think we're halfway there. I've lost 20,000 pounds today already. Push down the toilet, metaphorically, and... Now, you would have thought that that would win. That only got the four points for 10 to 15 grand. It was Mark Watson who took the five points with his gate backing onto a communal garden. Oh, yeah.

That he paid 18 grand for for access to the communal garden. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. See, that... This is where I would debate what is pricey because i would still say mine is pricier for what i got to have access and especially post lockdown we are looking at this gate in a very different way yeah you can't move out of the house and you want to be in the garden and you want to be able to go out hang out out with your friends. 18 grand is part of buying a house. It's not that expensive.

I would still stand by a 13 minute bad nap, 25 pounds, very expensive for what I got. Because you're not paying 25 pounds for constant access to that lounge. Are you? No. Once off, just that time.

Yeah. I see what you mean. If you're divvying it up you could probably like however long mark there's a lifetime of joy and your children being able to access a safe place oh i'm sorry he found a prize for that it was sort of a typical mark watson prize in that he looked devastated that it happened and that he brought it in and that he was remembering this thing to the extent i was surprised greg gave him five because in the last three or four episodes greg has taken great joy in giving mark no points for that sort of thing to sort of destroy his life even further yeah yeah he was there was such pain and sadness and mark all the time that it was it did become

very funny and it was hard to feel sad for him anymore because it was such a joy to watch it's funny when i when i'm thinking back on it now i'm like god i would often it's not necessarily that i see myself as a cheater but i would definitely call myself a trickster and when i look back i was always looking for a loophole and they're the worst devils in court and i'm like oh i think i think i might be one of those like what's the laziest way to do this what's the like even getting my mother to like I posted my mother the pineapple and like but that was not being clever that was pure laziness I wasn't in the mood to try and do

the task so my mother you saw one third in the show of the stuff she actually did she went around that for like a week's go bringing that pineapple around the town to a variety of places she's terrible at sending photos it took her ages to upload them all to send them to taskmaster from her ipad it was one of the longest conversations of my life but i was trying to cheat like i was getting i was tricking away out of it you know know? Like I was always being a trickster. Whereas Mark really did try and play by, like, what's the actual rule here? OK, well, I'll do it by the exact letter.

And I was always going to go, well, is it a capital letter or is it a small letter? The communal garden is jointly sort of owned by a residence association. And so it turns out, if you want a gate that goes onto it, you have to pay a three-year fee to join that residence association. This is, like, madness. When we win this prize, do we win access to the garden as well?

The funny thing is, yes, you do, yeah. Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly, host of Under the Influence. Recently, we created an episode on cannabis marketing. With cannabis legalization, it's a brand new challenging marketing category. And I want to let you know we've produced a special bonus podcast episode where I talk to an actual cannabis producer. I wanted to know how a producer becomes licensed, how a cannabis company competes with big corporations, how a cannabis company

markets its products in such a highly regulated category, and what the term dignified consumption actually means. I think you'll find the answers interesting and surprising. Hear it now on Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly. This bonus episode is brought to you by the Ontario Cannabis Store and ACAS Creative. 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 ourselves. At York University, we work together to create

positive change for a better tomorrow. Join us at yorku.ca slash write the future. at yorku.ca slash write the future. Well, let's see if you managed to trick your way out of this one. Task one, wearing that blindfold at all times, travel as far as possible in three minutes. Alex will be at your side at all times because he is a strong, independent, handsome man. On removing the blindfold, you will then have another three minutes

to retrace your steps to your starting position. Longest successful retracing of steps wins. do you remember the question that you asked immediately after finishing reading that do i have to walk my feet myself or on my feet yeah correct you were straight on alex's back yeah yeah yeah yeah this is what i mean i absolutely i'm delighted with that that's one where i was delighted with what i did yeah it was pretty it was really just to ask that immediately there was no there was no gap you didn't need to think about that you knew absolutely you were jumping on Alex isn't it funny that I didn't really remember what the task was and as as you were saying the reading it out my brain jumped to the same place so I wasn't

remembering I was like what would I do here am I allowed like my instinct was the same the second time around almost like a memento really so that wasn't you remembering what you did that was just you doing what you were doing it was a little bit as it was it was column a or column b it was like a little bit from column a a little bit from column b because I was thinking through it going oh what would I do there how would I get so far maybe if someone carried oh this is the one where yeah so my thought process was roughly the same you I mean you did pretty well you got managed to get alex to take you 200 meters away and then when you came back

you were 64 meters away from where you started and that's without even realizing that you were given a piece of bread and you should use it for a trail you eventually got to where you wanted to go and you didn't even say oh i should have used this bread to lay a trail. You said I should have just used this bread as a marker at the start. You thought you should have left the whole slice of bread where you started and then tried to find the bread. Oh, yeah. I could have bread crumbed it back.

Yeah. But I should have just left, but then I would have had to look around for the bread. Because I thought your initial thought was just to have a little bit of bread for energy yeah just in case I go too far and I get hungry I'll need this bread but you did very well and this I think what you what you're very good at on the whole series is creating very long lasting images I think you on Alex's back wearing that thing is very funny. And then also the thing I keep meaning to bring up, which is I think my favorite,

one of my favorite images from Taskmaster and a very good gift as well. If you're into your gifts is you stood on the table, Alex is off the table and you're looking at the jelly slide down the pole is fantastic. It gets used a lot. I mean, I've, I've definitely over my career become many a meme, some of which I regret and some some of which I'm I'm fond of um and some of some of which I knew as I was doing it I was like oh there's gonna be a

fucking meme by the morning I'm like you know put the take the sausage out of your mouth Aisling but with that jelly one it's often used like waiting for Brexit or lockdown this or trying to you know you got feeling when or whatever it is and it's always quite funny to me well it's often used like waiting for Brexit or lockdown this or trying to, you know, you got feeling when or whatever it is. And it's always quite funny to me. Well, it's because a lot of, you know, a lot of the political situation in the last four or five years has been very jelly sliding down a pole, hasn't it? Jelly sliding down a pole.

Wishy-washy, wishy-washy sliding down a pole. Yeah. But Alex is very good. He's very good at like, he will match whatever speed the person who he's with is so if you are being silly or dry he'll be silly and dry if you sort of take your time he won't rush you he's he's a very good facilitator of the moment or what's happening or your energy so at that moment I just wanted to stare at my own demise and he helped me with that so yeah so you did pretty

well there to end up only 64 meters away Bob did slightly better it's it does always blow my mind how practical Bob is because yes he says so many silly things but like you say in quite a deadpan way he is really practically just he's a very good dad dad figure yes but this is what's lovely about the show is there's there's no you never feel like oh i'm gonna be totally terrible at everything there'll be something that will surprise you like i'm quite a domestic person so you could actually eat all the things i made um because i cook quite a lot but some people when they watch this show assume that I'm like oh I'd say you're an absolute mess in the house you know and I'm not I'm a really tidy person so there's certain things and the same with like you know Bob's an actual dad he's got kids

like finding people and stuff like that you know knowing where you are being in directions there's qualities of that that you're like yeah that would actually lean into that more so than the silly or or with a musical bit like you know dancing and singing and just surprisingly coming together as a band or an issue mark you know being a band and then wanting to actually be like no we're really good we're band guys um yeah i think when nish played the guitar people were really surprised to what because he's really good at the guitar and he always practices he's always playing the guitar yeah and then when he actually did it I think people like but you've been such a tip for the whole series yeah yeah yeah yeah um so yeah so Bob yeah he did he did quite well at that one he did very well um Sally uh everything sally does makes me laugh but and it makes her laugh as well to be fair sally was so glorious and also the way her brain works is is really like say bob is we're all sort

of like lefty alty kind of comedians at times. But I think Sally is a truest, completely alt comedy brain out of the bunch, which you might not think. Yeah. She's the most, thinks in the weirdest, most fantastical way. And when we'd be working together, I would have, you know, sometimes you'd think,

oh, maybe that's for the camera. It's not, that's genuinely how beautiful and brilliant her brain works um you know not even playing for the laugh her thing will be the silliest like stuffing alex's trousers with cake or and it's really it's it's really quite beautiful to watch and it's like someone like lou sanders as well someone who genuinely is is so on another level playing field, like a sort of brilliant genius of silliness. Completely. And she, yeah, just even the way she started laughing when this task came up,

when they start describing what the task is, you can hear her off camera just howling with laughter. She remembers quite how badly she did. What did she do again? Well, it worked out all right in the end, but like she, I mean, both her and Nish, I mean, and Mark, Mark didn't do great. Mark didn't use the bread properly.

And then when he realized what the bread was for, it just, again, Greg says it, it summed up his entire time on Taskmaster. A dog just appeared and started eating the bread. See, I think when we remember about this stuff, you were watching as if we all did it on the same day, but these were long days. You'd started like five in the morning. Yeah. think when we remember about this stuff you are watching as if we all did it on the same day but these were long days you'd started like five in the morning yeah and by the end of the day so

depending on what task they put where like what type of brain you have is very different so you first thing in the morning and someone else might have done it like late in the afternoon but like me doing something for I'm quite a good morning person in the afternoon I totally slump I'm probably more likely to cheat if I did the task around three or four o'clock no matter what it is and you forget that we were squashing all the tasks into say five or six filming days over the course of three or four months so sometimes you were being lazy because you were like it was near lunch and you were hungry other times you were so ramped up because you just had a coffee there were other times when yeah you were just like what's what's cheaty cheaty way because I'm not in the like I've or I'm quite overheated because it was a sunny day near that river

and I'm overheated so what's the like coolest physically coolest way to do this you know so that's quite funny like remember we're all remembering different states we were in doing these tasks as well. They weren't like normal nine to five days. You're remembering different weathers and what you were going through personally, as you were doing all of these mad things at home and stuff like that, you know?

Well, yeah. Sally just sort of storms off in the wrong direction. She does. She ends up 74 meters away. So she still gets the three points uh mark 70 meters away but couldn't find any of the bread because the dog ate it uh and nish i mean this is just this sums nish up for me i think he walks around in multiple circles for something he doesn't walk in a straight line he only ends up 15 meters away from where he started and then and then when he has to walk back walks 180 meters away from where he is he just very confidently strides off in the straight line he should have walked in the first time it is incredible when you're watching it you go would you not just would you just do this or

would you not just do that but again your brain is in all of these different states and you don't know what's going to happen yeah so you just opened an envelope and you're trying to almost like get your head around the english of what's in the envelope and then suddenly you're blindfolded in a place you don't know and while you might be like oh that's so silly you're it's harder it i mean this is such an obvious thing to say but a lot of the stuff is harder than it looks and then other things are absolutely easy like reading the instructions properly and that's where I would often fall down. Well, it was one point for Nish, two points for Mark, three points for Sally, four points for you, Aisling, and five points for Bob.

I think the only way to do this really is to walk in what I believe to be a completely straight line. Now, already, that's not very nice, is it? OK, Alex, how's your back? Here we go. OK, go straight that way. Okay. What's the loaf... the slice of bread for? Is that just one of those things?

Ah, breadcrumbs. I could leave a trail of breadcrumbs. Put me down for a second. I've just realized the point of the toast. I should have put the toast down where I started. You've got one minute and ten seconds to go. In that case, it's time to be more liberal with the bread. Ow! Ow! Ow! What? Bread? Just be aware now, I would.

Yes, I see what you mean. Well, I don't see anything at all. That was so tiring. Was it? Well, I don't see anything at all. Oh, that was so tiring. Was it? Oh, I'm sick. Task two, muster the biggest coconut bobsleigh team. Most coconut bobsleigh team members still on board when the bobsleigh comes to a halt. Wins, you may only use items in the caravan to secure your coconuts. You'll be disqualified if you use any item used by another contestant.

You have 20 minutes and one attempt. Your time starts now. Do you remember this ashling did i sellotape them to a skateboard everyone had to use the skateboard that was part of the so you had to use the skateboard i'd say the thing that you got the five points you absolutely smashed this i'd say the thing that defines your bobsleigh is the banana barrier oh yeah oh my god when you're describing this back to me i've had less i've had less lucid acid trips this is i actually did that as a human i smashed up a banana because you couldn't use sellotape there was no sellotape so i was trying to create the barrier by which not make them fall off yeah and i use the banana barrier of course he's the banana do it again yeah he's string as well uh and i think he's some uh some

tennis rackets i watched a lot of macgyver growing up and i think i always thought of myself as someone who if i was in a pickle would be able to use such cunning to like orchestrate a bomb or like get out of the white house in time or whatever it is and and on this whole show that's what i'm attempting to do but i would absolutely have died in a white house or you know whatever the thing is i would be like god bless her but absolutely dead yeah and covered in mashed banana covered in mashed banana she lived and she died um well because it felt insane when you started doing it. I was like, oh, what's Aisling playing at now? That banana barrier isn't

going to work. But lo and behold, you got 14 coconuts to the end of the course. It's still the only form of contraception I use. Yeah. And banana barrier, you say banana barrier, it sounds like just a weird word for the normal one, but you know, you're being literal. No literal i genuinely mean it uh nish uh this was a success from nish he uses

a drawer which is very good lateral thinking and a milk uh milk bottle crate um and i don't know if you remember this they left deliberately a suitcase in there that they labeled a coconut harness and everyone else went in there and made a sarcastic comment going oh everyone's going to use this oh there's a coconut harness there here what a coincidence and nishran is the one of the purest things i've ever seen he picks it he picks it up and went maybe i can use this and alex went what is it nish and he went it's a coconut harness i remember that moment and i'm really loving my friend yeah i remember it's funny like what it's memories are there because of feelings so if you had no big feeling around something but i actually remember that moment

because it was so pure and gorgeous and i knew that wasn't nish being silly or funny it was almost caught like a normal person not a comedian and it was really gorgeous I remember that and being like, I love you. Well, he did very well. He got 13 coconuts. Mark just bunged 19 on the skateboard and hoped for the best. Didn't tether them, didn't secure them in any way. And two stayed on, which incredibly earned him three points. And Bob and Sally, sadly, even though they both did well, both used the curtain to secure the coconuts and then both got onto the skateboard.

Bob's weren't on board anyway. He was just sort of dragging them by the sides. I don't think he would have got the points anyway. That's what was tough about the show when something like that would come up because when you didn't know of the other and you're trying to think, so Nish is one of my best friends.

I became very close with Sally doing the show and I would know Bob and Mark, but I wouldn't sort of like, what will they do? It's not like a guy, an immediate gang of pals. So you're trying to think around people you don't totally know. Like we all became great friends during it. But, and the one thing we all stick to, and I'm sure you're the same, is that we, myself and Nish, never, ever talked about a single thing we did.

Yes. We never, ever. We genuinely stuck to that. And everyone did. So when we met, we didn't, we didn't breach that rule. And I think it was because it was actually a bit of the fun

and we didn't want to ruin the fun of ourselves by letting them know. So that's the one. Oh, the only thing we sort of mildly suggested that because we were all so proud was we were all like oh I can't wait till the singing the song we'd say that to each other yeah because I think we all thought we were absolutely beautiful like we all thought again after this musicals will start ringing yeah but like they were really proud of their song and

I remember like being like oh my god I'm just like you know I'm a young I'm a young Sinead O'Connor here just waiting to be discovered and when we sing Rosalind's a nightmare it'll be amazing so that's the only thing we sort of hinted at like oh yeah we did we we sounded really the band was good yeah yeah yeah but yeah I mean you're both right you know I mean you're both astonishing songs and uh you know that's why it was the last task of the whole series but the no musicals called there hasn't been that those calls haven't come no but i now wonder is there something wrong with my telephone you say it is so obvious that they should have it's the only answer it can be my

telephone maybe once we talk about it on the podcast i'm sure that yes the podcast will do the thing yeah yeah so sadly nought points for Bob and Sally, even though Sally's test run on the skateboard, just her sat on a skateboard, is just so fun to watch. She's so excited and she's so little and fits on the whole skateboard and just flies down it about 100 miles an hour

and crashes into the coconuts and bursts out laughing again, obviously. It was three points for Mark, four points for Nish and five points for you and your banana barrier. It is amazing how some games on this show can just give us a brief window into the souls of the competitors. I've written down everything that they said.

Bob said nothing, he just got on with it. Aisling said, I already know I'm going to be brilliant at this. Which is incredible. Mark said, oh, I don't know about this. Sally said, this looks scary. And Nish went, oh, shit. Extra task here. This is another one of the ones where you need to sort of know

what the others are going to do. It's vote for which contestant you think should receive five bonus points. The contestant who receives the most votes will receive five bonus points. You may vote for yourself. If, however, you vote for yourself and fail to receive most votes you will lose two points interesting more of a psychological experiment this one psychological one but i knew and i think we all did am i right in thinking none of us voted for ourselves you are wrong in thinking that uh mark and nish both voted for themselves oh that's now i'm remembering the surprise because again

i had the same feeling going it's a good gang no one will vote for themselves and i's now i'm remembering the surprise because again i had the same feeling going it's a good gang no one will vote for themselves and i'm like am i right i'm thinking then you're like no you're wrong i'm like god damn no mark and nish both did it which is the most arrogant i voted for sally and sally voted for me no no sally voted for bob bob voted uh for sally you voted for sally i voted for sally yeah and no one voted for me no one voted for Sally. You voted for Sally. I voted for Sally, yeah. And no one voted for me. No one voted for you. I'm retrospectively annoyed now. Well, no one voted for Mark and Nish

apart from themselves, which I think is the most demeaning thing. Yeah, but that's what I mean. I didn't even back myself. No one backed me. I didn't back me. Bloody hell. But what was incredible about this whole thing

was Sally guessed exactly what was going to happen. So she just walked in straight away and went, well, the boys will vote for themselves except for Bob. Yes, that was it, yeah. I think Bob will vote for, I think she knew exactly, she said exactly how it was going to play out, which was pretty incredible. So Sally got the five points, nought points for Bob,

nought points for you. And then both Mark and Nish, minus two points for being arrogant little boys. So they're voting for someone to get five bonus points. So, I guess the tactic is to vote for who you think is the weakest person to improve their score. Yep. Sally voted for Bob, Bob voted for Sally. That's nice. Aww!

Aisling also voted for Sally. So far, so true. So, so far, no-one's voted for themselves. Yeah, but... What do you think Mark and Nish did? I mean... They voted for themselves. Exactly what Sally said came true. Sally gets five points, they both lose two points. They both lose two points.

It was incredible. Task four. Make a funny little flipbook film. The mat beneath your feet is the paper. The camera above your head will take photos of your paper. Funniest little flipbook film wins. You have one hour. Now flip the flipbook. book yeah and that was quite an intimate one because you watch that flip book but it's a very bloody slow thing to make and there were times i was just lying on the floor on top

of alex yeah and you're just like this is you know intimate it's just a sort of intimate task really surprisingly because also you know you only see two seconds of it but that's an hour of like slowly rolling around on the floor together on paper yeah those are the ones I enjoyed the most they were my all of those things the little movies or the little scenes and stuff they were always my favorite story like the storytelling ones were always my favorite tasks because i also couldn't wait to see with the exact same situation how everyone else would interpret those but i think i had a man going for a walk with his dog and then what happened i think you were playing catch with alex uh then the ball flew off and i think you were in love with alex but then you ended up falling

on top of i believe it was gary the cameraman uh and uh falling in love with Gary the cameraman and then I think I think he rubbed poo in your face oh but I landed in poo yeah I'd actually land in poo which was something that had sort of happened to me but on a horse so I must have been chomping at that where I landed in a poo of a horse in front of a boy I fancied so I was again working through a lot of pain and that would become the second pilot from this way up yeah the um that using my pain through art um yes that was it and then I was an Alex sad or heartbroken at the end or something yeah it's very evocative I like yeah and Mark had a similar sort of his was about friendship um a lovely I mean both of yours quite involved I'd say uh whereas I think um maybe some of the others benefited from being

a little bit simpler so Bob did the banana yeah I am too high I flew too close to the sun Ed well that's it the thing is you were you had a sitcom within you at the time um and then so given that opportunity you're like now it's time for me to get all of this narrative out onto the page whereas very tricky to do i will always over underestimate how much time is i have and how much there is to do on every single part of my life getting ready getting dressed washing myself getting out the door when i'm on stage talking oh my giddy aunt always the wrong way around but i give it the old college triad i give it the old college track well yeah bob's banana uh video was very well thought through simple but then obviously he had to i guess he had to chop different bananas the different lengths to push it into his eye

it sounds mad telling you this um no i i do remember that was a good one yeah nish also bagged the five points um uh he ate the cat the cat uh ran around he stroked it and then he ate the cat uh went in his mouth yeah very good three full characters with backstories in his yeah exactly there was no need i'm seeing someone came back to the studio for him to go the thing is you need to know about that cat it's been through a hard time yeah this is all based on when i fell off a horse yeah you can tell you still got the three points three points uh along with sally who did her sort of french uh tale of a cat bouncing the cat is boing boing um again i think that's what you're talking about with her brain it's very genuinely odd yeah yeah fantastic and interesting um mark's tale of friendship and fruit got three points as well

and nish's cat and bob's banana got five points The live task now, the studio task, send the most things to the taskmaster items must travel via zipline and land on your segment of the taskmaster's table you may not move from your current position you have 100 seconds did you enjoy doing the live studio tasks um yes i did because those studio days actually watching through stuff for really long yeah and they're really i mean they're really good fun you can sort of let loose i mean you didn't yeah and you didn't do great in this one did i do great no you didn't do great i mean i don't know if whether you counted it as a sport or not maybe maybe it's because i forgot that i hadn't done great that's something that was what five years ago and i feel like this podcast is just like reminding me of fails you know and i was like you could have said yeah i'd be like

great sorry because you don't remember i should have just said you won the whole series really shouldn't i it's like um going being in one of those movies and someone wakes up with no memory right this is the perfect chance to just tell them everything's fine and instead you're like oh you don't have a great relationship with your wife uh you're in debt severely in debt um you're not great with people you're very socially awkward and you're like oh i could have restarted well you got look you got two points sally got one point uh nish got three points mark got four and bob got five final scores of the episode nish bottom well let's let's I win well let's wait let's get there

Mark got 15 points Sally got 16 points you got 17 points Bob got 18 points but you won anyway thank you yay I forgot that I wasn't good

you know what my favourite prize was because I know at the end of the episode but my favourite prize was the I know at the end of the episode but my favorite prize was the hats one yes where I made I got Dave Gorman's uh my friend Beth who's Dave Gorman's wife to essentially make me a hat out of Yorkshire puddings yeah and I cannot tell you how much I'm not sure if I said this on the show but she made me two like she made two just in case one didn't um work out and so I told production I was like oh I'm made two just in case one didn't work out. And so I told production, I was like, oh, I'm bringing two just in case you can have an extra one. And the evening before the studio, I was like, gosh, say that giant Yorkshire pudding is lovely.

I think it would be nice with cheese on it. And I just ate it. I only bought one. I absolutely ate the whole yorkshire pudding hat the night before that's great i do not regret at all my only regret is that i didn't eat the second one and bring nothing because it was one of the most delicious things in the world there was it was a wonderful photo of dave gordon wearing a big yorkshire pudding as a hat though you've got to admit yes exactly and we could have just used a picture but

i actually brought the other yorkshire pudding to the studio yeah um but i oh every day i regret not eating that second one and that was my biggest of of the same email that this is the this is the only one i'm going to read out this one's from andy parkinson but trust me listeners we know that you also sent one in it's a great question uh andy says hi ed and the taskmaster team love the podcast love taskmaster series five is one of my favourites. My question for Aisling is, is her mum still testing her potential boyfriends on the jockey training horse? Keep up the excellent work.

That's so recent and yes, and true, that I'd forgotten I said that, but actively very much so. And if you look at my Instagram from around, it would have been June, so and if you look on my instagram from around it would have been june you will see me up on the horse around around that time it was getting tested let's put

it that way um but you will see the the electronic horse at race if you look at my instagram from june of this of the last june we had in 2021 absolutely and I I totally forgot that I mentioned that on the show and it's it's quite like a yeah yeah I just you for the things you say you're there right you I totally and luckily my mother has a good old energy but I'd be careful of mentioning other people because they're like can you stop mentioning I was like what did I do it again just um yeah if you could have seen if you could have seen Aisling's face when I brought that up there it was just oh right I did I had no idea I'd said that and yes she still does that absolutely not really yes it's been used more times than I would like

Aisling thank you so much for coming on the Taskmaster podcast we always get our guests to rate their experience on the podcast between one and five points in the style of the Taskmaster podcast, we always get our guests to rate their experience on the podcast between one and five points in the style of the Taskmaster. So have you enjoyed doing the podcast and would you give it one, two, three, four or five points? Is there an option to give nothing? Yes, I guess so. You could disqualify

the entire experience from your life. Yeah. Am I joking? You got me. You got me me i will give you five for everything ed sass zoom background because that's obviously clearly some shithole zoom background um change it to what your house really looks like okay hang on now what's weird is that i suddenly pivoted my whole without you doing anything to deserve it into like a roast comic i'd give you nothing your house looks terrible why did i do that you can say multitudes actually you're in you're in la you've clearly got a gig at roast

battle tonight or something and yeah like what am i doing to my friend ed he's been absolutely lovely and kind with a lovely calm dad energy about him. And I'm like, yeah, silly Matt. Like I have had actually a glorious time to the point where I've forgotten I'm on a Zoom. Lovely. Well, that's good. It's like we're in the room together. Yeah. The Zoom where it happened. Well, enjoy the rest of your day, thank you very much for coming on the Taskmaster podcast. And we will speak to you again soon. Thank you very much. And also thank you very much to everyone who watches the show because there are some super fans out there,

which even years later, people are so nice about it. And it's lovely when like families play the games and send messages in of their tasks or the things that they do. So keep on doing that because it's really lovely and glorious. And it's a very pure joy

at a time of like divisiveness and opinions and but genuinely people are very joyful and sweet about the show and it's really nice thank you very much ashling i love you ed do you love me of course bye bye there we are thank you very much to Aisling for coming on. I mean, now and again, the guest will not watch the episode because they don't want to watch themselves on something, which is absolutely fair enough. But Aisling's recall of what actually happened in those episodes

was quite incredible. She didn't need to watch it. Huge fan of Aisling's work, of course. You can go and check it all out this way up, especially go and watch that. Thank you very much for listening don't forget to vote for taskmaster in the british comedy guide awards at comedy.co.uk we will be back next week to talk about series 5 episode 8 the final episode of

series 5 then we'll be moving of course on to the champion of champions episodes the series 1 to 5 champion of champions episodes a lot of confusion last week when i said that people got excited and said i accidentally blurted out the broadcast dates for the new champion of champions i do not know those dates they do not tell me those things when you find out i will find out thank you very much for listening we'll see you next week goodbye Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly, host of Under the Influence. Recently, we created an episode on cannabis marketing. With cannabis legalization, it's a brand new challenging marketing category. And I want to let you know we've produced a special bonus podcast episode where I talk to an actual cannabis producer.

I wanted to know how a producer becomes licensed, how a cannabis company competes with big corporations, how a cannabis company markets its products in such a highly regulated category, and what the term dignified consumption actually means. I think you'll find the answers interesting and surprising. Hear it now on Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly. This bonus episode is brought to you by the Ontario Cannabis Store and ACAS Creative.