The Rest Is Entertainment - How much are Goggleboxers paid, and what are the secrets behind on-screen registration plates and phone numbers?

Episode Date: February 29, 2024

Ever wondered if you called a phone number on screen what would happen, or have you searched for an on-screen car registration plate? Plus, do authors earn anything from Amazon discount deals? A bounty-full question... and answer edition of The Rest Is Entertainment with Richard Osman and Marina Hyde. Twitter: @restisents Email: [e-mail] Producer: Neil Fearn Executive Producers: Tony Pastor + Jack Davenport 🌏 Get our exclusive NordVPN deal here ➼ https://nordvpn.com/trie It’s risk-free with Nord’s 30-day money-back guarantee! ✅ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Best Western made booking our family beach vacation a breeze. And it felt a little like... Come on kids, back to the hotel room. Good night, kids. Good night, Mama. Life's a trip. Make the most of it at Best Western. This episode is brought to you by Fidelity Investments Canada.

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Funds and ETFs are not guaranteed. Their values change, and past performance may not be repeated. Hello and welcome to the Restors Entertainment Questions Edition. I am Marina Hyde. Hi, I'm Richard Osborne. Welcome to our Questions and Answers Edition. You've got an apology to make. I have got a self-mandated apology, fortunately,

because it could have been mandated by someone far more serious than myself. As I was leaving, having recorded this podcast last week, I was thinking, why did we appeal to people to tell us their stories if they've been on a jury with a celebrity? Even if they'd done it, it would be a contempt of court. For us to broadcast it, I mean, I actually think we might have committed an incitement towards contempt of court last week. You know, we don't want to go to prison.

Yeah, I don't mind. If you think prison scares me, then you don't know me. See, I think I justify a lot of things in life by saying, oh, I'd be fine. I went to boarding school. But I think the points of difference with boarding school would be the bits I had the problems with. But I didn't go to boarding school. So for me, it would all be new. It would all be a novelty. Yeah, well, it would be a great podcast. Also problems with but I didn't go to boarding school so I don't for me it would all be new it would all be it would all be a novelty yeah well it'd be a great podcast

but also I'd like the I'd like the court case yeah because they're not really going to send us to prison and it'd be really really good publicity there is actually no space in prison so perhaps the podcast too might we might just be out on sort of honestly if we were in prison we'd be doing a podcast like every day yes the rest is prison yeah it would be an interesting listen actually but by the way I got a huge amount of messages from people who said they had been on Juries with Celebrities and now I can't say any of them. You shouldn't actually even allude to them

because even that, all of those people have committed contempt of court. But the key thing is, I'm not frightened. Absolutely. The week's come and get me plea is to the police. Absolutely. This week's come and get me plea is to the police. And also, try me in a court of law with the gladiators as the jury. I'm happy to do it and I will name

each and every one of them. I bet you are because they'd suddenly acquit you after all the publicity you've given it. Alright, should we do some questions? Yeah, let's do that. By the way, also after last week's one, so many people talked about could crime writers commit the perfect murder. So many crime writers and

Agatha Christie's great great grandson pitching me perfect murders as well. It turns out everyone's thinking about how to commit the perfect murder all the time. But no one's doing it. Thank goodness. Okay, I have a question for you Marina. I say I have a question for you. Alex Svensson. That's a strong

name isn't it? Very strong name. Alex Svensson. You could name a character after Alex Svensson couldn't you? You could do. What happened to theenson, couldn't you? You could do. What happened to the Western, asks Alec, once the biggest genre in Hollywood for a decade and now nothing? Why do some genres simply disappear and would it happen to superhero films which seem to be the Western of the past 20 years? I think that's a very good comparison actually between the two genres.

And what happened to the Western by sort of popular belief is there was a film which you'll have heard of because's became a sort of byword for enormous flops. Heaven's Gate, which is a Michael Cimino film, is the film he did after The Deer Hunter when he was riding very, very high. It became a hugely troubled production. It was massively expensive. And what it crucially did was it collapsed not just its studio, United Artists, a storied and amazing sort of Hollywood studio that had a huge pedigree. It collapsed the genre of the Western.

Oh, wow. And it basically collapsed what was called the new Hollywood, which was all these kind of young independent filmmakers who were outside the studio system were making these kind of experimental films. And, you know, obviously everyone from Scorsese, Coppola, in this case Cimino. And really after that, what it did is it pulled people back these auteurs who'd gone off and kind of

existed almost without oversight people thought right now we need proper oversight we're going to be right on top of them and the people who sort of won in a way were the nerds the sort of however brilliant they are the sort of Spielbergs and the lucases who were able to stick to budgets didn't do kind of crazy things like francis ford coppola did on apocalypse now where he was kind of borrowing helicopters from the philippine air force and it was just a kind of chaotic famously chaotic shoot so that's what happened to the westerns and every now and then it kind of you know you'd have a western that would come out like unforgiven um i don't know am i calling young guns a western i guess i am yeah yeah I am and then uh Django

Unchained I guess was a sort of version of a kind of subverted version of a western in terms of superhero movies yes I do think that the same thing will ultimately happen to superhero movies because there's a point at which you can't filter every story through that same prism and Kevin Feige who's the head of Marvel, always says, you know, we've got every genre, we've got She-Hulk, which is a legal drama. It's like, no, no, no, you've only, as we said before on this thing, you have one genre, which is superhero stories, and trying to sort of funnel the entire, you know, range of human experience through that one kind of sort of way of doing it is, it becomes very boring. And people, you know, superhero fatigue

is real, it has set in and I think the trouble is is that the studios have committed so completely to this genre and so many of the big things on their upcoming slates for the next kind of two years are within that genre and they for such a long time thought of it almost less as kind of artistry and more as banking it was such a reliable it was the most reliable way to make money ever really in the history of hollywood like buying whiskey yeah yeah and yes and um sequel after sequel made money and they're going to have to come up with something new because eventually people will get bored with these genres and it just doesn't work any longer be a good time to pitch a western in fact it would be now a great time the western doesn't

speak to us anymore as a as a genre really because we're not so close to that era and we don't see it in that same way it just doesn't speak to a global world in the same it's interesting why this superhero genre has been such a big deal in this time but well it's interesting there's a movie oh god it's probably 10 years ago now that i thought this is the best idea for a movie of all time and did nothing in the end i thought i wonder if that's because Westerns were too far in the past. And that was Cowboys vs. Aliens.

Yes. Which is, I mean, is there a better, the moment whoever came up with that just thought, hold on, it's a cowboy movie, but aliens come down and the cowboys fight the aliens. They must have just gone, I mean, this is like Christmas. Every meeting they had on that, every studio must have gone, okay, what have you got for us?

And you go, Cowboys versus Aliens. They go, okay, how much? It's a three-word pitch, yeah. And yet, as you see, Richard, I must say I wasn't taken immediately by that pitch, and I don't think it did anything. It did, yeah, it did nothing. Those genre mash-up things, I think,

actually work very, very rarely, and in that case, unsurprisingly fast. You'd be the only meeting they had in that day. You'd be going, what? Cowboys versus Aliens? That doesn't make any sense. Yeah, just keep talking because at the moment I've got three words and I don't like any of them really. I don't mind cowboys.

I don't mind aliens. I just don't want them to work together. I don't want them together. Exactly. I like steak. I like jelly. I don't like steak versus jelly. There's a show. Okay, this is your one. James Scott asks about Gogglebox box how much would people on goggle box be paid is it the same for all contestants or would their pay be based on screen

time i like contestants as yeah yeah um gladiators oh no sorry that's the wrong show let's just mention gladiators again they are it takes them about they film it across two days sort of 12 or 13 hours so they're all paid for loss of earnings different sums depending on how long they've been there not crazy sums but not you know not nothing but one of the key things is a few times a year uh the goggle box universe does adverts for products and some of the longest serving goggle boxes get to do those adverts and for adverts they've paid the absolute kind of going rate which is a lot a lot of money exactly so you know people are giving up an awful lot of employment opportunities to do that show

and they're not allowed to exploit it outside of it you never see them on on other shows and of course you can leave the Gogglebox universe and go on to other things Scarlett Moffat being the sort of best example who left and you know now now as a staple on tv but yeah i think it's um that's why so many of them have been there so long so many of the the much loved ones um it's back this week do you know what gogglebox constantly amazes me about how brilliant it is every time you will never regret watching an episode of gogglebox you learn more about britain from gogglebox than pretty much any other TV show.

If ever they do the news, you're like, oh, here we go. What have they got? You know, you just think, you know, when you watch Liz Truss in America embarrassing herself, you think, oh God, I hope they do that on Gogglebox. I hope they do, yeah, but it's like a focus group for the whole of culture.

It's like a live ongoing focus group where you love the people. I almost always love the people in focus groups because I think it's a completely fascinating sort of science but to know the characters in the focus group it's so warm and clever and amazing is the best high concept thing ever and it's an enormous reference point now for for so many tv and film people as i was in a netflix meeting the other day for a script that this guy's written which is brilliant and it's got like a final scene which is a will he won't he and i was saying but i can just see this scene on goggle box with the welsh couple

going oh no he's not going to is he oh he's going to oh my god oh don't oh he's going to and netflix was saying we think that all the time with scenes we think how how would this how would this play on goggle box it's very rare to have a show that just is all good and i think i think goggle box is one of those. Yeah, what a cultural success right across the board. Fascinating. There was a tweet once that said, which men in our culture would you be completely comfortable in a room with?

And someone replied, the Siddiquis from Gogglebox. I think, yeah, yeah. Yes, absolutely. Exactly that. I have a question for you, Marina. This is from Paul. Thank you. We get so many questions and we sort of look through them.

Occasionally one leaps out that I kind of think, I bet Marina will have a view on this. So Paul asks, do you know how real are car registrations in films and dramas? I would love it if you could help me to stop fixating on this question. Every time there is a shot of car registration in a film or drama. Otherwise, I think it's time I sought therapy. Oh, Paul, I love you. And you're not alone, by the way. on this question every time there's a shot of car registration in a film or drama otherwise i think it's time i sought therapy oh paul i love you and you're not alone by the way this is something

that i don't want to i want to say men in particular but men in particular fixate over this okay i talked to someone to do in line of duty and they were like we get so much communication from people saying that range rover that model could not have that registration plate okay now this is some we're getting some it's a real esoterica here but the dvla will issue what they call ghost plates okay to just get rid of this whole problem yeah to get rid of yeah they're unissued plates four dead chefs yeah compete against each other. Anyway, listen, I'm just... Ghost plates. This week on ghost plates. Okay. Fanny Craddock.

I love that show. Please, can you hold that? Okay, so unissued plates. Now, I should say that there's also something that this reads across to, which is phone numbers in things. Now, phone numbers, historically, whenever you see an American show,

they always say area code 555 because it doesn't exist. You know, I've got to tell you, if you run a New York number, people will try and call the Ghostbusters. If you say who you're going to call and they will try and call the Ghostbusters, they will try and call any number, a large number of people, many more than you think will try and call any number that they see on screen ever. Now, Ofcom have got a recommended 01623 code for all British TV. So that's just a bit of a detour on things like that. My friend Tom Blakeson, who now produces The Wheel and lots of other quiz shows, is the absolute quiz guru. He once, he did the, when Armando Iannucci was doing the armistice election thing

and they put a phone number on screen and he put Tom Blakeson's phone number on there for some reason. Tom said it did not stop ringing for weeks it's unbelievable it was it was actually on screen for like two seconds and he said everybody rang it people ring in all the time they which is why you have to anyway but with cars um manufacturers have higher fleets which they will lend out um which is obviously cheaper but it's why you sometimes see like quite kind of low down the chain coppers driving a really nice new Audi and you think, well, how's that happened? But people really mind about this stuff. They also mind about like people getting out of cars and not locking the

doors. They're like, what? I mean, you know, you're trying to tell me this is a scene, it's a rough area. You're going in to talk to this person in this house about something they might have seen. If you don't lock your car and it really takes them out of the moment. So don't seek therapy, Paul. You're not alone. You can find solace on many talk boards i will tell you that the absolute boon now for editors who have that thing of oh you haven't locked your car yeah is um the sound of an electric lock which they can just add on in post they go hold on he didn't lock his car yeah oh god stick on a beep and then we'll assume he's just done it with his uh electric thing so it's a good question not unlocking was a big thing and then it was like no no no he's got one of those you know things yeah so it's all i was talking to an english

actor recently he was working with a big name hollywood actor and he had to take a phone call take a phone number on a phone call write it down on a bit of paper for the hollywood actor and the hollywood actor then had to respond so he took down the note he just wrote down just wrote down some numbers and the big name Hollywood actor looks at the bit of paper and just looks up at this action he goes what what is this he goes I'll just write down because the number is supposed to be a New York number you've absolutely I'm out of the scene completely you've absolutely lost me me. And you're like, okay. What a complete dick. Yeah. Unusual in that line of work.

Yes. So unusual. Isn't it just? Okay, Richard, I think we should go to a break now. But when we come back, I'm going to ask you a question about discounted books in the daily deals on Amazon and things like that. Whoa. Okay. Why does it make you think of me?

This episode is brought to you by Fidelity Investments Canada. Make investing simple. Fidelity's all-in-one ETFs are designed to do just that. In fact, Fidelity does the heavy lifting, including rebalancing these ETFs to help navigate changing market conditions. Visit fidelity.ca slash all-in-one. Getting closer to your goals could start today. Commissions, fees, and expenses may apply. Read the funds or ETFs prospectus before investing. Funds and ETFs are not guaranteed. Their values change and past performance may not be repeated. What day of the week do you look forward to most?

Well, it should be Wednesday. Ahem, Wednesday. Why, you wonder? Whopper Wednesday, of course. When you can get a great deal on a whopper. Flame grilled and made your way. And you won't want to miss it. So make every Wednesday a Whopper Wednesday.

Only at Burger King, where you rule. Working at your local Tim's is more than serving coffee. It's building connections with a team in a great environment, connecting with your guests in the community, and participating in programs like Smile Cookie and Hockey Card Trade Nights. So join your local Tim's team today. Apply now at careers.timhortons.ca. Welcome back. Richard, I have got a question for you when an author's books are included in the daily deal on amazon in the kindle store at a reduced price are you as the author or your agent

involved in the decision or do amazon determine the reduced price it's a good question in in general amazon will set their own price for a book. So, you know, if I have a new book out and the recommended retail price is £22, Amazon would almost always do it at £11. It makes no difference to me if it's £11 or £22. They have to pay the same amount. It's just so they can get the most of the market. Your local bookshops, independent bookshops, cannot match that because they're paying rates, they're paying rents,

they're providing, you know, service and all that kind of stuff. So if your local bookshop is selling them for £17, £18, they are not ripping you off. That's the cheapest that they can possibly do it. If you feel it is worth your while paying an extra £6 or £7 just so you've got an amazing shop full of amazing people on your high street, I think it's well worth it. Absolutely, always support if you can.

Exactly. But either way, the author is getting the same amount. And when it comes down to paperbacks, again, it'll be recommended price about £10. Amazon will do them for £4.50. Your local shop will do them for £8, something like that. And the author gets exactly the same. If you're talking about these daily deals and discounted things on Kindle, that is different.

Amazon have to say to you, we want to make your book available for 99p or whatever it is and if you want the publicity of that you will do it i've never never ever discounted any of the thursday murder club books on kindle they say uh volume for vanity price for sanity because you know if you if you do sell your book for 99p you can sell a lot of books but the author is not making a penny so the author will make absolutely nothing they will make pretty much nothing if you're charging three pound or or less there's there's nothing there so that's just for the publisher just going this has run out of steam you know it might have been out for a year you know we're not gonna we're not selling thousands and thousands a week like on the apprentice when you know they start selling

cupcakes for two pound right at the end of the task just to get rid of them so it's a good way of finding new authors for authors it can work that someone can try out their work for 99p and then go back into the back catalogue and buy the more expensive things but by and large if a book is discounted in a shop the author gets full price those daily deals when it's very very cheap the author will get nothing at all but I will say again and again and again that local bookshops do not have that luxury you know they work on fine margins and they provide a service that's above and beyond just sending you a book in a cardboard envelope and nobody at an independent bookshop is grifting you you know they're really they are literally mortified that you can find this

cheaper somewhere else because other people have different business plans and that's why they by and large try and give you the best customer service that they can that's a very good question that was from k by the way i'm sorry that i didn't say her name at the start uh one for you marina from uh oh this is a good name one of these days i'm going to name a character in a book after one of our questioners well this one's a good this one's go so rico rinaldo writes in hey rico what are your feelings on trigger warnings across all forms of entertainment i get emails from my supermarket to opt out of receiving mother's day adverts in case it upsets me which seems counterintuitive as by asking me to opt out you have already triggered me by asking me about mother's day

and bringing it to my attention. Thank you, Rico. I think that is a very good point. I must say I don't think that trigger warnings are a good thing. And the chief reason that I don't think they are is because they don't work. All the research suggests that they don't impact people's emotional responses to things. In fact, the forbidden fruit effect, as it were, might be actually causing people and trigger warnings to have the completely opposite effect. And sometimes people call it the nocebo effect, where, you know, you've got a negative expectation of something because you've been told that it's going to be distressing, and therefore,

it exacerbates distressing outcomes. There are many, many different studies on this that just say it doesn't work. And I think it's therefore a sort of piece of performative mumbo jumbo that is probably doing more harm than good. But people go along with them and the obligation to do it because they fear that they might be being shamed as mean, or perhaps they feel they need to, it's a sort of in-group signifier, isn't it? That, you know, certain type of people always will do a content warning and make you feel that, you know, I just want to show that I'm a person who takes other people's feelings into consideration.

But as it turns out, scientifically speaking, you're not necessarily doing that at all. In fact, you might be doing quite the opposite. But I suppose on a wider philosophical thing, I know life is hard and awful things happen, but I do feel that part of the journey is sort of being confronted by these things and learning to get past them. You know, as you say, Rico, you've been talked about about the Mother's Day, the supermarkets had to mention Mother's Day to ask you if you want to opt out of the

Mother's Day marketing. I don't think people are particularly upset by Mother's Day marketing, actually. And I think that it's created a sort of weird issue where there needn't be one. And that I think is generally what trigger warnings do. The only trigger warnings we used to have back in the 80s were Simon Bates on the beginning of VHSs telling you it was an 18 and saying you know there's a you know rude language and stuff like that yeah it's fascinating trigger warnings and you know books don't really have them because you can sort of hint at things in the blurb anyway I mean a television I guess given we don't sort of read TV listings anymore

and things can just turn up in our living room unannounced and we can watch something because someone we used to see in Coronation Street is in it and then there's something in it that actually is uncomfortable for us, I sort of can understand that you might just, you know, point people in the direction that there's, you know, tricky stuff coming up. But all sorts of...

Anything can be tricky for anybody. That's the trouble, you know. The thing that up. But all sorts of, anything can be tricky for anybody. That's the trouble. You know, the thing that you might think is the tricky thing in the programme might not be. And in fact, there might be other things that provoke people's memories in a different way. But, you know, life is about having our memories provoke. And with the greatest of sympathy, the fact that it makes it worse and that most of the research suggests it either makes it worse or does absolutely nothing. How does it make it worse, by the way, research suggests it either makes it worse or does absolutely nothing. How does it make it worse by the way or is that if you're not? Because it

alerts you to it and so you're in a heightened emotional state and most people actually unfortunately can't quite still stop themselves from watching it even though they've been given the warnings so that in that sense they think it doesn't in any way sort of moderate people's emotional response to it it can actually heighten people's emotional response to things. And I suppose it sort of puts a ring fence around the your experience anyway that says oh your experience was so awful we don't as a culture talk about it this is something that we're not comfortable talking about it you probably should keep it to yourself and keep it locked away and part of all types of processes I think is having to sort of get through things and some of these things are so traumatic the events that my dear

me you'll be reminded of them all the time and you'll be thinking about them every single day of your life and it doesn't matter whether they're on a television program or if they're not to me it is an affectation on behalf of the producers the broadcast whatever it is and it's not to do i mean this is nothing to do with the victims who of course i have utmost sympathy for but it doesn't work and i think that they should just be dropped it's not often we give a proper definitive answer yes that's not when i have, well, this is a good one to sort of follow on from that, I think. Don Palmer says, Brett Easton Ellis recently commented that if American Psycho was written today

by a debut novelist, it would never be published. Do you agree that in recent years, publishers have become oversensitive and the author as provocateur is a thing of the past? That's interesting. I mean, I can give a definitive answer there, which is no. I don't believe that at all. I don't believe that it wouldn't get published. It always sounds good if you're Brett Easton and let us go.

I tell you what, the thing that I wrote would not get published today, my friend, because I'm a little bit too dangerous for this modern world. I think that books are actually quite a good place to do something iconoclastic and you know against the grain and get published still would it sell i do think just to pause you there i do think that books are the most the best place to be iconoclastic and to be you can do really exciting and difficult and provocative things in a novel that you just could not do on television and you can have really complicated and dark characters and nobody's going to give you the note like, oh, I think they need to be more likeable. You can have absolutely monstrous protagonists in novels.

No one ever gives you any notes in books. Yeah. That's the great news. They go, listen, this is the thing you want to write. Listen, I think what he might be saying is it probably wouldn't sell as well. Maybe culturally we wouldn't take it to our hearts quite as much. But even that I don't think is right. If you were like a proper anti-hero some horrific you know patrick bateman type then you know there's a appetite for that i don't see that publishing particularly is is shying away from more difficult

areas you see really yeah i do i first of all i it should be said that american psycho was very very controversial at the time yeah i always thought mean, I thought it was a fantastic book. And I think it's an incredibly moral book. And I think it's a very misunderstood book. And there were a lot of protests about it at the time. You're right in saying that a book could never be that big again, to some extent. You know, books were like movies then. You know, you wrote a number one New York Times bestseller.

And it was like you just, you know, you were on the top of the world. And it was almost like having a sort of blockbuster opening. And our culture is so much more atomized now. And books just don't, to some extent, create those events, that idea of being a bright young thing, the voice of a generation. Maybe you'd be in television, something different anyhow. But I do think that publishing is much more wary. They're wary of their own staff. I think many, many people have said, oh, we can't possibly publish this book because many of the people working on this book in the publishing house at various different levels don't agree with what's in it. Well,

there have been plenty of examples of that. And again, these are the sort of things that are affecting liberal workplaces around the world. Many people don't publish things, I think, because they say, oh, we couldn't actually publish that. It's very difficult. It's very difficult for this book to find a publisher. Now, I think there are many books that are regarded as too provocative. I have to say in fiction, probably less so. So we're talking about nonfiction titles, I think, that maybe cover things like the sort of trans wars or there have been sort of things like Milo, the kind of cultural, you know, the sort of alt-right, all those sort of books. These books have caused a lot of controversy.

But in fiction, I think you can be more, as you say, you can be more provocative and you can television they are constantly telling you yeah I you know I just can we have a sort of hearts and hearts and hugs pass that we don't we would just like this person to be more likable and the things that television people hate being told is that you know everyone has to really be likable and what people sort of love when in something like secession was like all these people are absolutely terrible and you know what it's been a massive show and everyone's loved it so that what they writers often want to say is no they should be able to be dreadful dreadful people or villains or victims who have whose stories haven't been told yet or whatever they say but the idea that they should be likable is much more prevalent in

television so I think you could still have a monstrous protagonist and I think you probably do I haven't read any recently but people can write in and tell us what the big sort of monstrous anti-heroes are currently in fiction I'd like to know no there's all sorts of great ones and funnily enough that the book i recommend at the start of the year johnny sweet's uh the kellerby code that's a about an anti-hero i i think that yes i saw i've got it now it's my next on my pile so yes um i think that you are absolutely right television is far far far more far more sensitive and far more sensitive and by the way i understand by the way, I understand why, because television is in the corner of your room

and it can be on without you inviting it in or your kids can watch it. Whereas a book, you've been to a shop, you've read the back of the book, you might have read a review of it, you've paid your money, you've taken it home. So books can be whatever they want to be. The same with comedians doing a live tour.

You say whatever you want, because people have gone out, paid money for the ticket, you know, got a babysitter, sat down and down and said okay i want to be entertained by you when you're on television i think there's sometimes you think there's certain material that television wouldn't allow you to do and i understand why but i honestly think with publishing and you know all the books you talk about find publishers you know they just find different publishers and then you know if they find a market it's because they're good or bad but I think books I mean I'm somebody it will shock you to learn I love writing likable characters that's what I like you know and I love watching

things with likable characters so to me it plays into my hand so it's not something I've ever had to come across but yeah I've yet to meet a book editor who wouldn't read American Psycho and just go, oh, my God, this is an amazing piece of writing. And what our culture would now call the stuff that's problematic about it is what makes it brilliant and interesting and art and something that's worth reading. And I do think Brett Easton Ellis is probably wrong. I think he would definitely find a publisher. It might not find its same place in the middle of our culture as American Psycho did. But I don't think the book industry is in a bad place in terms of what it's happy to publish. Okay, this is a great one to finish on from Catherine Ward. After watching a recent episode

of Pointless where someone couldn't hide their disappointment at their partner scoring 100, always my favourite. Richard, did you ever have to intervene in any onset arguments between unhappy pairings? or have you heard of similar on any other shows? That's a good one. That is a good question. Yeah, you certainly, it's you know, I always think that presenting duos are best and I think that contestant duos are best as well

because instantly when people come on point, maybe they're married and you're thinking who's married well or they're married, you think you're quite a lot older than she is and you think and you met 12, who's married well? Or they're married, you think, you're quite a lot older than she is. And you think, yeah, and you met 12 years ago? Okay. So, you know, there's a little bit of judgment.

By and large, on Pointless, we're incredibly lucky to get such brilliant contestant researchers. And so, you know, it's very rare you have people on the show that you don't warm to, that you just think, oh, you're a bit off. But, yeah, you certainly get a thing where one partner will let the other partner down. Have I told the Lee Mack story before? So Lee Mack came on Pointless Celebrities

with the late, great Bobby Ball, who played his father in Not Going Out. So Lee comes on, and Lee had come on because his kids loved the show, right? So he said, oh, come on, because my kids love it. And it turned out it was a big thunderstorm. It had taken him forever to get there. because his kids love the show right so he said oh come on because my kids love it uh and uh it turned out there's a big thunderstorm it's taken forever to get there he turned up only about like 10 minutes before the show went on air uh but he had his kids with him and um you know we said hi

to the kids and blah blah blah uh so lee comes on he's there with bobby gets there uh and the uh question was um words of the words in the English language ending S-O-N. So words ending son. So, okay. So Bobby Ball steps up first on the first podium and says, Apple son? Like, okay. All right, Bobby.

I mean, where you got it from, I don't know. Anyway, the thing goes up 100. You go across the other podiums, low scores, low scores, low scores. You get back to Lee. He's already out on 100 points because Bobby Ball said Appleson. He's back in his car five minutes later and off home. It does happen. We had the famous one that there's lots of clips of is this pair who,

there's lots of clips of is this um pair uh who i think the question was name a country whose name ends in two consonants all right so a country's name ends in two consonants not that we were reaching for questions uh and uh this woman says paris i think she's a geography student as well and the the meme of her partner's expression is so brilliant which is i've come here to win pointless it's a country with two continents at the end and you said paris and you're a geography student and you're a geography student and so you do sometimes think that is going to be a long car journey home the ones that i really feel at most sometimes people come on with their boss and you're like come on that's high tariff yeah and if they get 100 you're like that's not good or people come on with their father-in-law or their mother-in-law and you know they just got instant dynamics haven't you yeah whatever

happens and then you're like oh don't get a hundred and okay you know some hundreds are good hundreds you know someone goes out on a limb takes a risk but some hundreds are proper bad ones and yeah you do feel for people and we have takes a risk but some hundreds are proper bad ones and yeah you do feel for people and we have less of the contestant team very good after the show and you know because they have to come back as well it's very very rare i think we had twice ever that a couple didn't come back i think twice ever wow uh just had some stuff to work out had some stuff to yeah yeah one was a married couple who decided not to come back. And you're like, oh, that doesn't...

And even when we were watching them, you're thinking... More dangerous than starting wife swapping. You just don't know where this journey is going to lead. We're going to pull out now and we're not going to do it. Yeah, exactly. But by and large, they're lovely people and we look after them. And you can see it's scary being on set and having a light shone on you and being asked a question that you know the answer to obviously and yet yeah we could all do it goes

out of your head so it's um yeah by and large one is sympathetic but yeah there's there's a few friendships that you think oh this is not going to be it's not ever going to be quite the same after this is it there's going to be just always something in between you. And it's not a pointless trophy. No. Okay, Catherine, I hope that answers your question. That's us done, I think. I think it is. Okay, well, we'll see you next week for the main show,

where we'll be talking about a number of things, including Saudi money in Hollywood. In Hollywood. Film washing. Film washing. Thank you for listening. Thanks for listening.