The Rest Is Entertainment - Marina and Richard's Worst Ever Ideas

Episode Date: June 5, 2024

If Marina and Richard had to come up with a movie designed to flop what would it be? How much say do radio presenters have in their playlists? And, do actors really spit on one another? Plus Richard provides the truth about whether he was once on Drop The Dead Donkey. You can now sign-up to The Rest Is Entertainment newsletter for more insights and recommendations - www.therestisentertainment.com Twitter: @restisents Instagram: @restisentertainment YouTube: @therestisentertainment Email: [e-mail] Producers: 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

Hello and welcome to episode 50 of the Rest is Entertainment. This is the questions edition. Questions and answers edition. And I'm Marina Hyde. And I'm Richard Osmond. Such a quick study. Such 50 times only to get that right. Is it only 50? I literally, I'm used to doing that sort of thing in a day. Listen, get back to me when it's in the thousands. Yeah, okay. Okay. Have you got a question for me?

Oh yeah, I do. Do you know what? I issued a Come and Get Me Plea to our listeners to ask us about top threes and they've come with, there's a lot, but I'm going to give one for you and you can do one for me later. This is from Matic Bow and Matic says, would you be able to list your top three film stars under 35? I think this is off the back of talking about the people we consider film stars are aging up a bit.

I will talk about the ones that I think are the biggest and why they are. There is no question for me at number one has to be Timothée Chalamet. You're supposed to start at number three. No, no, I want to start at number one. Okay, great. Well, let's do that. I'm starting at number one for- 50th show, folks. I'm starting at number one because I

want to do a bit more than three messing around you know the almost rounds I mean honestly the format bit of me is just silently weeping but I know and I just tolerating me but listen number one Richard is Timothy Chalamet and there's no question okay this person can open a movie I have to say that I can't quite see the kind of huge sex appeal but that's because I'm old and I have officially aged out of the fancying Timothée Chalamet phase but there's no question that young people want to go to the cinema and see him he had the top two movies at one point of the last sort of eight months which were Wonka and June

too and that had not happened since the early 80 where it was John Travolta. Wow. Number two, Zendaya. I think she's extraordinary. The way she's come up, the way she's kind of broken out of that Disney thing. She's changed in lots of interesting roles, but she also does blockbuster stuff. She's definitely number two for me, although it's, it's tight cause it's almost like second and third equal. So there were some people I thought about, it's interesting what people say to you is like, what about the Stranger Things kids? And you're like, yeah, they're

the Stranger Things kids, okay, they cannot open a movie. I've seen one movie with it. Finn Wilford, what's the one? He's Mike in Stranger Things. He's in Ghostbusters Frozen Empire, which I suffered my way through. Was it not good? Okay, breaking. Ghostbusters Frozen Empire is very bad. And then there are people like General Tager, who's only actually been in quite small movies. I think she might be a bit difficult as an actress, which I rather like,

because I don't have to work with her, and she may bring that to her work, and she's obviously massive in Wednesday. Florence Pugh, interesting. Tom Holland, very sweet. Jennifer Lawrence as well, I mean, I assume she's probably about 33, 34. She's under 35 anyway.

Isn't she? People like Jennifer Lawrence and Tom Holland, if you take them out of their franchises, the IP is the big star in a way. And then what is a Jennifer Lawrence movie or a Tom Holland movie? Maybe when they're not in those, it is pretty hit and miss and sometimes more miss than hit. So I can't include those. Margot Robbie. Oh, of course. When you watch Barbie, she is an absolute movie star she got that made she's a producer as well she's got all that sort of behind-the-scenes

power so those would be my top three under 35 for definitely I'm not gonna say someone like Millie Bobby Brown because I love the character of Eleven in Stranger Things and she's very good at that but do I care about these Enola Holmes movies? No it's like a TV thing I don't think you can go to the movies and see that she's but she's got her brands and her all those other things. She's going to become one of those multi hyphenates that's got makeup and clothes and stuff like that. But movie stars, Chalamet, Zendaya, Margot Robbie, it's pretty tight between those two but I think Zendaya might sort of, I mean maybe

I've got those last two in the wrong order. That was a long answer. It's a good answer though. You see why top three's are fun. You know what, it was fine when I got over the hump. It was actually fine. Honestly, it actually looked like you were enjoying yourself. Yeah, no, you're right. I didn't hate it. Exactly. What are you doing to me?

My opinion, yeah, actually I do have an opinion as to whether Zendaya or Margot Robbie is a bigger movie star actually. But also everyone on their dog walk will be going, no, come on, Shalime. Robbie, every day of the week, they'll be saying. Here's one for you, following your excellent Have I Got News for Your Appearance recently,

Have I Got News for Your Legal, Tom Keely would like to know, I saw Richard's recent appearance on Have I Got News for You and was wondering, are there BBC lawyers who specifically cover the show, especially with Regula E and his lot being the most sued man in Britain? Yes, there are, there definitely are, but I mean there's lawyers for all shows, but

I mean most, you know, there's lawyers for, you know, pointless, you know, everything is lawyered, everything goes through that compliance and lawyer process. But something like Have I Got News For You, the unusual thing about that is they will be there on the night, because that gets edited overnight to go on the next day. So a lawyer will be in the gallery with the with the crew and everything that's said, the lawyer will be going, that's going to be an issue. That's going to be an issue. And at the end, you get to re-record things. So you do them as pickups. You do them as pickups. Exactly that.

And that's where the famous Angus Dayton allegedly came from. exactly that and that's where the famous Angus Dayton allegedly came from. It created a thing that people think is a legal get out which by the way don't just say any old like rubbish on Twitter and then just write allegedly because it's not by the way it's not a get out but it was really good the way they did that because it was such a there are ways I know when I'm writing things where you can write say exactly the same thing one in the way that will get past the law and one won't but it was so good that they created and it became funny in in and of itself a very specific instance in in the show that I was on where Ian and Ruth Davidson were talking about to pull her venils yes

it was in that week the post office CEO who was appearing in front of the inquiry that week yes exactly and they stopped the CEO they listen she may come back that'll be be ahead of a comeback wouldn't it? Never say never again. What would have to happen between now and Christmas for her to go back? I think a lot of people in the UK would have to actually be killed in a free catch and there would be no postal system. They were talking about Paula Vennell's and it was brilliant and you know one of the lovely things about being on that show is if Ian really goes on a, I was going to say a rant and it's not a rant but he

was absolutely a tear he was going on a tear up and they were talking about Paula Venos and talking about her performance in The Inquiry and talking about her complicity and some of the things that happened and it was great it was really really good and it was kept in I think almost entirely but then at the end Phil Wang who was the host because Amol Rajan wasn't able to host it because of the election had to do I can't remember what it was but a form of words that said Paul of Venos has said x y and z. You run the denial. Yes exactly that exactly that so they were able to keep the whole thing in so long as you say. But that's because

Ian is as somebody who is very, is so skilled at legaling things into the show in real time, as opposed to a lawyer with the best will in the world. Well, sometimes there's certain types of lawyers. I've always loved being lured by newspaper lawyers who want to get things into the paper, as opposed to ones who will just say, take the whole thing out. And you say, well, there must be some way it can work. And that's what happens with a V use of you as well, that's the understanding, that's the contract really. It's like help us out here rather

than because normally on a show you just say lose this, lose this, lose this, anything that might even vaguely be actionable you'll lose but on that show the lawyer doesn't you know obviously there's disagreements but the lawyer will work with them and try and find a solution to keep something in the show. That's brilliant I have to say I think it would be so counterproductive to sue that show now, even though that doesn't mean you don't have to have it loyed, but you just know that if you do sue, and most likely they would have to read out an apology or whatever it is, and BBC would have to pay them some money, and maybe the politician would have 15 minutes of crowing that they

beat have I got news here. But no, they would not be the ultimate winner because you just know they would then be in every single week and they'd become the new hate figure or whatever it is. So I think in a way, just the sheer longevity and the sheer thing of the show that you think, yeah, you'd have one good headline and then all the rest would be bad.

So I think they're slightly insulated by that. Thank you, Tom. Okay, Marina, Margarita has a question. Margarita says, I would like to know what is the criteria for choosing sports commentators with Nick Kiriost being announced as a new BBC pundit. This has made me question who is taking these decisions. Okay, Margarita, I think you're going to hate me. Is this because he's very, very badly behaved on court sometimes and on social media and various other, I mean, anyway, he can be, I think. If we're in an insider-y type of a show, let me let you into a little inside secret about

tennis. It's not really a sport. Buckle up, everybody. It's not like a pastime, like non-balls, right? It's a game. Tennis? Yeah. It needs great commentary. Okay, McEnroe, if it didn't have McEnroe, John McEnroe was a commentator in any other sport. If he's a commentator in football, he would be the best commentator in the entire world, because he would, it would be the meeting of man and form. But as it is, and also you're dealing, I mean, you know, you're dealing with a crowd at something like Wimbledon, who would honestly

rather applaud a pigeon, then they love it when a pigeon goes on, than the tennis. And I want just to let listeners know, at the end of whatever this is, I will pick her up on a number of points. Can I just say though, if anyone is thinking of sending in a death threat, our lovely producer Neil opens all the emails first. Could you just put death threat FAO Marina hide Neil don't open please, so that it comes directly to me and he doesn't have to see that stuff. Re tennis.

Re tennis. him in, he doesn't have to see that stuff. Re-tennis. Re-tennis. Kyrgios is also one of my favourite things, a tennis bad boy. The stakes are so low in tennis. There was one time in the US Open where he got in trouble because of the underside of his collar. It had been put up and it said like, you do you. And he was like shouting this on the television, I'm not going to play until you show me the rule. Because the umpire said no, this is against the rules, you've got to put your collar down. Show me the rule, I want to see the rule. I'm not going to play until you show me the rule because the umpire said no this is against the rules you've got to put your collar down. Show me the rule I want

to see the rule I've seen shirts worse. That's what you get in tennis, it's like it's a bad shirt. This is the level of transgression it's really easy to be a tennis bad boy. Andre Eggersley he was a tennis bad boy. He lost the French Open because he was worried his wig might fall off. Yeah I'm going to ask you about tennis one second. I will say this every single sports producer ever their entire life, of course, you're covering the sports and you have your commentators.

And the one thing you're always looking out for is people who are interesting in interview and people who have a unique take on the game. And sometimes you'll get players during the tournament and you'll bring them up to the commentary box. You might bring them up for the radio just to chat a bit and you start spotting talent. So that's how large house sports producers find their...

Who doesn't necessarily give that much of a shit about what they say on air and that is what you're looking for. Well you want someone who's an incredible analyst. You definitely want that. You want someone who absolutely can tell you exactly what's going on and how a player is feeling and there you want someone who can add a bit of colour as well. Someone who won't be boring, someone who as you say is not afraid of being controversial. Not calling out people who they know, you know, it happens in football and the competitors have all got to see each other and they've all got to see the players and you have to be able to say, okay I said something quite harsh about you but not totally sort of club-able and I can be critical. Yeah exactly, to sit alongside Tim Henman.

I think it's fair to say that Nick Kyrgios can be critical. Yeah, I think he can. I'm so sorry to, you know, on our 50th episode to bring this up. I think tennis is a sport. I think it is. I think it's very athletic. I think it's very competitive. I think the best player tends to win. I think you can get better at it. I think there are lots of different formats of it. The best player often doesn't win. But that's sport. Yes.

Isn't it? What's the difference between a sport and a game? Okay, there are... Because I think, by the way... Wow, I mean, okay, that's a whole podcast. That's 50 podcasts, but okay, that is 50 podcasts. That's another 50 podcasts. Yeah, that's another 50 podcasts.

So I think Lorne Bowles is a sport, so... Do you? Yeah, well, if dance is a sport, then Bowles is a sport. I mean, I also love dance, but if you can have a pint while you're doing it You can have a pint when you're playing football if you really want to. While you're on the pitch? Yeah, but they don't have a pint anymore. Okay, yeah, but you can. Whenever they nip off they literally down so much. The one thing about darts, I've been backstage at darts tournaments and now they're not allowed to drink anymore. They've got them lined up. They nip off, they absolutely hammer it. They need to get the same amount in that they would have got if they were allowed to have it on the telly.

But yeah, I think that tennis is a sport. Okay, well let's talk more about this in Wimbledon and I'll do specific examples. But obviously some of the greatest sportsmen that we've witnessed, Roger Federer. I mean, I love tennis. I've watched huge amounts of it in my life and I go to Wimbledon every year and I absolutely love it. Why did you just call Roger Federer a sportsman? Because he perfected the form. Of what? Tennis. But sportsman? He's not a gamesman? Yeah, it's... Your Honour, I rest my case. That's like the end scene of a Jack Nicholson... Is tennis as good a sport as cricket?

Come on then. Is it? Is it as good a sport as cricket? Don't be ridiculous. Don't be absolutely ridiculous. Well, I think probably that's something that people... Hold on, top three sports. Why are we talking about that? Oh no, I'm not doing a top three sport. At one point, I'd be very happy if anyone's got questions about sports as formats. I'm very, very... I have very strong opinions on that. Tennis, I have a strong opinion on cricket. Oh, I've got a really strong opinion on that. Can we please have questions about that as they kind of come into our summer of schedules?

Yes. We'd love those. I think it's a good question. I always, whenever people are being interviewed, this is always the thing to look out for if you're a football fan, rugby fan, tennis fan, whatever, watch the players being interviewed and you can see the ones who are giving a little bit more. You can see the ones who don't want to be there. Yeah.

See the ones who the media trainer has just said, just say this. And you can see the ones who want to engage and they're the ones that the agents look out for and the producers look out for. And it's fascinating when their sort of commentary style is so different to maybe the way they played. I mean boycott another person you probably didn't think ought to be booked as a commentator but it was so sort of remorselessly dull watching him play and yet he was by far the most interesting commentator. It's like look at something like Micah Richards it's amazing how at the end of a career you can

if you've got it, if you've got that star quality then suddenly you know you're on and you're booked on stuff and that's what producers are always looking for, that just that bit of star quality. We took more on this than I thought we were going to. Yeah sorry we've really gone on. Thank you Micah Rita. Anyway more summer sports questions please. Should we now have a break Richard? Come on then. Sorry, we've really gone on. Thank you, thank you, Margarita. Anyway, more summer sports questions, please. Shall we now have a break, Richard?

Come on then. Welcome back. Now, Richard, we're going to go straight into a top three. Top three. Taskmaster. Samantha Jo asks, can I have your top three Taskmaster tasks, please? You certainly can, Samantha. Well, not mine, in fact.

I thought what I did instead, so I was on Taskmaster many years ago and I keep in touch with Andy Devonshire, who's the exec producer, and it's literally like a full-time job, Taskmaster. When I was on it was like the second series and it was, you know, five episodes. But they are non-stop. Is it the whole week? It's like, when you're on it, it's not too bad. But for Andy and for the gang and for Alex it's just it never stopped.

It's one of those really high maintenance things. Like crazy, they go around the world now they're doing a live experience of it. So I said to Andy what are your favorite three Taskmaster tasks because he's the one he's sitting there with the headphones on he sees all five people come in and do the tasks you know he sees every single unedited version of it. So I asked him I him, I thought, great, Andy, you'll send me back. Uh, you know, his top three and it caused him so much pain. This question, he said, I wish you would ask me which of my children I like best. He said, he said, this is like, this is impossible for me because I

love the show so much and I love all the people who've been on it. But he, he, he narrowed it down. Uh, so number three, he was talking about about he loves the ones where you get to film stuff with the contestants where they have to create something. Me and John Richardson did a joint task where we had to do a stop motion film with potatoes. It's brilliant. Yeah, we did 28 days Tato. Well, that's not one of Andy's favorite three, but he says he loves doing those things and he's in season nine We talked about season one Roisin and and Romesh doing their film something that we can play backwards Roisin did a brilliant thirsty wolf and Romesh did his tree wizard

But his favorite one of those was Rosie Jones's chickpea funeral from series nine So he's gone with that as number three, which is an absolute cracker. Number two, talking about how brilliant Alex Horne is, how under appreciated Alex Horne is, and even though he's really appreciated, he's still underappreciated because he's such a genius behind all of the tasks and coming up with them, which is amazing. But then he also, he will do anything to make that task work. And it's fascinating that show because so many shows on TV are choreographed in some way. Like, this will choreograph the comedy, this will do this and we'll do that. Taskmaster really isn't. So Taskmaster, you'll have an idea. Sometimes it's an immediate thing. Sometimes,

you know, like doing the films, you need to get a few props together, sit and chat with Andy and say, I'd quite like to do this, I'd quite like to do that. And one of the main things you want to do is, can I get Alex involved in some way? And Andy says, Alex never ever ever says no. He said that's something he just, if it's going to help the task, if it's going to make it funny, Alex will always play the full guy every single time. And that incredible given his status on that show and given that he goes around the world doing that show, he will literally put himself in the worst positions possible. So his number two was series six and the task was show your love for the taskmaster. Lisa Tarbuck made Alex go into the shed and sit down on a cake with his bare bottom and

Alex dropped his trousers. Andy said, he said, I had microphones on. He said, I can still hear the squelch now. He said, literally a profiterole disappeared. It disappeared. But not only is it a testament to how brilliant Lisa Tarbuck is, just that thing of Alex just kind of someone saying, I want you to pull your trousers down and sit on this cake, which is so demeaning and so absurd and so ridiculous. But Alex knows that that's the show and does it does it brilliantly. And he was saying, good, the camera angles we had to work out just before he sits on the cake as well were quite something.

Wow. So that's his... He's the ultimate good sport. Yeah. I mean, he really, really is. So that's his number two. And his number one was from one of the recent ones, season 16. And it was a group task.

Sue Perkins and Susan Wakoma, I think, did half of it. And Lucy Beaumont, Sam Campbell, who I absolutely love, I love all of these. And Julian Clary. And it's when they turned the Taskmaster house into a hotel and Alex checks in and has lots of demands and essentially they have to make him happy. And again, Andy was saying the thing with that is so often Taskmaster, it's sort of like a panel show, but you've got these different comedians and sometimes all these different skill sets and all these different shticks all come together just in this ridiculous kind of glorious mess of television and you know when it all comes together like that

it's like you know it's his dream. The symphony. His top three, Rosie's chickpea funeral, Alex sitting on a cake and the season 16 hotel task are his top three. It's so endlessly creative it gets gets better and better, it's extraordinary. And as we discovered the other day, the most left-leaning television program in Britain in terms of the viewers. Yes. One for you Marina, Matthew Dalladay Simpson.

Good name. All right, Jane Austen. He asks, after your discussion of Coppola's new film the other week, what are your dream projects? He has some criteria. It needs to be expensive, ambitious or left field, and needs to have a 75% chance of being a flop. Can do. Okay, can do. I love this. I really got into the idea of the flop.

And I was thinking for a while, I went down a real wrong rabbit hole, cause we'd been talking about the fall guy and things like that, thinking I want to do the Knight Rider movie. I know I can do it. I know I can find the chemistry between him and the car. You know, and I'm going to really mess it up by like making him a woman or something. I just do it, messing up with the original format. But then I thought

no. I remembered that when I was doing research for the superhero TV series, lots of people have talked about the Bible as a franchise. I was like, yeah, no, I'm going to sit, okay, it's all free, the IP. It's all free. It's not copyrighted. So mine is the Bible, a franchise, right? I'm going to have Peter Jackson do, I'm giving a point in directors. Peter Jackson does the Old Testament. Nolan does the New Testament. Oh, I like that. Guy Ritchie can do the Book of Revelations, which he's also predicted in. And I'm going to release them all, I was thinking I'm going to do them all on the same day. And I thought, why am I? Why aren't I doing what Kevin Costner's doing? I'm trying to really make a flop here. I'm desperately

trying to make a flop here. I'm going to do what Kevin Costner's doing in real life this summer. And I'm going to release like the New Testament on one day and then six weeks later when that half of the turkey is really rancid, I'm going to flop down the next rancid half of the turkey in the form of the Nolan directed New Testament and you know once we get for a Christmas special or something, Guy Ritchie's book of Revelation. I would do New Testament first and then pitch the Old Testament as a prequel. A prequel, yeah, that's right. Do you think Nolan would go first?

To be a hit, Timothy Shadome is Jesus, right? But we need something that has a 75% chance of being a flop. So who plays Jesus? This is the trouble, Richard, I can only think of very rude things to say. Who would be the worst Jesus? By the way, you can have a great actor, but just someone you just think, I don't particularly want to see them as Jesus. Like Bradley Cooper, for example. Very, very good. I'm not sure

I'd want to see his Jesus. What about Ryan Gosling's Jesus, but played as Ken? He plays Jesus as he's playing that role every time. He's playing it in the Fall Guy. He can play it again as Jesus. He can play Jesus as the Ken, stroke, cult, sievers, and now Messiah role. So Christopher Nolan's Bible with Ryan Gosling as Jesus. Well, Christopher Nolan's New Testament, don't cut Jackson out because he's going to want equal billing with Nolan, whether we'll get it or not is another matter. That's a really good idea.

I mean isn't that the point of all of this? Because otherwise Gosling's not going to sign up. Yeah, and actually I said to you what, when Will Smith had this idea of a big franchise movie, which I think was called Something Like Earth 2000, I'm going to get this bit wrong, but I think he wanted that, I think I've talked about this before, he wanted there to be, he thought it was so important that you couldn't like discuss it on Facebook or Twitter or something like that. It needed its own social network specifically for discussing this franchise. So my Bible franchise would have its own social network as well, but would launch at the same

time in which people could talk about my Bible franchise. I love it. Yeah. That feels like... 75% chance of a flop or... Oh, yeah. I'm nudging 76%... I would have thought so.

I mean, listen, great directors and all sorts going on. Yeah. Okay. Our producer, Neil, has very kindly just told me that the Will Smith thing that never happened, by the way, was not called Earth to Earth, it was called After Earth. After Earth. After Earth? After Earth. Actually, hang on a second, can we talk about Will Smith on next, Will Smith, can we talk about Celebrity Redemption while we're at it next week, because Will Smith is coming

back with Bad Boys 4, coming back off a little incident at the Oscars a couple of years ago, and I think we should talk about it. Celebrity Redemption. Perhaps that was just a trailer. Yeah. I'll do one, it's three words, lawyers in space. Listen, that's got a 25% chance of being a hit. Yeah, it has actually. I think I'd watch it.

Yeah. But I'm an ironist, I mean, I watch anything. But you know that charity who, if you get arrested in Thailand or something, they will send you a lawyer who speaks the language and understands the legal system of that country. I love this. That but for space. So like a decrepit little charity on earth and whenever you get in trouble

in other parts of the universe, they fly out. I really like this, you see, now it could work. Kind of like Highway to Heaven or something like that. Yeah. And he has to go and it's a story of the week and it's a different alien. Have you just pitched me Doctor Who? He's not a lawyer. No If he's got the sonic screwdriver can do anything. Yeah, that's true. This is a little thing that makes people go. Yeah, okay This one's definitely for you Richard. It's about radio show autonomy Georgina Walker asks

I've always wondered radio DJs in their shows How much choice in music do they actually have? Can they pick the tracks played or do they have a set list to pick from and they're told what to play? Sort of a mix but yeah every radio station, I mean it's a huge business radio and they do so much research into their audience. Commercial radio stations and BBC, they really know what people like and they have very very smart people who are Obviously getting tracks from the archive but also finding new tracks They think would appeal to the audience so you'll have a playlist that is pretty rigid Certainly on commercial radio where people tend to listen to quite a small amount of time and you want to make sure they hear something

That they absolutely love on radio one for example if you're on the a list you would be played for a song That's on the list you'd be played 25 times a week And if you're on the B list you'd be played played, if you're a song that's on the A list, you'd be played 25 times a week. And if you're on the B list, you'd be played 15 times a week. So it's a big deal. You know, it's a really, it's a huge deal. And it, you know, it's, it still makes hits. So it's very, very structured. You'll get the odd moment where the presenter gets to choose. Most presenters will have a thing you hear on all sorts of shows where they have like a pick your own playlist or, you know, we're doing tracks about the weather today and listeners will send stuff in and then the host will then pick three that he really likes or she really likes and that's a good way of

getting your own kind of stuff into the playlist. Oh I see it's like a device to... Exactly because they're so bored of playing the things that they are forced to listen to. And equally during the daytime it's far more rigid as well because you know people have their routine and you know they want to hear stuff that they listen to. And equally during the daytime it's far more rigid as well because people have their routine and they want to hear stuff that they love and they want to hear new stuff that, say Radio 2 will pick stuff they know they're going to love. Later in the evening it's more specialist shows, especially on the BBC which has a remit to introduce new

music to people. But on the commercial stations there's a reason why Absolute and Heart have all these kind of little spin-off stations like 90 you know, 90s and noughties and 80s and stuff like that. It's because they want to keep people within the brand, but listening to songs that they love. I did a Radio 2 show last year. I stood in and that was interesting because about 75% of what I was playing was stuff that was mandated. But even with the mandated stuff, I was like, I was playing was stuff that was mandated. But even with the mandated stuff, I was like,

I don't know about that one. And then I could suggest things and they would go through the Radio 2 computer. They literally got a spreadsheet of every single song that's ever been played when it was played. So you could say, I wanted to play the Mare of Simpleton by XTC, right? Which is a song that wouldn't normally get played

on Radio 2, but I know that a Radio 2 audience would like, but they were able to say, oh, literally two Fridays ago we played, you know, Senses Working overtime by XTC, the last time we played XTC before then was a month ago, so they can tell you exactly what's what. So, you know, I'd suggest stuff, I mean, I've got a filter anyway, I'm not going to suggest, you know, Napalm Death, because, you know, the poor producer would have to tell me no, but so you have some Input but by and large radio stations are built on keeping their listeners loyal and the radio stations really really really Understand what the listeners love to listen to but that's why if you can get a proper hit on radio

It's a it's it's a hit forever and ever and ever But yeah, any any time you hear one of those, when someone goes, oh, we've got a new feature this week where it's songs about, or we're gonna do pun songs that are about this, or songs that remind you of your holidays, that's them thinking,

please let me play something that's not on the list. And they did some amazing research. And just for a general listener, someone who's got the radio on in the background, there's a research that you don't recognize you've heard a song before until you've heard it 25 times, which is why it's that number, which seems crazy. And for big music fans, by the way, that number is much, much smaller. But if you're just, if it's just on in the background, 25 listens, and you go, oh, that's

that song I like. And all of radio essentially is, oh, that's that song I like. Oh, this is a charming one for you from Angie Bolton. Thank you, Angie. When characters spit on other characters, do the actors actually spit or is gloop splattered on the receiving actor, hoping it is the latter? Well, Angie, you can do it various different ways. Obviously, if you don't show the spit leaving the mouth and going onto the other person, you can do it in two shots, in which case they can just sort of throw something and actually target it a bit better. In general, they do actually spit, but the trouble is they have to do so many takes.

So they do make you a spit mixture because you couldn't perhaps- A spit mixture. A spit mixture, which actually contains some mouthwash, which sort of feels like a bit of an Antoine service, doesn't it? It's like, I'm going to spit on you, but it's kind of fine, it's going to be cleaning off at the same time. Because people just can't get that much spit and you might have to do 10 takes or what have you. And so they might do that. And they have to kind of get it to the right

gloopiness so that it will drip in that way. Quite a lot of things, funny enough, speaking of sort of liquids like that, you know, you get the real thing and it doesn't look right, like rain doesn't look right, or shower water or tears or whatever don't look right, so they have to mix it with glycerin and it's much thicker, lots of things like that, in order for those kind of close-up shots when things are going down, if you did it with water it often wouldn't work and if sometimes if you did it with spit, spit is just not good enough to play spit, not even good enough, It has to be enhanced

in order for it to be proper spit. I'd love to know what Angie was watching to send that question in. Yeah, I mean, you see it quite a lot. It's a gritty crime, I think. Or football. That's all real. Everything you see on the pitch is real. It's real spit. We're going to finish with this one. Young Richard, it is promisingly titled, Paul Nicholas says in the last ever scene of drop the dead donkey where the removal men are emptying the news office is a young Richard Osment one of the removal

men it looks like you but it's uncredited. For younger listeners that was a wonderful sitcom in the 90s about a sort of a news channel with Neil Pearson is in it, Loza Hayden Gwynn is in it. Stephen Tockerson, Hayden Gwynn is absolutely brilliant and it was sort of recorded quite near to live so it felt current and they would always have a bit of banter over the credits which would be really topical. And it was written by the wonderful Andy Hamilton and Guy Jenkin. Now at the time when that was on air I was working at Hattrick who were the makers of Drop the Dead Donkey. So the short answer is yes, it is me. I could end there if you like, but I'll just give you a...

No, please don't. I need to know a lot more. I'll tell you why. So Andy, he writes it with Guy and Guy Jenkin is my height. I think Guy is six, six or six, seven. And Guy wanted to be in the last scene of the whole thing. That was the question I was going to ask you. How could you be with anyone else? I know. So Guy wanted to carry this table because that's the end that all

the furniture has been taken out and needed somebody he knew who was as tall as him to take the other end of the table. And as we previously established no one in acting is taller than five foot seven. Exactly that. That was the problem he had. And so yeah, it's me and Guy Jenkin. That's fantastic. I've got to watch it. Can you see it on YouTube? Can you see it on YouTube? No, it's like my mum would say, I don't know if I've got YouTube, have I got YouTube? Yes, you can see it on YouTube. I'm gonna have a look now. Yeah, it's very different, I was rocking a very different vibe. I think that's us done, isn't it? Regrettably it is. Yeah. But we'll do another regular episode on Tuesday, shall we? Absolutely.

We will see you next Tuesday. See you next Tuesday, everyone.