When Celebrities Get Inked (or Viz Y'Know Killed The Radio Star)

As hard as I try I can't imagine Pat Roach being young.

Born this day in 1937, the much missed Roach was best known probably as Bomber in "Auf Wiedersehen Pet" although being in all three Indiana Jones movies is an equally fantastic claim to fame, not to mention his roles in Willow, Red Sonja, Robin Hood Prince Of Thieves, A Clockwork Orange and of course, Jack and Jeremy's Police 4. But when I think of him being born, like seeing ancient yellowing photos of your grandparents doing the dance moves of the time (examples include 'the spruce waiter', 'the groovy Rivron' and 'the rivers of blood') I just picture him being birthed with a full beard asking if its chips for tea.

As well as all these achievements, Roach was also in another exclusive club although not necessarily one he'd understand, or even known about. For Pat was the frontman for a cartoon strip all about...well, have a see...

Informative and informal there I'm sure you'll agree but you wouldn't be completely wrong for assuming it didn't actually contain any jokes - the discordant combining of a Look In magazine style factual strip with an actor unassociated with the sea in any capacity is the entire gag - and it works magnificently. For all its success, Viz Comic is very rarely commended for just how well it dismantled and parodied the entire history of British comics, from the 1930's Film Fun style antics of murderers Shipman and West ("Harold and Fred - they make ladies dead")  to the infamous DC Thomson take downs such as "Desperately Unfunny Dan", "Little Plumber" and "The Three Chairs". Some strips in early issues wouldn't look out of place in the underground comix scene which was still puttering along by the time the comic appeared in December 1979, but Viz was a product born of Newcastle not New York and this was reflected in its targets. In the above Pat Roach strip (issue 46 February / March 1991), the joke is simply to recreate the sort of boring factual filler magazines like Look In and its myriad knock-offs would print. Two years earlier in February 1989, issue 34 presented the following public service...

Simple but effective and given that extra twist by its use of a minor celebrity. Famous folk have been featured in Viz's humour from the very start but it wouldn't be until the early nineties that the official looking spin-off comic strip featuring an unlikely - and nearly always very British - star would become the regular go-to gag readers love still to the present day. As I write this the current issue contains "Fire Chief Bozza", a take on The Beano's General Jumbo and his miniature remote-controlled army with "52-year old Boris Johnson" as "the lucky owner of his very own mechanical remote control fire brigade". The previous issue had Tony Hadley from Spandau Ballet fronting a "True Crime" strip, the latest in a long run of petty scams perpetuated by Elton John with his partner David Furnish and heavily Scots-accented Royal fun in "The Broon Windsors". On the subject of the latter, The Sunday Post strips originated in the 1930's by comics great Dudley D Watkins - "The Broons" and "Oor Wullie" - were clearly a source of huge inspiration to the Viz team cropping up in various guises, starting with this from issue 41, the first proper celebrity strip featuring Oor...Jimmy?!

I mean, its just an Oor Wullie strip with bucket to match (later use of the bucket would put in a copyright infringement-free slot to suggest it wasn't a bucket but Ned Kelly's hat.) With that little bit of history in place, here are my top ten celebrity-starring strips from the first two decades of Viz (1979-1999)...

10. Paul Daniels' Jet-Ski Journey To The Centre Of Elvis (Issue 85 - August / September 1997)

Two celebrities for the price of one here as Simon Donald draws this fantastic voyage of a miniaturised Paul Daniels sent in to remove a "peanut-butter log jam" from the King (who only communicates with variants on the phrase "Lord Have Mercy") after surgery is risked impossible to the singer's big belt. At the peak of his career, Daniels did actually headline in Vegas several times so it wouldn't be out of the realms of possibility that, had he lived, Elvis might have seen him perform. Although probably not coming out of his bottom on a wave of excretia. FUN FACT: Paul saw this strip and contacted Viz to buy the original artwork.

9. The Undersink Cupboard Of Jacques Cousteau (Issue 70 - February / March 1995)

A fantastically stupid quickie featuring the 85 year old (and two years from death) famous French marine explorer whose programme "The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau" had been a Sunday afternoon staple filler on BBC One throughout the 1970s.

8. Harry Enfield strips (Issue 62 - October / November 1993)

And in the same issue later on...

I chose these not for the lame puns or the incongruity of those characters having strips - indeed they had already appeared in comic form thanks to Charlie Higson's cartoons in Enfield's 1988 comedy cash in book "Wad And Peeps" (much more on that here) - but the fact that both of these comics appeared in late 1993, four years after Enfield had stopped performing either character. The Viz team were long acquainted with Harry by this point after he got in contact in regards to collaboration (also needing Geordie voice tips for his new character Buggerallmoney) and later provided the voices for the Billy The Fish and Roger Mellie animations. So they could have run these as "Look at us, friends with the hippest trend in comedy!" kudos five or six years earlier but didn't, thus making the appearance in the mid nineties even more ridiculous. And therefore brilliant. 

7. Noddy Holder (Issue 48 - June / July 1991)

In 1991, Holder was in a bit of an odd place as far as the public conscience was concerned - not quite the Grimleys-starring national treasure he would become but also not really relevant for his work with soon-to-split Slade (their final Top 40 hit "Radio Wall Of Sound" being released that October) anymore. This strip pitches him as a mischievous young lad who finds his granddad's old magic set in the attic and has absolutely nothing to do with his band, Glam or music in general. Its just a very daft premise and perfect for this list.

6. The Adventures Of Rolf Harris The Cat (Issue 46 - February / March 1991)

Look, I know, I know. BBC knew. We all knew. Whatever. Its a funny strip.

5. Fry's Turkish Delight (Issue 58 - February / March 1993)

Long in those dark days before endless QI repeats on Dave, Fry was still very much the go-to figure for someone extremely wordy and mildly pretentious. Although he'd left Cambridge over a decade previously, Stephen was still clearly the brainiest boy and so received this gift of a big pile of Turkish Delight with the proviso that it had to be gone from the premises within one hour or he'll be suspended. Numerous ruses fail and so it falls on him to eat the lot there and then and wouldn't you know it...

4. Donald Sinden In "There Goes My Knighthood" (Issue 86 - October / November 1997)

(open image in new window to enlarge)  

I knew Ald Sinden before he was made a Don you know... The definitive Viz farce appeared a lot later in the run than most people remember it and is almost certainly inspired by a similar knighthood running gag in Spitting Image some years previous.

3. The 2 Ronnies And Their Gangs (Issue 58 - February / March 1993)

Just perfect. There's something inherently ridiculous to me about The Two Ronnies when divorced from the material anyway so recasting them as heads of rival gangs seems the most gloriously appropriate fate and something that could easily have appeared in "Cor!" or perhaps "Beeb".

2. Spot The Clue (various)

Still occasionally making an appearance in the comic, Davey Jones' flights of fancy have been a crucial part of Viz since he joined as a contributor in 1986 with his regular strips such as Roger Irrelevant, Gilbert Rachet and "Spot The Clue" always contains a genuine but utterly banal red herring that readers can use to work out the perpetrator of a terrible crime. 

And taking the top spot...

1. The Human League In Outer Space (Issue 45 - December 1990)

Perfection. "Look In" magazine throughout its run from 1971 to 1994 would regular serialise "fun" stories featuring bands of the time such as Madness, Bucks Fizz, Five Star and, of course, Flintlock. The Human League amazingly weren't included into this pantheon of greats and so it was left to Viz to provide exactly the same sort of story that would appear in the pages of the "Junior TV Times". The fact that it came from a year when Phil and "The Girls" were at their absolute lowest career point just made the whole thing even more surreal, silly and the best celebrity based cartoon strip Viz ever produced.

What do you think? Anything major missing? Feel like The Simon Salad Cream Story or Gary Bushell The Bear deserved a place? Perhaps Jarvis Cocker's His Quest For Knockers was cruelly overlooked? Or Bernie Winters' Circus Of Horrors? Yes, they all existed! Thanks for reading and sorry about all that Rolf Harris business earlier...

...piss.

75 Pints, 1 Song, No Laughter: People Who Died On Their Arse For Comic Relief

HAPPY RED NOSE DAY! Whatever your opinion on the charity, the programme or its inspiration to make members of the public to do tedious things invariably involving beans for cash, it does a lot of good work both abroad and at home. And occasionally something funny happens!!! Maybe it was Victor Meldrew in the bath, French and Saunders being rude, Catherine Tate saying "bothered" to someone you wouldn't normally expect or Mr Bean falling down a well that made you giggle like a goon when you were younger. But what about the times where the audience don't - or won't - join in with the chuckles? Maybe they fail to get it or they're tired but occasionally the laughs don't come for some acts on stage and live television actually feels live for once.

Ably assisted by Mr Tim Worthington from the always excellent Newsround blog, here are a few acts who suffered that fate on the big night...

Adam And Joe

In a bit of a limbo since their self titled Channel 4 programme ended and awaiting the broadcast of their "Go Tokyo" series by BBC Three that May, Adam and Joe were still an exceptionally cult act for anyone not in the habit of watching late night sketch shows on C4 (their last series had aired on E4 before it was watched by anyone and given a horrible Wednesday night 11pm timeslot after being a staple of Friday nights when people might actually stay up to watch telly.) When I saw them listed as presenters for this, I hoped it would be a triumph but you know the premise of this article already, right? Already given the poison chalice of having to host the very last segment of Comic Relief 2003, the programme overran as ever meaning the 12:30pm slot given for "Comic Relief's Classic Comedy Masterclass" (a cheap clip section featuring old comedy bits) ended up closer to 2am and a very tired studio audience were in no mood for two people they'd never heard of in silly outfits and looking more like kids TV presenters. Add that to the fact that neither Buxton or Cornish had done much work in front of a live audience and it lead to a rather downbeat ending to the night's proceedings. The same would happen to Simon Pegg and Nick Frost in 2007 who ended up starting past 3am but smartly were pre-taped as if they were good or something.


Eddie Izzard



Believe it or not, there was a time when Eddie Izzard was known as the comedian who 'didn't do TV'. At his own insistence. His initial rise was entirely down to the popularity of his live act, and although I'd seen this written about in glowing terms, the only time that I'd really actually encountered it was through his really rather good appearance on Radio 5's Club Class. Then in 1993, as part of Comic Relief's pleasingly ad-hoc and ramshackle-looking revival of Saturday Live, he finally made his first major television appearance to some considerable fanfare. Which may have sounded exciting, but the performance itself most certainly was not. Looking and sounding uncomfortable, he hesitantly made his way through a string of arcane and audience-baffling jokes to very few laughs at all. So exactly like the 'new' acts on the original Saturday Live, then.

- Tim Worthington

Father Ted and Dougal



Sadly the full segment - listed in the Radio Times as "Father Ted and His Faithful Friends" - isnt online but I remember the sense of utter bafflement from the studio as Lenny Henry hands over the next half an hour apparently to two random Irish priests in spangly golden jackets arriving on the back of a (lovely) horse. Of course, to faithful Channel 4 viewers this is Fathers Ted and Dougal, fourteen episodes and a Christmas special into their run but not quite a nationally known series from years of repeats. As Ted says "I thought that hosting Comic Relief was mainly reserved for famous comedians rather than two completely unknown priests from the west of Ireland.” The material, all written by series creators Arthur Mathews and Graham Linehan, is generally of a very high quality with a particularly memorable section featuring Dougal copying Vic and Bob's big saucepan fights but with a real pan, breaking Ted's nose. See it for yourself on the fairly recent Ted boxset. Who will they have next as a Comic Relief presenter? Father Noel Furlong????

That Blankety Blank sketch



A contribution from Peter Serafinowicz and Robert Popper, creators of the wonderful but hugely obscure BBC2 fake science comedy "Look Around You" purporting to be an unaired archive episode of "Blankety Blank" which went out around 1am in 2003 and I first saw without sound waiting for a takeaway. I recognised pretty much everyone involved and chuckled to myself as I saw Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Matt Lucas, David Walliams, Sarah Alexander and Martin Freeman frustrating Serafinowicz' usually calm and controlled Wogan, even if I couldn't work out who everyone was meant to be. (Freddie Starr, an embarrassing and frankly shameful "ha ha a bit like a Wookie" Willy Rushton, Su Pollard, Ruth Madoc, Liza Goddard and Johnny Rotten - which sadly breaks the 'reality' of the sketch for less clued up folks - retrospectively it turned out) Everything goes wrong with Pollard stealing all the "Hi De Hi" thunder from Madoc, Starr being an attention-seeking git, a Greenham Common protester and finally a gun toting contestant (played by Kevin Eldon) losing the plot leading to a celebrity massacre. The audience applauds but laughter is thin on the ground as both the premise and the jokes fly over many collective heads. They should chill out and get some yellow reggae on.


Paul Daniels

One of the first big catastrophes of the TV shows came from Red Nose Day 1989 where a milk jug trick went horribly wrong on live TV for Paul Daniels who only slightly lost his cool. Its place in Comic Relief history was cemented by cutaways to a weeping Griff Rhys Jones and Lenny Henry in their seats convulsing at how rubbish the segment was, the latter later saying that if people pledged more money, they'd show how the trick actually ended. The clip would also crop up on the next few telethons too as incentive for people phoning in.


The League of Gentlemen



Trailed excitedly all night with clips from their popular BBC2 sitcom, Reece Shearsmith, Mark Gatiss and Steve Pemberton turned up after midnight in 2001 to do a sketch from their live show starting its run at Drury Lane the following week. Unfortunately for Royston Vasey fans though it featured none of the popular TV characters. Instead, a very slow "Scott of the Antarctic" piece was performed which devolves into argument about wanking and features a rare F word for the time. Reaction picks up as the piece gets ruder but its fair to say that Alan Q Publicnormal in his seat at TV Centre was not especially impressed. Wait until they see series three...

Norman Lovett

Comic Asides, BBC2's unusually successful series of prospective comedy pilots from 1989, included I, Lovett, a charmingly offbeat bit of nonsense written by and starring Norman Lovett as an eccentric inventor who lived with a Geoffrey Hughes-voiced talking dog named Dirk. The pilot caused a great deal of excitement, partly on the back of Lovett's Red Dwarf association but mainly because it was refreshingly different and ridiculous for ridiculousness' sake; however it would take four years for a full series to appear, which never quite managed to recapture that initial promise. With the series due to arrive just over a week later, Norman and his canine puppet friend were ushered on to 1993 Comic Relief to do a spot of pre-launch promotion in the unenviable middle-of-proceedings slot. Quiet whimsy from two unfamiliar characters was not really what the hysteric-prone studio audience were looking for, and the to say the least 'muted' reception does leave you wondering if any of them were actually inspired to tune in.

- Tim Worthington

Mitchell and Webb

For fans of the double act, seeing them performing their big hit sketches - Numberwang and Ted and Peter, the snooker commentators - was a big treat. Sadly, this was 2007 and with just one series of "That Mitchell and Webb Look" aired at the time, very few people knowing "Peep Show" and Mitchell not yet having appeared on every panel show ever made, the predictable mutter of "who are they and what is going on?" rose from the crowd. The former convoluted game show spoof was boosted by appearances by mathematical marvels Carol Vorderman and Johnny Ball but later in the night, a rendition of their live tour closer featuring Ted and Peter singing the "secret Snooker lyrics" to "Lady In Red" - now "Table Of Reds" - seemed to baffle the audience into near silence. Chris De Burgh and Hazel Irvine dressed as a snooker table coming on helped matters little. The pair returned the following show in 2009 with a slightly higher profile and a bunch of sketches with fellow sketch stars Armstrong and Miller who Mitchell & Webb were head writers for in the nineties. Although none of that came close to the impact of this in 2011...



Vic and Bob

The ultimate example of the sort of comedy act that delight some and leave others not just cold but positively chattering the teeth in the Arctic tundra. There's no disguising what a brilliant and as Jonathan Ross says in this first clip "once in a lifetime" duo Vic and Bob were when they first arrived on TV with "Vic Reeves' Big Night Out" in May 1990. They could also be two of the laziest "that'll do" buggers to ever appear on live television. Sometimes it works, other times...

Come the following year and despite the Radio Times promising that "Vic Reeves stages a Red Nose Novelty Island", Reeves and Mortimer actually did a piece all about getting rid of their unwanted red noses. Despite being stashed long after midnight and featuring all their big catchphrases, Lenny points out after how some of the audience may not have quite gone for it...




Although that's nothing to "75 pints, 1 song", a 1995 sketch that should have been hilarious with Vic and Bob, now BBC signings although still fairly cult (the breakthrough Shooting Stars wouldn't be until later that year), getting increasingly drunk whilst trying to sing Nilsson's "Without You". Despite them being trick pints with much less in each glass, the two quickly lose what they're meant to be doing (blamed on screen by a few snifters taken due to the show again running late) and basically just shout while Mel Smith looks suitably unimpressed.



This year they're back live after a pause to do The Stotts interviewing a guest live, which has the potential to be brilliant, especially on the back of their recent great anniversary tour. Lets hope they stick to halves...

So here's wishing all of tonight's performers the best of luck. Even Miranda Hart, Noel Fielding and Romesh Ranganathan who are very very funny indeed. *looks into distance* Thanks to Tim for his much appreciated help and go look at his brilliant blog. And give to Comic Relief or any charity you think deserves your money today. As Wednesday's horrible scenes showed, we are a nation of passionate brilliant people and we have a real power to make things better.

Enjoy your comedies and remember, it could always be worse...

QUIZ: Happy Birthday Ian Darts

"Its only a game / so put up a real big fight / I'm gonna be / throwing some darts / tonight". So almost went the theme to a programme not about darts but I couldn't think of any songs about that and I'm fairly sure music by the 70s pop act Darts wouldn't count. I'll start again...

It's Eric Bristow's birthday! "The Crafty Cockney" is 59 today and still probably the most famous darts player in the world after Phil "The Power" Powerington, Ian Darts and the late Harry Secombe. His autobiography (amazingly titled "The Crafty Cockney") is one of the finest books on sport ever to be written by a man named Eric Bristow. To celebrate, I've got ten quotes from it here for you. But only six of them are real - can you find the fake flight-flingers and the true tungsten-tipped talking?

As they say in darts - LETS DARTS!

1. "My first detention was for farting on the school headmaster. He called me a 'darts-obsessed youth' and I called him a 'non-darting fanny'. I had to write a thousand lines about being respectful to my elders. I thought 'We'll see who has the last laugh when I pick up the News Of the World Under 18s Trophy!"

2. "I always walked the streets with a claw hammer stuffed down the front of my trousers in case of any trouble. Everywhere I went I took it with me. That claw hammer became my best friend. It got me out of some sticky situations because you never felt totally safe walking the streets of Stoke Newington."

3. "In 1988, I was asked to be a guest on Paul Daniels' Magic Programme and I thought why not, something to show the kids so went on and was asked to tie the feller into a mummy's tomb thing. I genuinely couldn't see how it was done and I worked out who did it in Murder On The Orient Express in 20 minutes. But that little baldy was just too quick for me that day. Dickhead."

4. "I loved having babies around the house. I was fine with changing nappies and mopping up sick. I was a New Man before the term had even been coined."

5. "I've always loved the darts but if there was money in playing Connect Four, I'd have happily been World Champion at that. I just always seem to win my games. Its like a magic spell. I was shit at Buckaroo though."

6. "I blame Roy Castle for the smoking ban. I did a few charity events in aid of the Roy Castle Foundation and the one thing that got me was how all the smokers there were frightened to light up. I just went dink at the first opportunity and puffed away. Then I’d hear the dink, dink, dink of other people’s lighters as they followed suit. What a bunch of idiots."

7. "We were all in the pub one night having a bit of after-time and Brian got a bit rough with this gay and started pulling him about. He was having a laugh, but going a bit over the top, as he was inclined to do when he’d had a few beers. He ended up pulling this gay by the arm and it came off in Brian’s hand. Brian just stared at this arm in bewilderment. I was on the floor rolling about with laughter. It was the funniest thing I have ever seen. In the end the one-armed gay landlord said, ‘Give me my arm back,’ snatched it off Brian and put it back in the socket."

8. "In 1987, I was playing in an American casino when a Yank came up to me and said, ‘You crazy mad Brits, shooting all those people in Hungerford.’ He was referring to the Hungerford massacre when Michael Ryan shot and killed sixteen people with two semi-automatic rifles and a handgun before turning the weapons on himself. I said, ‘I’ve never heard of Hungerford, you dickhead. What are you on about?'

9. "I've never believed in ghosts but one night coming back to the hotel in Manchester after a few too many sherbets I got a bit lost and had to ask directions from this black geezer in a fancy hat. He put me on the straight path and the next morning after a full English and a kip I thought I'd go out and find this guy to offering him two tickets to the final for being so kind. But when I went back he'd gone and nobody around had any memory of seeing him. Still haunts me to this day."

10. "We were all in the green room before filming started when Rod Hull came into the bar. He was the surprise celebrity guest who came on at the end of the show. I wasn’t keen on him; I’d seen what he did with other people. He basically used the puppet to feel up women and stick his hand between people’s legs. It was out of order. We’d all had a drink, perhaps one or two more than we should  I went straight up Rod Hull’s face, eyeball to eyeball, and said, ‘Now listen, pal. When you come on set later on with that fucking silly bird of yours, if you come anywhere near me with that fucking thing I will knock you out straight, on telly, whether it’s fucking live or not. I will bop you.’

 


When Hull came on later on he was pulling Jim Bowen all over the place with his stupid Emu, but he didn’t come anywhere near us; he daren’t. Then the silly sod went and fell off his roof and died some years later. What a plonker. When I heard about it I thought, well it’s a pity that bird can’t fly or it could’ve saved him. I didn’t like Rod Hull. He was a pervert who was getting away with something that wasn’t right. That’s why if he’d touched me inappropriately with his hand I would’ve sparked him. His bottle went when I threatened him. He’d only come down to have a quiet drink before the show, but I had to nip it in the bud. I didn’t want another situation developing as happened on Michael Parkinson’s show a few years earlier where he assaulted Michael so much that he fell backwards off his chair. That was well out of order."

Answers after the old Bull and Bush....

The real quotes are 2, 4, 6, 7, 8 and 10. Especially 10.