0:09

Hello again and welcome to My

0:11

Time Capsule. I'm Mike Fenton Stevens

0:13

and My Time Capsule is a podcast

0:15

where people tell me five things

0:17

from their life they wish they had

0:19

in a time capsule. They pick

0:21

four things that they really love and

0:23

one thing they'd like to bury

0:25

and forget and never think of again.

0:28

My guest in this episode again

0:30

is Mark Thomas, the brilliant

0:32

stand -up comedian and campaigner. In

0:34

fact, this is an extended version

0:36

of Mark's original episode. It

0:39

was recorded in 2020 when Covid

0:41

was still going strong, and Boris

0:43

Johnson was Prime Minister. No,

0:45

honestly, there was such a time. It

0:47

wasn't all just a bad dream, you know? Anyway,

0:49

it's Easter, so we thought we'd re

0:51

-release this episode, but with the stuff

0:53

that we originally cut out, put back

0:55

in. Why we cut it out

0:57

in the first place, I can't imagine, because

1:00

Mark Thomas is one of the most

1:02

compelling, genuine, fascinating, and entertaining men

1:04

I know. At least I

1:06

think so. I hope you do too,

1:08

because here he is in all his

1:10

glory. Ladies and gentlemen,

1:12

the brilliant Mark Thomas. I

1:18

just sort of think, you know, brilliant.

1:20

You got through 10 months without live gigs.

1:23

Yeah. You know, managed to adapt and

1:25

find new work and, you know,

1:27

get by and scrimp and save and

1:29

all of that. Yeah. And

1:31

I know I feel very much that way

1:33

with them. know, you sort of think to

1:35

yourself, well, if somebody had said to me,

1:37

well, you're not going to be doing any

1:39

theater. You're not going to do any telly

1:41

radio stopped because they can't work out how

1:43

to do this amazingly. I

1:46

know. Everybody else has. And

1:48

actually do. We

1:50

worked out how to do it after about

1:52

three days. You know, oh, I know

1:54

how I work out to work, record a radio

1:56

show. I can do it took the arches nine

1:58

months. Well. It's

2:00

unbelievable. That's the arches for you. That's the

2:03

arches for you. There we are. So, Mark,

2:05

it's really lovely of you to do this

2:07

and give up your time to do this.

2:09

I think I may have told you when

2:11

we bumped into each other, which you probably

2:13

don't even remember, outside of the Battersea Arts. I

2:16

think you came to see a play that I was in

2:18

that Chris Good directed. Yes, I do remember it. It was

2:20

a very good play. It was a very good play. Lovely

2:22

to do. And I

2:24

asked him years later, I said, why did you pick me for

2:26

that? Because you didn't even get me to read for it.

2:28

You just said, you want to do this? And

2:30

he said, I said, why did you ask

2:32

me to do it? And he said, oh,

2:34

I saw a thing you did called People

2:37

Like Us. There was a moment in it.

2:39

I was playing a vicar. And after about

2:41

25 minutes of this program,

2:43

this vicar realizes through the

2:45

ineptitude of the person interviewing, but then

2:47

actually he doesn't believe in God anymore. And

2:50

it's quite a devastating moment for

2:52

him. And it was that

2:55

moment that Chris spotted. Out

2:57

of all this comedy, we're doing comedy, comedy,

2:59

comedy, suddenly this man, and he says, so

3:01

you do believe in God, don't you? And

3:04

you go, and it's that moment that

3:06

when this man can be straight. But

3:09

there's a wonderful thing. I think

3:11

you can see these moments. They're beautiful

3:13

moments. They really are. And

3:16

for me, the king

3:18

is Zero Mostel. Yeah, yeah.

3:20

When you see him, um

3:23

in the front when he

3:25

when he toasts himself in the

3:27

hotel bedroom he does this brilliant

3:29

thing and he's he's got his

3:31

hat on and he's doing his

3:33

little thing and he looks at

3:35

himself in the mirror and goes

3:37

and then you see him and

3:39

as he walks towards he turns

3:42

out of the room and he

3:44

starts walking down the corridor towards

3:46

the window where he's going to

3:48

jump out of yeah and the

3:50

world is on him In

3:53

an instant, the world is

3:55

on him. It's

3:57

fucking remarkable. Yeah, it

4:00

is. When people do things like that, when

4:02

they turn it on a sixpence, without

4:04

any effort, with no... Nothing's happened.

4:06

You just know it. still, they're

4:08

in the producers, where he's suddenly

4:10

got a huge bloke who's going

4:12

around the rose garden to seduce

4:14

the old lady. He's got this...

4:16

He's like a fucking cat. Oh,

4:20

Oh, you're right, yeah, God, he's amazing, isn't

4:22

he? Zero mustel. And

4:25

just that ridiculous hair and everything, you

4:27

know, everything about me. But you know

4:29

he was a proper old commie. He

4:31

was brilliant. Yeah, yeah. Yeah,

4:33

absolutely. He was one of the

4:35

ones who was blacklisted, wasn't he?

4:38

Indeed he was. And there's a

4:40

famous story that they were doing. The funny thing

4:42

happened on the way to the forum, and

4:44

they were touring it around America, and the director

4:46

had been in to see it. when they're

4:48

in Baltimore or somewhere like that. And I said,

4:50

right, we're going to get a choreographer in

4:52

because you're really not on spot. You're not on

4:54

point. So we need to tighten

4:56

up the show. You've got too loosey -goosey. And

4:59

they brought in this

5:01

guy who was renowned for

5:03

giving up names during

5:05

the McCarthy era. And

5:08

they're all and everyone knew.

5:11

And they're all waiting in rehearsal

5:13

room. This guy walks in and Zira

5:15

must still goes, in the Torah.

5:18

It is written that he

5:20

who betrays his fellow

5:22

man is lower than a

5:25

snake. He's lower than a

5:27

vermin. You are. And he

5:29

just goes, shoot his absolute

5:31

fucking tears and my part goes,

5:33

but. We on

5:35

the left do not blacklist.

5:37

Let's do this thing, Two,

5:39

three, four, something. Two, three,

5:42

something four, something. Oh, Oh,

5:44

brilliant. Oh,

5:46

that's amazing. Oh. I

5:50

think he'll forever be my hero.

5:52

Oh, God. I'm going to

5:54

have to look at that. I'm going to have to search

5:56

that out again, actually. Something happened on the way to the forum.

5:59

I I mean, Zero

6:01

Mostel was I mean, I love

6:04

Frankie Howard, but you know... Zero

6:06

Mostel was... This was a

6:08

vaudeville. A piece of

6:10

vaudeville. And so fucking Zero

6:12

Mostel was custom built. Yeah.

6:15

Frankie Howard sacked me from my first job. That's

6:19

my autobiography title. That's the

6:21

one. I

6:23

always remember saying to Barry Cryer,

6:25

something similar, when he told me

6:27

that he woke up once while

6:30

he was sharing digs with Frankie

6:32

Howard, who was masturbating. Yeah. That

6:34

would be it. Of

6:36

course. He

6:39

was shameful. Absolutely shameful.

6:42

Oh, God. I went with Jimmy Mulvill

6:44

and Roy McGrath to his house

6:46

once. We were going to write

6:48

some stuff for his radio show. And

6:50

he... and Jimmy said watch

6:52

out he does it every time we turned

6:55

up and he was in a dressing

6:57

gown he said oh sorry sorry I just

6:59

had a shower I was well behind

7:01

I do apologize and then he sat down

7:03

and said sit down sit down boys

7:05

sit down and we all sat down with

7:07

our little pads of paper and he

7:09

sat there and the thing fell right open

7:11

and just this sort of semi -rigid cock

7:13

hanging there you thought oh horrible horrible Well,

7:18

did you remind him

7:20

that you... Yep, that's on

7:22

my list of me

7:24

too. What

7:28

a

7:30

world.

7:33

Anyway, look, we should get on with

7:35

this thing. Have you had a chance to

7:37

think about it at all, or are you just going to...

7:39

I've had a few. Great.

7:43

Okay, whenever you want to start.

7:45

Okay, fantastic. Mark, it's

7:47

absolutely delightful to have you on my time

7:49

capsule. I have to say I've been

7:51

an enormous fan of yours for many years

7:53

and when I first thought of this

7:55

program, I wrote a list of the

7:57

people that I didn't know that I would like

7:59

to have on the show and you were right at the

8:01

top. So thank you for doing this.

8:04

You're very sweet. Thank you. Thank

8:06

you for having me. No. Not

8:09

at all. I've admired your work

8:11

for many years. I think

8:13

you're a very funny man, but also

8:15

I love what you say about things. I

8:18

have my moments. Yeah, you do.

8:22

This might be one of them,

8:24

maybe not. Let's find out. going

8:27

to put five things into a time capsule, five

8:29

things from your life that you think are precious

8:31

to you. They can be insignificant, but

8:34

as long as they're important to you, that's

8:36

what matters. So, let's start. What would you like

8:38

to put in first? I think

8:40

I'm going to show you

8:42

something. Okay. Lovely. In a

8:44

non -Frankie Howard way, I'm

8:46

going to show you something. And

8:49

I'm just going to reach over, hold on

8:51

one second. And

8:54

it's this. Ban, passion,

8:57

statues. Yeah. Years

9:00

ago, I was doing

9:02

a show where I was

9:04

looking at the rules

9:06

and regulations regarding demonstrating in

9:08

Parliament Square. I remember it

9:11

well, yeah. David Blunkett, who

9:13

was then Home Secretary, said

9:15

that if you needed to give advance

9:17

notice that you were going to demonstrate

9:19

and you need to give the police

9:21

six days notice and you need to

9:23

fill in a form and tell them

9:26

all this stuff. And

9:28

actually, the thing about this is

9:30

that Demonstrating is a right. It's a

9:32

thing that you just have. You don't get

9:34

permission from the state because, you know, it's often

9:36

the state you're demonstrating against. The idea that

9:38

you should go and ask permission from the people

9:40

you're in opposition to is frankly nuts. As

9:42

a matter of fact, I could be rebellious, sir,

9:44

yes, for half an hour. It's nuts. So,

9:47

you know, I started to look at the

9:49

way that this law was drafted very badly.

9:51

If you make a law very quickly, and

9:54

also if you make a law that's

9:56

only designed to, it was brought in

9:58

to get the peace campaigner,

10:01

who was Brian Hall, who was outside,

10:03

who had a peace camp in

10:05

Parliament Square. And it was to

10:07

get rid of him. If you bring in

10:09

a law that applies to everybody because you want

10:11

one person to stop doing something, unless

10:13

it That one person is pressing

10:15

a nuclear bomb. The law's not

10:17

really worth it. No. So they

10:19

brought in this law, and we

10:21

just examined it and ripped it

10:23

apart. And what happened was, I

10:25

started to go along and I

10:27

said, right, I want permission to

10:29

demonstrate. And

10:31

I went to police station.

10:33

I went to Charing Cross police station. And

10:35

I met a guy called PC Paul McAnally,

10:37

who was a Scottish police officer working out

10:40

at Charing Cross. And he picked up my

10:42

form and goes, right, Mr. Thomas, you wish

10:44

to demonstrate to defend surrealism. And

10:46

I said, yes,

10:48

I can demonstrate on anything I like. He said,

10:50

you can indeed. I just didn't

10:52

know surrealism was under threat. And

10:55

at that point, you just think, you're in the

10:57

show. Do you know what I mean? When you

10:59

meet somebody, when you meet someone like that, and you

11:01

just think, oh, they're full of play. Do you

11:04

know what I mean? And so

11:06

I did a demonstration to defend surrealism and I

11:08

turned it on. I called my mate. We

11:10

invited the founders of the British surrealist movement, the

11:12

Penrose family. We said, do you want to

11:14

take part in a demonstration to defend surrealism in

11:16

Parliament Square? And they said, no, we're all

11:18

right. But they sent along, they sent along items

11:20

to represent themselves, a pair of

11:22

socks and an onion. So we

11:25

stand in Parliament Square with

11:27

a pair of socks and an

11:29

onion. Defend surrealism. We had

11:31

my mates turned up. They had,

11:33

we had amazes. People brought

11:35

along. banners with what do we

11:37

when what which is a

11:39

great great surrealist sort of like

11:41

statement somebody else that just

11:43

had wallpaper on their banner and

11:45

they just stood there facing

11:47

the traffic and we just had

11:49

a great laugh and then

11:51

and then we applied there's a law

11:54

that says you need six days but

11:56

if it's an emergency demonstration you could

11:58

apply with one day and so I I

12:01

applied for a demonstration

12:03

to destroy surrealism. And

12:05

P .C. Paul McNally, you were

12:07

defending it yesterday. I said, I've

12:09

changed my mind. He said, I can see that. You

12:13

just think this is great. So

12:15

we had all these demonstrations and

12:17

it led to, basically,

12:20

I said to him, P .C. Paul McNally,

12:22

I want to do two demos. And

12:25

he goes, oh, you'll need separate permissions. I

12:27

said, oh, really? He said, yeah. And I

12:29

was like, because we wanted to prove how

12:31

stupid the law was, any more paperwork was

12:33

like, this is us. This is great. And

12:36

I said, too, I'd better reply. I said, oh,

12:38

Jesus. So that's

12:40

it. We just start applying for loads of different demonstrations.

12:42

And then I said, what about if I move

12:44

to the other side of the road? He goes, that

12:46

counts as a separate demonstration. So I said, right.

12:48

So this area that it works in is quite a

12:50

big area. And we

12:53

had demonstrations. So

12:55

I applied for 21 demonstrations

12:57

in this area, right? And

13:00

they had to give me permission. And

13:02

we were having our demonstration on

13:04

the same day as the anarchists

13:06

were organising a thing, a smashed

13:08

parliament. And they hadn't got

13:10

permission. So that's the

13:12

anarchist. Typical anarchists. They

13:15

didn't bother getting permission at all.

13:18

We had this bizarre situation where I

13:20

was doing all these demonstrations and we

13:22

were going all around this area in

13:24

central London, so we went from number

13:26

10 Downing Street and we went through

13:28

Parliament Square and over Hungerford Bridge down

13:30

the South Bank, went outside the old

13:32

county hall, over Westminster Bridge by MI5,

13:34

all the way up around Channel 4.

13:36

We had all these, you know, all

13:38

the way, all around there, and we

13:40

had all these different demos all over

13:42

the place. On Hungerford

13:45

Bridge, we'd demand more trolls. and

13:47

we had to be in Africa. MO

13:49

for that. And we're

13:51

ending up, and I've

13:53

got my mates to come along with me.

13:56

And we've got a dustbin. We're carrying all

13:58

our banners in it as the banner caddy. And

14:00

my mates were demonstration assistants. So

14:02

we've got big aprons with demonstration

14:04

assistant on the back of it.

14:07

And I've got protester under license.

14:09

And then we pulled all this stuff out.

14:13

And they'd sort of go, you'll need a

14:15

number nine demonstrating banners. And hand me

14:17

a banner. And I'll sort of wave out.

14:19

We'd made them all in advance, so

14:21

we'd have all the banners ready. I

14:24

mean, we glued our permission and

14:26

all the paperwork to the lid

14:28

of this wheelie bin that we'd put

14:30

all the banners in, right? So we're

14:32

going along for the final demonstration. There

14:34

was absolute chaos at the end of

14:36

Downing Street, at the end of Whitehall.

14:39

And there's big sort of, as we come

14:41

into Parliament Square, all the anarchists are all

14:43

over the place because we're finishing where we

14:45

started. As

14:47

we're coming, this cop just goes, stop, and my

14:49

mate lifts up the lid and goes, gaze at

14:51

the lid of permission. And there was all this

14:53

police paperwork, and this bloke goes, all right, I

14:56

know you, Mark Thomas. He said, right. He said,

14:58

I'm going to get my super. And the guy

15:00

comes over. There's loads of cops. There's sirens. There's

15:02

real mayhem going over. And this police

15:04

superintendent comes over. goes, right, Mr. Thomas.

15:06

I said, I've got permission. He said, you have indeed. And

15:08

what my job is to facilitate your right to demonstrate.

15:10

However, as you can see, we've got a bit of an

15:12

incident over there. And what I don't want is your

15:14

presence to either incite it or for you to be dragged

15:16

into the melee, or for you to come at harm,

15:18

sir. So what I'm going to do is

15:20

I'm going to appoint these two officers here to

15:23

escort you, to enable you to carry out

15:25

your legal and lawful right to demonstrate in Parliament

15:27

Square. So I've got given these two cops,

15:29

and we wander into the middle of Parliament Square.

15:31

There are people getting arrested, they've got their

15:33

arms behind their back, there are dogs, there's flashing

15:35

lights, there's poop being bundled in the van.

15:37

We'll get these two cops standing next to me

15:39

while I'm standing there with Mike demonstrating mandatory. Very

15:44

few people have ever protested

15:46

with the police protection. So

15:49

anyway, we came to do more of them

15:51

because I've got loads of people on one day,

15:53

we've got loads and loads of people to

15:55

do it. I've got 10 mates and I said,

15:57

you need to get 10 mates and we

15:59

need them to do 20 demonstrations and we

16:01

built it up. So we had

16:03

something like, we had over 2 ,000

16:05

demonstrations. They had to give permission to

16:08

give all the paperwork for them

16:10

in one day. And I said to

16:12

my children, What should I

16:14

demonstrate on? Because I don't... I was just

16:16

feeling really bit down and my daughter goes

16:18

ban posh statues. And so she drew this.

16:21

Brilliant. And what's lovely

16:23

is my daughter

16:25

is... She's really

16:27

clever. But she's really

16:29

practical. And she

16:31

makes clothes and she makes

16:33

her own music and she does

16:36

her own art stuff and

16:38

she... She's a young woman who's

16:40

on her way of finding herself. This

16:43

has always sort

16:45

of been a lovely

16:47

thing that's about her

16:49

as well as about my

16:51

stupidity. But it's about

16:53

her and about her

16:56

instinctive way of looking at the

16:58

world. Yeah, instinctively. This is

17:00

years ago. This is

17:02

this is 2005. And

17:05

she just went ban posh

17:07

statues. statues before the statues must

17:09

be a posh. Yeah. I

17:11

think she was six. Oh, wow.

17:13

That's fantastic. You know what I mean?

17:16

And I did the thingy,

17:18

but she drew the outline. Brilliant.

17:21

And there's something wonderful about that

17:23

instinctive way of looking at the

17:25

world. That sort

17:27

of... We

17:29

become used to it. We become used

17:31

to looking at things. And I think

17:33

one of the great things about art

17:36

is that we try and get to look

17:38

at things in a different way. And

17:40

there's... And for me this sort

17:42

of symbolizes not just her, but

17:44

this approach to art that we should actually

17:46

have this thing where we should look at it.

17:48

We should constantly come to the fucking statues

17:50

possible. Why aren't there any of us? So

17:53

that would be my first thing. But it's

17:55

a lovely thing. And what's amazing about

17:58

it, I always think, is that you can

18:00

be as clever as you think you can

18:02

be. You can go through the whole

18:04

process of thinking, yeah, I've got a great

18:06

way of demonstrating exactly what I mean

18:08

by these demonstrations of the absurdity of it

18:10

all. And look what we have to go

18:12

through to get this done. You

18:14

know, we're not demonstrating against anything that

18:17

we really care about. We're just showing you

18:19

how absurd it is that we have

18:21

to go through this process to demonstrate. When

18:23

it's when, as you say, it's unnatural,

18:25

right? It's our right to stand up and

18:27

say, excuse me, I don't agree. I

18:29

just don't agree. And that's

18:32

everybody has that right. Then your

18:34

child actually sort of pinpoints it. Six

18:36

year old child pinpoints it. And that's a

18:38

glorious thing. So that's got to

18:40

go in. That's the

18:42

definite. I

18:45

think you're right. For

18:48

me, as

18:50

you get older, I

18:53

become slightly more curmudgeonly.

18:56

And it's not that I want to,

18:58

it's just that... I notice it in

19:00

my mum, she's 85 and she's just,

19:02

and I spent lockdown, the first lockdown,

19:04

I spent five months with her. Just

19:07

me and her in a two

19:09

bedroom flat, and she's such a

19:11

commudant. But I went out the

19:13

other night, right, on my walk,

19:15

and I'd scoped down where all

19:17

the evergreen was, right?

19:20

And so we have, you

19:22

know, the holly is

19:24

basically, there are two types of holly.

19:26

In fact, there's male and female. That's

19:28

right, with the berries or without the berries. Yeah,

19:31

so you have berries, which are female,

19:33

which I call molly. And

19:36

you have holly,

19:38

which without any berries,

19:40

which I call buddy. Right? So we have

19:43

buddy and molly. So you...

19:45

So you can be driving and going,

19:47

fuck, there's a bit of molly! You

19:49

go, log that, we'll come back and get

19:51

the molly. We

19:54

all do that, you know. I think

19:56

maybe. Or maybe it's just you and

19:58

I. But every time I see a

20:00

molly, I note it. You

20:02

do. Because you go, that'll be

20:04

good. That's Christmas. Yeah. I've

20:07

gone and got mine. I've

20:09

got it. I've got Laurel.

20:11

I've got Bay, because Bay is a type

20:14

of Laurel. And I've

20:16

got molly. And

20:18

I've also... Lovely.

20:20

And between you and

20:23

I, I scoped it out in

20:25

a cemetery. So

20:29

I had to go and visit someone to get

20:31

it, but you know. You

20:33

had to carry a bunch of flowers to pretend. I

20:36

should have done. I'm here

20:38

legit. Anybody

20:41

with a bunch of flowers, you can spend as long

20:43

as you like in a cemetery. You're

20:46

absolutely right. Sometimes too

20:48

long. You

20:52

hang around in a cemetery. It's not happening.

20:54

No. Well, let's face it. You don't want

20:56

to spend too much time there because you're

20:58

to spend a lot of time there anyway. Yeah.

21:01

yeah, time to come for that. Why

21:06

was I talking about Molly and

21:08

Buddy? You were talking about spending lockdown

21:10

with your mum. Oh, yeah. Yeah,

21:12

yeah, yeah. The commudant love. The

21:14

commudant love. I'm going to put her

21:16

in the time capsule. She's

21:22

fantastic. Oh, because I took

21:24

all this evergreen round to her flat

21:26

today, right? Because I spent the first five

21:28

months with her. She's so rude, it's

21:30

unbelievable. I mean, it's probably, probably rude.

21:32

I phoned her up the other day to see how

21:34

she was, and we just got chatting and I

21:36

talked about longevity and our family having a lot of

21:38

longevity. And she just went, well, I don't

21:40

want it. She said, as soon as I

21:42

can't do what I want to do, that's it. I'm off.

21:44

I'm out of it. Goodbye. Sigh and horror. I said,

21:46

all right, all right. I said, as long as you leave

21:48

a note saying it was nothing to do with me,

21:50

I'm leaving a note saying it was you. I'm leaving a

21:52

note saying you've got a special pillow you're going to

21:54

put over my face. Let's

21:57

say you're five. Brilliant.

22:00

This is so cummingly. But,

22:02

you know, obviously, there

22:05

is something brilliant. I

22:07

don't want to put my mum in there,

22:09

really. What I want to put in there

22:11

is something that's connected to her, which is my dad. My

22:14

dad was... It's

22:16

a funny old thing. Shall

22:19

I go and get the stuff for you, and I'll show

22:21

it? Yeah, I'd love to see it. Yeah,

22:24

no, I don't mind. We can describe it

22:26

for people. I'll grab it for you. Hold on.

22:28

Do, that'd be great. Hold on.

22:36

Okay, so hold on a second, right?

22:41

My dad...

22:44

I think our

22:46

parents obviously influenced us

22:48

hugely. My dad was

22:50

builder. He was a self

22:52

-employed builder. He left school

22:54

with no qualifications, literally no

22:57

qualifications. He left at 14. And

22:59

it's funny looking back at

23:01

that time. It's

23:03

really weird. My grandmother...

23:06

who was, uh, she

23:08

came from North Seaton

23:10

up in the north,

23:12

uh, northeast. And, uh,

23:15

she came from a mining family. And

23:18

she was so funny. She

23:20

was just... She used

23:23

to sit me on her knee, used

23:25

to bounce me up and down, smoke

23:27

in fags, and sing in Geordie folk

23:29

songs. And what she used to be

23:31

able to do was flip a cigarette,

23:33

so it went fully back into her

23:35

mouth, So the lit ends in

23:37

her mouth, and then she'd blow, the smoke would

23:39

come out of the filter, then she'd flip

23:42

it back, take a drag, carry on singing. Proper

23:45

grandmother, do you know what I mean?

23:47

She was just, she was great, and

23:49

she had this... We always had this thing in

23:51

our house, and I was thinking about this a lot as

23:53

it comes up to Christmas, was to

23:55

lay a plate for someone who

23:57

you don't know is gonna come. Yeah.

24:01

You lay a plate out just for

24:03

someone who, for a stranger, for someone who

24:06

may drop in. You never know. My

24:08

mum still does this. Seriously. Well,

24:10

I became diabetic during lockdown, okay?

24:12

And I became diabetic during lockdown because I

24:14

was staying with my mum. You're up in the

24:16

kitchen cupboard, right? And she's got so much

24:18

sugar in there, so many different types of biscuits.

24:20

I once counted how many packets of biscuits

24:22

she got. And there's like 30 packets of fucking

24:24

biscuits in this cupboard. And I'm standing there

24:27

going, bloody hell, you can give Mo Farah diabetes.

24:29

When it turned out, there was me. that got

24:31

it, right? But the point being

24:33

is you'd say to her, why have you got

24:35

where you never know who's coming around? We've got

24:37

big family. So that was her thing you had

24:39

to have. You always had to have more than

24:41

enough. You know what I

24:43

mean? Because you didn't know who was coming

24:45

around. You had a big family and

24:47

you should always be prepared for guests and

24:49

friends and strength. My uncle Norman turned

24:51

up. We used to have these Sunday lunches.

24:54

just enormous, right? There were huge great

24:56

affairs. All the women did the cooking, right?

24:58

Men weren't allowed in because you were

25:00

regarded as predatory because you'd nick a bit of the

25:02

chicken skin, do you know what I mean? So

25:04

you were kicked out, right? So the women did

25:06

all the cooking. The only thing I got to

25:08

do was I was allowed to take up like

25:10

the Brussels sprouts or the greens up to my

25:12

nanny. She had to do summit for

25:14

the Sunday and she had a room upstairs in my

25:16

mum and dad's house and so that would be

25:18

her bit. And I'd sit with her while she did

25:20

the one of the veg and then take it

25:22

down. That would be my time. That was all I

25:24

was allowed to do. The blokes every

25:27

Sunday used to go down this pub in

25:29

a place called Thornton Heath. There's

25:31

a pub there called Lord Napier, who

25:33

was a bastion of the empire.

25:35

And the Lord Napier is an old

25:37

jazz pub. And it's this amazing

25:39

place that we used to

25:41

go there every Sunday on mass.

25:43

So all the family used

25:45

to meet there. They

25:48

used to have a drink called Ram and Special. It's a

25:50

Young's pub and used to get Ram and Special. So

25:52

you'd get half a pint of Special and then you'd

25:54

get a bottle of Ramrod and you'd put it in

25:56

together and it would give you a bit of pep

25:59

on a Sunday. And

26:01

we just used to take over tables, do you

26:03

know what I mean? Had a big hall. So

26:05

you had a little public bar and then you

26:07

had a hall that you just walked through into with

26:09

a stage at the back. There used to be

26:11

a jazzer called Bill Bruntskill who was one of

26:13

these guys who I always used to love because what

26:15

he did was he was a semi -prong. He

26:18

was a mate. George Melly used to

26:20

write articles about how good he was as

26:22

a trumpeter. But Bill Brunsack had always

26:24

used to go, no, I never wanted to

26:26

go professional. I had a pension with

26:29

a silver service. So he served at his

26:31

time, got his pension, then went professional. And

26:33

I loved the way that

26:35

you just all these old drunk,

26:38

old blokes, do you know

26:40

I mean? He would be playing

26:42

there on Sunday lunchtime. and

26:44

Bill always used to climb on the

26:46

stage to start the second set and

26:48

he used to get his trumpet and go

26:50

and that was just the sign that

26:52

everyone had to get back on so you

26:54

did and it meant the second set's

26:56

about to start would everyone get on stage

26:58

please and so we always used to

27:00

go there and then we had this my

27:02

dad had this great van it was a

27:04

comma van like an old post office van

27:06

and me and my brother -in -law cut the

27:08

back off put a cab, we put

27:10

a bit of bull down to make a

27:13

cab, and then my brother -in -law, more than

27:15

me, welded a frame on it, and then

27:17

put sides up so he could run scaffold

27:19

poles along the top over the cab. Yeah.

27:21

What it meant was, in summer,

27:24

everyone just piled into the back

27:26

of this van, right, and

27:28

bounced around, holding onto the sides.

27:31

And sometimes people used to stand on the

27:33

scaffold rails, sort of like they were

27:35

doing some kind of military inspection in a

27:37

builder's van. We'd

27:39

all go down there, we'd all pile up,

27:41

we'd all pile up our own, there'd be this

27:43

massive, and everyone will have arrived, and there'd

27:46

be cousins and uncles and aunties, and there'd be

27:48

massive rails breaking out, and you never knew

27:50

who was gonna be there. You

27:52

never knew. So there was

27:54

always an excess of food, there was

27:56

always this thing, and everyone was welcome.

27:59

And my dad was a really good

28:01

builder, and he made this incredible table. We

28:04

actually got the wood out of a church. There's

28:08

an old Baptist church in Clapham that was getting changed.

28:10

And they said, we're getting rid of the pews.

28:12

So me and my dad took the pews out, and

28:14

they just said to get rid of them. We don't

28:16

want them. So my dad was like, oh no,

28:18

they're bungling me about the thing. And like,

28:20

they were so big and heavy and incredible. remember

28:22

we couldn't shut the van doors and we had

28:24

to tie them together with ropes so they were

28:26

sticking out like that. And what

28:28

we did was we, one

28:31

of the pews went into the kitchen. And

28:33

my dad built this amazing table. So

28:36

it was a long old table, kitchen table,

28:38

the pew, then the table. Then he

28:40

built a semi -circular bit, which you could

28:42

put on for Sundays. You could get 19

28:44

people around the table. Wow. Right? Massive.

28:47

And he used to always sit there in a

28:49

corner of the pew. Right? Just

28:51

leaning against the end of it. And

28:53

that was his position. I've got photographs of

28:55

him asleep there, holding the dogs there,

28:57

mucking about with my mum there, cheers, you

28:59

know, read it. That was his spot.

29:01

Do you know him? Yeah, I

29:03

do. And everyone was welcome and

29:06

everyone got treated right. And if my

29:08

dad was in money, then everyone was treated

29:10

properly. And he

29:12

left school with nothing. And

29:14

he did an apprenticeship in carpentry and joinery.

29:16

And the thing I think I've taken

29:18

from him is his work ethic. That

29:21

fuck everyone. You

29:23

know, if you want something to happen, make it happen. Don't,

29:25

yeah. Don't rely on people. Just get on

29:27

and do it. And I think that

29:29

that's a really important thing. And I think it's

29:31

been a thing that's kind of seen me through

29:33

the past 10 months. The fact

29:35

that actually you have to get on

29:37

and do it yourself. And what

29:39

I've got is my dad's... This

29:42

is a little frame. And I don't know

29:44

if you can see it here. Here's his

29:46

Builders Certificate, right? That he's done his apprenticeship

29:48

in carpentry and joinery at National Joint Council

29:50

for Building Industry. Can you see that? Yeah,

29:52

I can. Yeah, yeah. And on

29:54

this, this is his deed of apprenticeship.

29:57

Right, so he but

29:59

this one right it

30:01

was so young His

30:03

mom had to sign it

30:05

on his behalf sign it

30:07

so I've actually got my

30:10

dad's deeds of apprenticeship which

30:12

his mother had to sign

30:14

For him to go off and

30:16

and I love these that

30:18

I really really genuinely love

30:20

these There's something beautiful

30:22

about the innocence of them

30:25

that he wasn't even able to sign

30:27

it, but also of just

30:29

like this defiant starting

30:31

point. Yeah, show me

30:34

how to do it. And then I'll get on with it. Yeah.

30:37

Yeah. I mean, in a way, that's what an apprenticeship is,

30:39

is you go to someone who knows how to do

30:41

it. You say, show me what I have to do. Completely

30:44

and my dad had this real thing that

30:47

he would just and anyone he anyone he

30:49

worked with you. How'd you do that? You

30:51

know and he became brilliant I always remember

30:53

I used to work with this old built

30:55

bricklayer called Frank. It was just the dirtiest

30:57

man ever, right? He used to buy

30:59

a pair of winter long johns and put them

31:01

on at the end of September. They were buttoned

31:03

down flaps, right? And he burned them round about

31:05

March. And

31:07

we were convinced the only time he took

31:09

them off was Christmas Day when he'd have a

31:11

bath and come and have Christmas lunch with

31:14

us. I

31:16

always remember Frank, who was

31:18

so funny. He was one

31:20

of these, go and get me 20 senior service boy. I

31:23

don't know why he's... I remember him saying to me, right, he

31:25

goes, when I was your age, I used to muck up

31:27

for a brickie. And do you know how I used to... I

31:29

used to say to him on payday, do you know what, mate?

31:32

I'm not blowing smoke up your butt. You're the best brickler I've

31:34

ever worked with. He said, thank you very much. He's a tenner. So,

31:36

come payday, I remember going, Frank, listen,

31:38

I don't want to blow smoke up you,

31:41

mate. I just want to... He said,

31:43

fuck off. But

31:47

I always remember Frank, I was doing some

31:49

stuff for him, and he was trying to, he

31:51

wanted, I forgot what it was, he had

31:53

some money on a horse that's so much stupid.

31:55

Do you know what I mean? It was

31:57

one of those really stupid reasons. He was in

32:00

a hurry. And he was doing,

32:02

he was doing a wall outside, he

32:04

was doing a low garden wall. Yeah.

32:06

Yeah, one of those little London side

32:08

streets. And he's

32:10

going, fucking hurry up, fucking hurry up, he

32:12

was really moving it. And...

32:15

My dad came along. I

32:17

said, you're going to fucking, going to try

32:19

and fucking, you're kidding, ain't you? That

32:21

shit. And my dad

32:23

booted the wall over and goes, you better

32:26

start again, mate. It was such a bad

32:28

job. Right? And Frank turned to

32:30

me and goes, the worst thing I ever did was

32:32

teach your dad bricklaying. Brilliant.

32:38

Oh, don't. I live opposite

32:40

of bricklayer. OK.

32:43

Can you believe what you know? Oh, yeah.

32:45

Well, unfortunately, he's sort of in his

32:47

80s, but he is an astonishing

32:49

bricklayer. I mean, he lives in a

32:51

house that he built. And

32:54

to keep himself occupied while building

32:56

it, he practiced almost every possible

32:58

way of laying a brick in

33:00

this one house. So it

33:02

has parts of it that a herringbone, do

33:04

you know where he's laid the bricks in a

33:06

herringbone? It's astonishing. And nobody

33:09

ever notices it. But it's an

33:11

amazing thing. He's an incredible man.

33:13

I mean, he's a pain in

33:15

the bloody ass, but his work

33:17

is astonishing. If ever

33:19

I see a builder turn up in our street,

33:21

and if they start mixing cement, I say to

33:23

them, you'll be over in a minute. Be careful,

33:25

because he really knows his stuff. And

33:27

then they're all on their guard,

33:30

but he's... You know, it's funny.

33:32

My dad, he very rarely went

33:34

on holiday, right? But when he

33:36

did go on holiday, he was

33:38

so funny, because he would... I

33:40

remember we'd go off... We went on

33:42

a canal holiday round. It's

33:45

just the worst. Birmingham

33:47

and Coventry canals, right? We

33:49

secretly stayed a night at

33:51

the Coventry Basin, right? And

33:54

my dad was forever. We'd always have to tell

33:56

him, keep your eye on the road, because if he saw

33:58

a nice bit of brickwork, he'd go, bloody, look at that. So

34:01

he'd go away on holiday, and he started to have

34:03

more towards the end of his life, and we'd go

34:05

off. And he'd come back, and everyone would get their

34:07

photographs back, you know, you'd take them to the developers.

34:10

and they would come back, you'd

34:12

get 36 or 24 photographs that

34:14

would arrive out of which a

34:16

handful would be crap. So my

34:19

dad would get his 36 back

34:21

and there'd be three of the

34:23

family and the rest were all

34:25

of joints and brickwork. Do

34:28

you know what I mean? It was just in

34:30

photographs of all the things that had caught his

34:32

eye. There's a man who loved his trade. I

34:34

mean, it's a brilliant thing. I love

34:36

that. I love that. the joy in your

34:39

work. I mean, Peter, this old bloke

34:41

over the road, he said to me, when

34:44

I first moved in, he said, you see the

34:46

tunnel down at the station? And I went, I thought,

34:48

what's he talking about? I don't know what the man's talking

34:50

about. And he said, look at the tunnel down at

34:52

the station and tell me what's wrong with it. And

34:54

I thought, okay, I happened to be standing on the station

34:56

platform one day and looked at the tunnel and I

34:58

thought, what is wrong with that tunnel? And

35:01

it goes from two tracks to one

35:03

for this tunnel. So only one

35:05

train can go through at a time. And

35:07

then I realized that it was a double

35:10

tunnel, that clearly they built a

35:12

tunnel wide enough for two trains to go

35:14

through and then found it wasn't strong enough. So

35:17

they built another one inside. And I

35:19

would never have noticed that, not in a million years

35:21

would I have noticed that if this old bloke

35:23

hadn't said to me, have a look at it. I

35:26

love that. I mean, one of the

35:28

things I do is, I've

35:30

forgotten the name, it's in

35:33

a church in Stirling. And

35:36

they found it, actually, they found something

35:38

similar in Spain on the big

35:40

pilgrimage when you get to the final

35:42

cathedral on the way, you know,

35:44

with the seashells that you have to

35:46

wear for your pilgrimage. And

35:48

what it was, they found an

35:50

image of a stone mason right

35:53

up, right at the top of

35:55

the colonnade, hiding in the foliage.

35:57

You notice the column comes out.

35:59

So hiding in the foliage is a

36:01

little carved stone mason. The

36:04

only person who would have ever seen it is

36:06

another stone mason. Do you know what I

36:08

mean? And it's like a stone mason's gag. And

36:11

in Sterling,

36:13

in the church there, if you go up there, it

36:15

was one of the original Reformation churches. So it

36:17

was divided by a curtain. So

36:19

you had your Catholics at one end and your

36:21

Protestants at the other. And what

36:24

they did was on the

36:26

work you can see, they've

36:28

got a jester's head. Right,

36:31

on one of the arch, it comes up near

36:33

the altar. You've got Jester's head. If you look

36:35

on the other side, it's got the king's head.

36:37

And actually, the king's head is slightly lower than the

36:39

Jester's head. And the story is, is

36:41

that the Jester was the king's whipping

36:44

boy and was, you know, beaten. And

36:46

so, knew the stone mason, said, just

36:48

make me higher. So

36:51

actually, it's a

36:53

little gag. No one's going to

36:55

fucking spot it. Do you know what I mean?

36:57

Apart from the people who need to know it. Yeah,

36:59

you know it's there. The people in it matters

37:01

too. It's a brilliant thing, isn't it? But I

37:04

mean, also, once you get into

37:06

that world, once you get into the world

37:08

of these people doing this incredibly skillful thing,

37:10

I mean, if you've ever tried to lay

37:12

some bricks, which I have, I'm sure you

37:14

have, but your dad would have shown you

37:16

how to. No, I was

37:18

crapping it. No,

37:20

I just tried. I'd watched people do it.

37:22

I then had watched my neighbor do it and

37:24

I thought, I'm going to have a go and

37:26

I tried to copy it. And I laid just three

37:29

stone wall like that like your

37:31

mate was building outside the

37:34

house and uh it took me

37:36

days and days and days taking

37:38

things down bits of string getting it

37:40

level and you see people do

37:42

that in 10 minutes it's amazing and

37:44

and my father -in -law and my

37:46

my parents -in -law lived in France and

37:48

in the house they bought in

37:50

France in it was a brick kiln

37:53

so it was called La Tuiderie.

37:55

It was a, it had been a

37:57

place where they made bricks. It

38:00

was a very simple house but next

38:02

to it was this brick kiln

38:04

and they eventually turned this into their

38:06

living room. It was just the

38:08

most amazing building. It was square and

38:10

then it rose to a certain point

38:12

and then it started to bend and as

38:14

it bent it became conical.

38:17

And then it went up and

38:19

got smaller and smaller, simply by making

38:21

the bricks smaller. So every step

38:23

up, the bricks were smaller until you

38:26

ended in the same number of

38:28

bricks at the top, but tiny. It

38:31

was most astonishing. Wow.

38:34

Just somebody had obviously made it. That's how

38:36

they wanted to make it. Fantastic. It

38:38

is fantastic. That's sort of like almost

38:40

a little gaudy, isn't it? Yeah. hidden away

38:43

in a little bit of French countryside.

38:45

And that's the thing they made the bricks

38:47

in. So they were just making

38:49

bricks, and they took that amount of

38:51

care. I think it's fabulous. I agree with

38:53

you. I agree with you. So,

38:56

you know, you're right. You should be

38:58

proud to put your dad's apprenticeship,

39:00

his qualifications. treatment. Yeah.

39:02

Yeah, yeah. You should put them definitely straight

39:04

into the time. Well, they're definitely going in.

39:06

This is going to go in. So

39:09

what's that? It's a

39:11

bit of the Berlin Wall. Wow.

39:14

I was in Berlin. I

39:17

booked a holiday with my then girlfriend to

39:19

go to Berlin. And

39:21

it all kicked off. And we're sitting there going, bloody

39:23

hell, we're going to be able to go. Or

39:25

if we are going to go, I hope it's finished. And

39:30

we got there and we arrived

39:32

in Berlin. It was

39:34

that time between the

39:36

wall coming down and reunification

39:38

happening. And it was

39:40

thrilling. It was

39:43

like being in a place had

39:45

come alive. It was

39:47

like mainlining. It

39:49

was absolutely amazing. And

39:51

there were lots and lots of quibbles, you know I

39:53

mean? The West Berliners are going, oh, the East Germans keep

39:55

coming and buying all the cheap things from the cheap

39:57

shops. And they're going to be a cheap skate, you know

40:00

I mean? And you'd see these

40:02

East Germans coming over. They'd arrive in buses

40:04

and they'd have all those little canvass, you

40:06

know, those red, white and blue canvass. Hold

40:08

all so that you know when he put

40:10

your laundry in or something. They'd all come

40:12

charging and they'd be full of they all

40:14

bought Twix's or something So they were gonna

40:16

get back to the village and be king

40:18

of the Twix, you know what I mean?

40:20

They would sell them off or whatever But

40:22

what was thrilling was I went over because

40:24

I I partly went over because I I

40:26

love Bertolt Brett like to the point of

40:28

a Dollar Tree, you know, I mean and

40:30

I wanted to go to his I

40:32

wanted to go to his house and

40:35

his house is in East Germany,

40:37

the museum is his house in

40:39

East Germany. And

40:41

I always loved

40:43

Bert Albert because he was

40:45

the first playwright that I

40:47

saw at school that I was

40:49

just had my head turned by. I

40:52

went to see Corkacean Chalk Circle. So

40:55

at the beginning, there's a big argument, who should get

40:57

the land? Should it be the cheese makers? Should it be

40:59

the vegetable growers? And you go,

41:01

cheese makers, they've grown it for years. And

41:03

then they have this amazing play take place. And

41:06

then they say at the end, right, who gets

41:08

the land? Cheese makers or the vegetable? They should

41:10

go to the vegetable people because they're going to

41:12

make more use of it and they're going to

41:14

feed more people. And you go, yes, give it

41:16

to the vegetable people. And what I was amazed

41:18

at, and I remember as a young man, literally

41:21

being thrilled that you

41:23

could change your mind in

41:25

a theatre. So the play

41:27

changes the mind of the audience. Yeah,

41:29

so you could walk in and

41:32

see it and agree with

41:34

one preposition and by the

41:36

time it had finished you would agree with the opposite. And

41:39

I just thought, how

41:42

bloody marvellous is that? You

41:44

know, thrilling, absolutely

41:46

thrilling. And I remember

41:49

feeling Because sometimes

41:51

you see things, and I remember

41:53

seeing like comedians by Trevor

41:55

Griffiths on the telly, the play

41:57

about stand -up evening class, and

41:59

being captivated by it and thrilled

42:01

by it, but not quite

42:03

understanding it, but knowing that it

42:05

was significant. Do you know

42:07

what I mean? That was really, that

42:09

was amazing for me. That was a really

42:11

amazing thing. Those sorts of

42:14

things that sort of really inform you

42:16

and it's only later that it

42:18

sort of falls into place and you

42:20

start to put all the pieces

42:22

together But seeing that play was just

42:24

changed everything for me somehow Fundamentally it

42:26

set the course for what I

42:28

think art should be about or any

42:30

kind of entertainment and kind of

42:32

creative endeavor Which is change creativity to

42:35

create something new to make you

42:37

look at something differently and I love

42:39

that. I love

42:41

that And so I became,

42:43

I went to a place

42:45

at drama school. It

42:47

was Bretton Hall College, which

42:49

is up in Yorkshire. My

42:52

dad was so funny. I was

42:55

the first person in my

42:57

family to go to university, but

42:59

it was drama school. So

43:02

pride, but also disappointment. Oh,

43:05

you've never seen anyone so proud and

43:07

crestfallen in the same moment. What?

43:12

Boys? No, I'm just kidding. Oh,

43:16

no. funny.

43:20

I mean, it came round in the

43:22

end, but what I loved

43:24

was this idea that

43:26

you could change things. And

43:28

so I just became obsessed with

43:30

Bertolt. Whatever the chance I got, I

43:32

was very precociously directing Bertolt Brecht's

43:34

plays in my first bloody year, do

43:36

you know what I mean? Because

43:38

everyone would come and see it. I

43:41

was first year, do you know what

43:43

I mean? I was barely out of

43:45

leg warmers. So

43:47

I

43:50

went over to East Germany,

43:52

I wanted to see... And the idea of going

43:54

to East Germany just thrilled

43:56

me. Because of

43:58

that... Of Lou Reed and

44:00

Iggy Pop and recording in Berlin

44:02

and having the backdrop of the wall

44:04

and what it meant and what

44:06

and it was ideas of freedom and

44:08

totalitarianism and what people do to

44:10

rebel to create things. I

44:13

always found that absolutely. You

44:16

know, a really interesting thing. In fact, you've

44:18

got Bertolt Brecht there as well. This is

44:20

a man who, you know, got paid into

44:22

a Swiss bank account, had a home in

44:24

West Germany and a home in East Germany

44:26

with this theatre, and you think, well, there's

44:28

a refugee. Do you know, I mean,

44:30

there's a man who's had to flee from

44:32

one or more armies, which indeed he had.

44:35

And so I arrived there, his

44:37

place. I

44:39

remember going around there, the graveyard. We

44:42

got there early. And I said,

44:44

should we wander around in this graveyard? And as

44:46

we wandered around, it was next door to

44:48

the museum in this house. And it was apparently

44:50

for apparatchiks. It was

44:52

for people in the Communist Party. And

44:55

then I suddenly saw

44:57

Bertel Brex and Helen Weigel's

44:59

graves. So Brex's wife

45:01

and really incredible, one of

45:03

the great actresses of her

45:05

generation buried next to him.

45:08

But on the tombstones in white

45:10

paint was Juden Rouse

45:12

and a swastika. Oh,

45:15

my God. And I was so shocked. I

45:18

was nearly in tears of rage.

45:21

And I remember going into this museum,

45:23

going into this house, and there's

45:25

about four or five of us there to be on

45:28

the guided tour. And the tour guide said, OK,

45:31

who have we got here? Have we got any English speakers?

45:33

Yeah. Have we got any Spanish speakers? There's someone from

45:35

Spain, someone from Italy. And she said, have

45:37

you got any questions before we get going? I

45:39

said, yeah, I want to know why you've got

45:41

that filth on that grave out there. What's going

45:43

on there? And she said, I'm very glad you've

45:45

asked. The family have asked that it stays on

45:47

for the time being to remind people what we

45:49

face as Germany changes. And I thought,

45:51

fucking hell, the old bastards even challenging how

45:53

I see things in death. Isn't

45:56

that remarkable? That's incredible.

45:58

Isn't that remarkable? It is

46:01

really remarkable, yeah. Absolutely, because

46:03

you sort of go... You

46:05

think you know what you're

46:07

thinking. You know, you're

46:09

going there as an informed person,

46:12

Yeah, I know about Bertolt Brett. Ask me questions.

46:15

And suddenly you... And yet here I

46:17

am being challenged by this. And

46:19

so this bit of the Berlin

46:22

Wall, which I picked up... Right, it

46:24

was actually on the wall. I

46:26

can give it a kick and pick it up. And

46:29

this is a genuine bit of

46:31

Berlin Wall. No, it wasn't

46:33

picked or selected or went through

46:35

any tourist merchandising. This has

46:37

stayed with me for 32 years,

46:39

something like that, however long

46:42

it go it was. So

46:44

this has been around for a

46:46

while. And I've always just kept

46:48

it about. You can see

46:50

down here, they've got a bit where someone's drilled

46:52

in. I don't know if you can

46:54

see, someone's obviously drilled. See,

46:57

all the fake ones have, without a

46:59

doubt, all the fake bits of the

47:01

Berlin Wall. On one side, they will

47:03

have graffiti because the idea was that

47:05

the whole wall was covered in graffiti

47:07

and this proves it was part of

47:09

the Berlin Wall. But actually, most of

47:11

the wall, of course, is just solid

47:13

rock like that. Yeah. And I think

47:16

it's remarkable, all this stuff is remarkable.

47:18

There was a tunnel. I

47:20

mean, I really

47:22

interested one of the tunnels that went under

47:25

the wall. I think

47:27

it's tunnel 57. I

47:29

might be wrong. It was

47:31

built in an old bakery, a disused

47:33

bakery on the west. And

47:35

it went over to a toilet

47:37

in a block of flats in

47:39

the east. But

47:41

no one can know what's happening.

47:43

The authorities are watching both sides

47:46

of the wall looking for

47:48

activity. which means

47:50

all these students had to quietly assemble

47:52

under the guidance and leadership of

47:54

this. I've forgotten the guy's name, but

47:56

he was really sort of like

47:58

pivotal. And

48:00

they would stay there. Their

48:03

task was to quietly

48:05

arrive, quietly exist,

48:08

make as little noise, draw as

48:10

little attention to themselves as

48:12

possible, to dig

48:14

this tunnel, to rest

48:16

and eat. and then dig the

48:19

tunnel again. And

48:21

they did it till they get

48:23

to the other side. And what

48:25

happens on the other side is people

48:27

have to assemble quietly. You have

48:29

to assemble without drawing attention. And

48:31

you try and get as many people as

48:33

you can across. I think

48:35

it was 57 people crossed

48:38

before they noticed it, that the

48:40

authorities noticed that these people. And

48:42

what I was amazed at is when you

48:44

see things like that, you know, a group of

48:46

people who go, right, we're just going to, it's

48:49

not going to give up a weekend to go

48:51

collecting for the homeless. This is, we're

48:53

going to spend six weeks,

48:55

two months in a

48:58

house doing nothing but

49:00

digging and preparing to

49:02

dig. And what we will

49:04

do is we will

49:06

change the lives of 57

49:08

people forever. And

49:11

the whole time our lives are at threat. Hmm.

49:15

Yeah. That's pretty cool,

49:17

isn't it? It is pretty cool. It is. I

49:19

mean, Berlin is an extraordinary place. And I do

49:21

like the fact that even though a lot of

49:23

the wall is gone, that you

49:25

can clearly see the remnants of

49:27

it in the sense that there's

49:29

that great stretch of extraordinarily modern

49:31

flats that they built on East

49:34

Berlin, on the East Berlin side.

49:36

Beautiful, really classy flats that they

49:38

built right next to the wall

49:40

to say, you really should be

49:42

over this side. We're doing some

49:45

fantastic things, but immediately behind it, the

49:47

buildings were exactly the same as they had been

49:49

at the end of the Second Mobile. Those buildings

49:51

are somewhere else as well because they've all got

49:53

the bullet holes from the Battle of Berlin. And

49:56

I was going around the place and

49:58

the girlfriend knows me at the She

50:00

said, just don't walk under the balconies because

50:02

a certain number of these collapse each year. It

50:07

really did look like something out of the

50:09

Ipchrist file with Michael Cain or something. Do

50:12

you know what I mean? It was a

50:14

remarkable place. But I think also there was

50:16

this, there was also

50:18

a whole range of other forces that

50:20

were moving. So all the, in

50:22

East Germany, they had, I remember coming

50:24

across art centres that people had just

50:26

built and you'd have half the house

50:28

had collapsed and they'd have So the

50:30

floor would stick out of this and

50:32

the walls would have collapsed and they'd

50:34

have a lump of art on it.

50:36

They'd have a sculpture on it. They

50:39

just stuck out into the middle of

50:41

nowhere. And there was this real sort

50:43

of creative, you could see

50:45

and feel the creativity of

50:47

change. And that always, I

50:49

completely adored that. It was one

50:51

of my favourite ever visits

50:53

to anyone. Yeah. I

50:55

mean, people forget that there was

50:57

that period when... East Germany had lost

50:59

control of people. They had to

51:01

let them through because they just couldn't

51:04

stop them. They'd been shooting people a year

51:06

before just for trying to get through the wall.

51:08

And suddenly they went, OK, you can go

51:10

and visit, but you've got to come back. And

51:12

the East Germans went, OK. And they

51:14

did go back. You know, it's weird.

51:16

Every night they'd all go back in again. I

51:19

mean, I do think there's

51:21

something remarkable about totalitarian states.

51:24

you know, I would say this, but they

51:26

have within them the seeds of their own destruction.

51:29

And just because people just want to

51:32

have it, look at this

51:34

fuss people are having over masks. That's

51:37

hardly totalitarianism, a safety

51:39

measure. You know, I

51:41

mean, let's face it over vaccination. that

51:45

they're predicting that 30 % of the population will

51:47

say, not for me, thank you very much. I

51:49

don't want you sticking that thing in my arm.

51:51

That thing I've been waiting a year for desperately. It's

51:54

extraordinary, 30%. It

51:56

is nuts, isn't it? Crazy. We are crazy,

51:58

aren't we? I think

52:00

at the moment we are. And I

52:02

think what it is is that there

52:05

is... I mean, if you look at

52:07

it just in terms of democracy, rather

52:09

than a kind of like... broader sweep

52:11

of Marxist analysis. I

52:13

know. Words which fill your heart

52:15

with joy. You

52:17

know, they bloody do. It's nice

52:20

to hear them again. But

52:22

you know, if you look at in

52:24

terms of democracy, really, it

52:28

goes wrong when

52:30

the Twin Towers come down. It

52:33

starts to go wrong

52:35

then when George Bush

52:37

decides to attack and

52:39

declare war on an

52:42

entire country that had

52:44

nothing to do with a

52:46

terrorist attack. And

52:48

that no, no matter what anybody says

52:50

or whatever proof people put forward or

52:52

lack of proof, it makes no difference

52:54

that they're still able to go ahead. But

52:58

yeah, exactly. So you

53:00

have this rupturing of faith. You

53:03

know that actually the dodgy

53:05

dossier was dodgy know the

53:07

idea that Saddam Hussein could

53:09

look you know launch chemical

53:11

weapons in 45 minutes. It's

53:13

ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous the echo

53:16

chamber of self -belief and reconformation

53:18

It was incredible within Downing

53:20

Street and within those structures

53:22

of organizing war and They

53:24

were so opposed to the

53:26

populace. You know that I

53:28

remember very few people I

53:30

knew having you know Occasionally

53:32

you'd read, you know, Nick Poin,

53:34

who was always the left -wing rebel

53:36

in a Guardian, writing about how the

53:39

left are always wrong. You

53:42

know, and it was just like, thanks Nick. It's

53:44

just, God, there are a lot of

53:46

contrarians. There is something

53:48

that makes me laugh. You just say, God,

53:50

there's so many of you and you all

53:52

agree. I

53:54

have to say, I found it

53:56

very difficult at that time.

53:58

I'd had such... confidence in

54:00

the Labour Party when they

54:02

won that election. It was

54:04

the phrase education, education, education.

54:07

It had absolutely turned me as far as I

54:09

was concerned. They had my

54:11

vote and I had complete faith in

54:13

them. And so I found it really

54:15

tough to accept that they were then

54:17

deceiving me. I just kept saying they

54:20

can't be, they just can't be. I

54:22

didn't want it to be true. And

54:24

so I hung out for a long time

54:26

before actually protesting against that war.

54:28

I kept saying they must have the

54:30

evidence. I think

54:32

what was that's what motivated a lot

54:34

of people was the betrayal,

54:37

the feeling of betrayal, the feeling

54:39

of optimism, which they

54:41

felt in 97, which

54:43

was huge. And it was just seeing the

54:45

back of the Tories. It was just

54:47

seeing them gone. And I

54:49

think education, education, education, which I

54:52

always said, you know, was was more

54:54

of a stammer than a policy. I

54:57

think the SureStart

54:59

was remarkable because SureStart brought

55:01

literacy to people and there

55:03

is a proven link between

55:05

illiteracy and criminality. So

55:08

when you cut SureStart, which

55:11

is the program that intervenes

55:13

to teach people to read

55:15

and write, you can

55:17

literally measure the

55:19

growth in illiteracy because you've measured

55:21

the growth in literacy as you've

55:23

introduced the program. So when you

55:26

withdraw it, you know there will

55:28

be a decline. You know that

55:30

there will be. You know what

55:32

will happen. Now, if

55:34

you have got a relationship between

55:36

illiteracy and criminality and people being

55:38

imprisoned, then what you're doing is

55:40

you're just chucking people into the

55:42

prison system 20 -odd years down

55:44

the line, which is just a

55:46

crime, you know, that's the crime.

55:48

And, you know, even if you look at it

55:50

from a greedy economics, what do you want to

55:53

pay? What do you want to pay 50 grand

55:55

a year down there? Or do you want to

55:57

pay sort of like a couple of grand here?

55:59

You've got a choice. Yeah. You know,

56:01

and I think those bits were

56:03

really impressive. So you get the

56:05

year at war, you get the

56:07

MP's expenses, you know, where people

56:09

have just come, bloody hell, they're

56:11

all at it. You get the

56:13

banking crisis, you get the media

56:16

and the phone hacking and millie

56:18

-dollar and the police, you

56:20

know. And so actually what you

56:22

have are these sort of structures that

56:24

we should have faith in, that we

56:26

have, you know, that if you do

56:28

believe in sort of British democracy as

56:30

it was, then all the pillars have

56:32

suddenly gone. You know, of parliament and

56:35

of the police and of the due

56:37

process of the civil service and the

56:39

impartiality on all of those things, of

56:41

the media, its ability to report it,

56:43

of the police and the corruption involved

56:45

in it, all these things go, the

56:47

very thing of your home, which is

56:49

now, boom, that's gone out the window.

56:52

You know, the banking system is rotten

56:54

to the core and it's going to take

56:56

us all down. And it nigh on

56:58

did and it did for many people. You

57:00

know, suddenly you have this thing and

57:02

it's all collapsed. And what you're left with

57:04

is this wasteland of trust. There's no

57:06

trust there. You don't trust him. This is

57:08

why what's interesting in America is Dr.

57:10

Fauci, when you look at him, people trust

57:12

him. They trust him because he very

57:14

gently says the truth. And actually, that

57:17

picture of him trying to

57:19

suppress laughter while standing behind Trump

57:21

won him a million fans.

57:24

But I think the same thing applies

57:26

here, as applied in America, which

57:28

is that Johnson was able to present

57:31

himself as, well, I'm not really

57:33

an MP. I mean, you've seen me.

57:35

I've been on Have I Got News For You. And

57:37

I stopped being an MP for a long time. I

57:39

became mayor of London. and did 2012 so

57:41

i'm not really one of them you

57:43

know i'm a i'm a breath of fresh air

57:45

i will come in and i won't do the

57:47

old thing and i say what i mean

57:49

i'm honest i'm open and i just say it

57:51

and i think a lot of people were

57:54

absolutely taken in by it they just went yeah

57:56

yeah good old Boris you know he says

57:58

what he thinks he may make mistakes every

58:00

now and again he might offend a

58:02

few people you know letterbox eyes and all

58:04

that sort of stuff you know basically

58:06

he's a good egg I think

58:08

that's absolutely right. It turns out to be absolutely

58:10

one of them, right at the core of

58:12

it. He is to the core part of the

58:14

establishment. I've got a new book coming

58:16

out, and I'm going to tell

58:18

you, I'm going to read you, if I may. It

58:21

came out today. It was printed today.

58:23

We got new copies. We

58:25

decided we wrote it so fucking

58:28

quickly, but it's good. Isn't

58:30

that to be fine? I'm going to read you the beginning

58:32

because here we are. You ready? Mm

58:35

-hmm. This is the beginning. Every

58:37

serious person should wake screaming at least

58:39

once a week at the thought

58:41

that Boris Johnson is a Prime Minister,

58:43

let alone our Prime Minister. Our

58:46

Prime Minister. Whether you voted for him

58:48

or not, our Prime Minister has all

58:50

the gravitas of a wet wipe and

58:52

the intellectual agility of a mobility scooter.

58:55

His every public appearance is a humiliation.

58:57

He stands at the dispatch box

58:59

in the Commons full of lies, evasions,

59:01

crap jokes, bluster and incompetence. a

59:03

blonde, blubbering fib pudding of entitlement, droning

59:05

on and on like a shit -best

59:07

man at his own wedding. Every

59:10

Prime Minister's questions is a television car

59:12

crash involving a massive Ferguson of reality

59:14

and the clown car of his mind.

59:16

In a just world, he wouldn't be

59:18

Prime Minister. He would do the job

59:20

he was born to do. He'd be

59:22

an over -familiar estate agent driving a

59:24

Foxton's Mini around Chelsea and bumming a

59:26

bump off of his best pal Govey. So

59:33

you voted for him, obviously. Big

59:35

fan. Big, big fan.

59:38

I just thought if going to write something,

59:41

you know, start as you mean to

59:43

go on. Yeah. But what

59:45

thought was really interesting, and I mentioned this to

59:47

you because I kind of, it

59:49

was one of the, there's lots of shocking things that

59:52

I found out while doing the book. One

59:54

of the shocking things, for

59:56

me, it was shocking, was when

59:58

you start to look at how

1:00:00

many Black and

1:00:02

Asian fighters that were in World War II, you

1:00:05

have something like nearly

1:00:07

9 million troops

1:00:09

that were fighting on

1:00:12

behalf of Britain and the

1:00:14

colonies and dominions. 2 .5

1:00:16

million of them came from India.

1:00:19

2 .5 million

1:00:22

Indians, predominantly

1:00:24

conscripts. 2

1:00:26

.5. You

1:00:28

know, you've got 600 ,000 people

1:00:30

that came from various African, um,

1:00:33

what was part of the empire. Yeah.

1:00:35

You've got over 3 million people

1:00:38

who are black and Asian. Just from there,

1:00:40

that's a third, a third

1:00:42

of the fucking army. Yeah. And

1:00:44

people get upset if they see

1:00:46

a Sikh on a fucking television

1:00:48

show about World War One. And

1:00:51

how dare these people say my

1:00:53

granddad fought to keep this country

1:00:55

English or British? Exactly. How dare

1:00:57

they? Exactly. If

1:00:59

anything, all the fucking people in Southall

1:01:02

should be looking at white cabbies going, bloody hell,

1:01:04

look at a state of that, my granddad, fault for

1:01:06

that. Yep.

1:01:11

I mean, there's lots of things...

1:01:13

I mean, I think that... that

1:01:15

when you break down those kind of

1:01:17

levels of trust, and also

1:01:19

parts of community, because one

1:01:21

of the big things of community used to

1:01:23

be trade unionism. And that's

1:01:26

sort of really been eroded. And

1:01:28

the thing about places

1:01:30

like Whitefield, where I

1:01:32

went to college, I was part of

1:01:34

the Red Shed, which is a labour

1:01:36

club. It was the epitome of working

1:01:38

class self -improvement, that it would be

1:01:40

about communal improvement as well as individual

1:01:42

improvement. And actually, you could see

1:01:44

that in action in a colliery band. If

1:01:47

you've ever watched a colliery band, that's exactly

1:01:49

what it is. And

1:01:51

for me, there

1:01:53

was when communities get

1:01:55

eroded like that, when the

1:01:58

glue that pulls us together

1:02:00

gets taken away, what

1:02:03

floods in are

1:02:05

the conspiracies, you

1:02:07

know, so that you have a vacuum

1:02:09

of trust and a vacuum of being

1:02:12

part of something, and

1:02:14

that's where the conspiracy theories

1:02:16

breed. Yeah, the end of

1:02:18

suspicion that everybody else is against you, when

1:02:21

in fact they all want to come around and have a

1:02:23

cup of tea, really. Most of them

1:02:25

do, I am against them. Well,

1:02:30

you've got that piece of the Berlin

1:02:32

Wall to give you hope, I think, to

1:02:34

say, you know, there we are. That's put

1:02:36

that in there and you can look at

1:02:38

that anytime and say, things can change. Things

1:02:40

can get better. Not in the sense of

1:02:42

things can only get better in the Blairite

1:02:45

way, but really better. Yeah. Yeah.

1:02:48

The other thing I think I'd take

1:02:50

with me into the time capsule is a

1:02:52

record from

1:02:54

an album called Roots and

1:02:56

Blues. And it's a song

1:02:59

called Monin. And it's a

1:03:01

Charles Mingus song. There are

1:03:03

several jazz pieces called Moaning.

1:03:05

One is an Art Blakey

1:03:07

piece, which is just magnificent.

1:03:09

And also, there's an amazing record.

1:03:11

Oh, just the piano work

1:03:13

is breathless. And you know,

1:03:15

when you hear something and your

1:03:18

heart breaks with the joy of it,

1:03:22

there's a recording, I'm terribly

1:03:24

sorry, but if anyone

1:03:26

listening in just... Art Blakey

1:03:28

and the Jazz Messengers,

1:03:30

1958, recorded live in Holland.

1:03:32

There's a piece called Moaning that

1:03:34

will break your heart. And

1:03:37

I feel that way about lots of music.

1:03:39

Do you know what I mean? Music

1:03:42

is something that I just, I can't

1:03:44

quite function without. I

1:03:46

love listening. For

1:03:49

me, it's kind of, I'll put on Radio

1:03:51

4 for a little bit in the morning,

1:03:53

but then it will be promptly into you

1:03:55

know, whatever it is. It might be sort of

1:03:57

howling more from the Chicago blues or might be,

1:04:00

you know, it might be Johnny Cash. I've got

1:04:02

a whole stack of Johnny Cash. I was once

1:04:04

doing a gig. Right, my tour manager

1:04:06

is a great East End bloke. He's all like 18

1:04:08

stone. I've got in and it was a while ago

1:04:10

and I got him at a pile of CDs and

1:04:12

he goes, what you got there? I said, I've got

1:04:14

some Johnny Cash. He goes, what else? I said, no,

1:04:16

it's all Johnny Cash. And we're driving up to Newcastle

1:04:18

and back and we did the whole journey there and

1:04:20

back on Johnny Cash. And it was only by the

1:04:22

time he got to about Milton Keynes on the way

1:04:24

back where he just went, I've had enough, trauma! I've

1:04:28

got a... Just yesterday, I

1:04:31

found out a Johnny Cash

1:04:33

fact, which I thought was really

1:04:35

fascinating, that the fellow

1:04:37

in Dr. Hook, remember

1:04:39

Sylvia's mother with the by

1:04:41

-patch, wrote Boy Name Sue.

1:04:45

Wow. That's a very good fact. That

1:04:47

is a really good fact. I

1:04:50

went to see... Cash went,

1:04:52

I mean, I am a fan

1:04:54

tonight. I mean, it was

1:04:56

just... And he was still cutting it.

1:04:59

Some of the last gigs he did,

1:05:01

but by God, they were magnificent. And

1:05:04

there's something brilliant about seeing a performer

1:05:06

like that who can't do anything but

1:05:08

do it. And there's

1:05:10

a great story that

1:05:12

he recorded Redemption Song by

1:05:14

Bob Marley. And

1:05:16

he used to have a house

1:05:19

in Jamaica. I did Johnny Cash

1:05:21

and it was he was robbed

1:05:23

and held at gunpoint and was kidnapped

1:05:25

essentially for held hostage for a

1:05:27

period of time at gunpoint when his

1:05:29

son was as well and and

1:05:31

his wife and it was June Carter

1:05:33

Cash and he went to record

1:05:35

Redemption Song and the sound engineer

1:05:37

said Johnny do you want to do

1:05:40

want to change the lyrics here I think it

1:05:42

was Joe Strummer who was because Joe Strummer

1:05:44

adored him. Joe Strummer might

1:05:46

have told the story and he said

1:05:49

the first line of redemption song

1:05:52

is then pirates they do

1:05:54

rob I right and the sound engineer goes

1:05:56

johnny do you want to change and johnny

1:05:58

cash apparently turned around and said Bob Marley wrote

1:06:00

this song you

1:06:02

don't change your goddamn

1:06:04

line perfect perfect

1:06:07

Perfect. And if you listen to

1:06:09

those albums where he's performing in Folsom

1:06:11

Prison and, you know, and Sam Quinton, they

1:06:13

are magnificent recordings. And there's a man

1:06:16

who believes in redemption and that's an important

1:06:18

thing. Yeah. Do you know I mean?

1:06:20

An important redemption is a thing that, you

1:06:22

know, all of us are in need

1:06:24

of and so loath to give it to

1:06:26

anyone else. We really are, you know,

1:06:28

and I just think, you know, for the

1:06:30

love of... you just find a little

1:06:32

bit of humanity. We've got to learn to

1:06:34

forgive each other and move on. Otherwise,

1:06:36

we're all bloody doomed. So, know,

1:06:39

I love Jonika, I love music,

1:06:41

but this piece of music is

1:06:43

by Charles Mingus, and it's

1:06:46

called Moni. It's

1:06:48

quite a famous piece, and it

1:06:50

starts with the saxophonist. Hey

1:07:11

And it is justice. Wonderful,

1:07:15

wonderful sound that captivates you and it's

1:07:17

just so joyous and overwhelming and it

1:07:19

makes you sort of feel so alive.

1:07:21

It just makes you feel so excited.

1:07:23

A mate of mine, right, had this

1:07:25

thing with his daughter when she was

1:07:27

quite young. He was playing some music

1:07:29

with some techno and she was very

1:07:31

young. She was running around the room

1:07:34

and she just went, it makes me

1:07:36

feel crazy. And that's what

1:07:38

I feel like when I listen to that music.

1:07:40

It makes me feel those feelings. And

1:07:43

that has to go in.

1:07:45

And also my son gave me

1:07:47

that. My son gave it

1:07:49

to me, he said. But because

1:07:51

of the brilliance of YouTube

1:07:53

and the internet and Spotify and...

1:07:56

All of that, it means that

1:07:58

none of that generational baggage goes with

1:08:00

music. So he just goes, you've got to

1:08:02

listen to Charles Mingus. Well, my mate, who's the

1:08:04

old East End tour manager, who's 58, was

1:08:06

going to have got a great bit fucking South

1:08:08

Africa rap for you. you know

1:08:10

what I mean? And what it

1:08:12

means is you're just far more

1:08:14

open to listen to things and

1:08:16

hear things and get excited by

1:08:18

New York things, even though it's

1:08:20

just new to you. But that

1:08:22

piece of music by Mingus... I

1:08:25

think there's... I always

1:08:27

remember we were touring in New

1:08:29

York. I did some gigs

1:08:31

in New York, and it was

1:08:33

just like a dream for me. Doing

1:08:35

a gig in New York. We're standing

1:08:37

this flat in Queens, and we

1:08:39

had to get the train over, and

1:08:41

you'd watch the front of the train

1:08:43

turning on the tracks as you

1:08:46

go over the river. And I loved

1:08:48

every minute of it. Hardly

1:08:51

anyone turned up for the gigs, doesn't matter. I

1:08:55

honestly think the wonderful thing about music

1:08:57

is that you can judge a piece of

1:08:59

music yourself. You can say, I don't

1:09:01

like it. I don't like it. It doesn't

1:09:03

do anything for me. But that doesn't

1:09:05

make it not a good piece of music. Because

1:09:07

if you look at the effect it has

1:09:09

on other people, this morning

1:09:11

I spoke to Howard Goodall. Strangely

1:09:14

enough, I don't often do two recordings in a

1:09:16

day. But you sort of came and said,

1:09:18

what about Thorough? Fantastic. I'm very excited.

1:09:20

But I spoke to Howard Goodall this morning.

1:09:24

classical composer extraordinaire.

1:09:26

And he talked about Bach

1:09:29

and talked in with incredible passion about

1:09:31

Bach and the music of Bach.

1:09:33

And I, of course, got completely

1:09:35

swept along by the passion that

1:09:37

he had for it. And

1:09:39

I think if you can get a sense of

1:09:41

someone's passion for a piece of music, then you'll

1:09:43

get a sense of what they see in the

1:09:45

piece of music. So your passion there for

1:09:47

that piece of music makes me want to listen

1:09:50

to it. Oh, I beg you to listen

1:09:52

to it. There's a

1:09:54

band called the Charles

1:09:56

Mingus Big Band, which

1:09:58

was created by his widow. He

1:10:00

always wanted a big band, and he never got one. So

1:10:02

his widow created one, and they have a

1:10:05

residency in New York every week at

1:10:07

the jazz standard. And when we were there, I

1:10:09

said to my son, we got to go. And

1:10:12

they started with moaning. And

1:10:15

we looked at each other, and

1:10:17

it was one of those... moments

1:10:19

because it was, we were right, that

1:10:22

we were literally at the front table,

1:10:24

which is what I mean. And it

1:10:26

just, and there's a room for 150

1:10:28

people in that club. Bang! The whole

1:10:30

thing just blew up. It was amazing,

1:10:32

amazing. So, but also I

1:10:34

think you're right, when you hear people talk, when

1:10:36

you hear, there's a,

1:10:38

one of my favorite artists, Joe

1:10:40

Strummer, does this amazing thing

1:10:42

when he's, he's singing on, um,

1:10:44

they're recording a song on a

1:10:46

getting time. and they're recording it

1:10:49

in New York. And

1:10:51

they're clearly in a

1:10:53

riff. And the word

1:10:55

is, the story was, you can hear

1:10:57

a little noise and you hear

1:10:59

Strummer going, okay, okay, don't push us

1:11:02

when we're hot. And what we're

1:11:04

saying is the sound engineer's going, that's

1:11:06

great, we've got to take. And

1:11:08

Strummer's going, no, no, we're

1:11:10

on it. And it's a beautiful

1:11:13

thing. Yeah, fantastic.

1:11:17

there's nothing better as well that I

1:11:19

have to say than you know everybody

1:11:21

will have at one time their lives

1:11:23

been singing with people you know it

1:11:25

doesn't matter how well you sing it

1:11:27

it's just the moment if you hit

1:11:29

the right moment for any piece of

1:11:32

music it's it's a glorious thing so

1:11:34

everybody's you know just suddenly you know

1:11:36

let's all sing you know you know

1:11:38

a room full of people doing that

1:11:40

I love that I love that when

1:11:42

I was doing my last gigs which

1:11:45

was this sort of start of the

1:11:47

book. One of the things

1:11:49

I'd talk about was the national anthem

1:11:51

and what people thought of it. And

1:11:53

I'd go, does anyone got any national

1:11:55

anthems they like? And

1:11:57

people would volunteer. At

1:11:59

Corby, one of the

1:12:01

ushers stood and sang the

1:12:03

Polish national anthem because she

1:12:06

loved it. Right?

1:12:08

And she's got this massive round

1:12:10

of applause. In Liverpool, half the

1:12:12

fucking audience were singing the Russian

1:12:14

national anthem. Half of them! Half

1:12:16

of them! You

1:12:18

know, and I've been in

1:12:20

gigs when we've gone for

1:12:22

the Marseilles, when you've just

1:12:24

got... You know, when people... You have

1:12:26

half the crowd, suddenly going... And

1:12:29

they just jump in for that

1:12:31

bit. And you're right, there's something

1:12:33

brilliant about... Something brilliant about making

1:12:35

a sound that we all love.

1:12:37

There's something brilliant about coming together

1:12:39

to make that sound. And

1:12:41

sometimes it's, there's a great

1:12:43

jazz drummer called John Stevens who

1:12:45

really was somewhere else. And

1:12:48

he years and years ago.

1:12:50

I was working with a guy called

1:12:53

Colin Watkins who used to run

1:12:55

a theatre and Colin's great. And

1:12:57

he was always into performance art. Him

1:12:59

and I actually got kicked out of

1:13:01

the Institute of Contemporary Arts for heckling

1:13:03

during a performance art evening, which

1:13:06

is hardly the toughest thing in the

1:13:08

world. But he would always want to

1:13:10

show new things. And one of the

1:13:12

things that I remember him doing was

1:13:15

bringing this guy, John Stevens along. and

1:13:17

going, this is how you improvise with

1:13:19

jazz. And he does

1:13:21

this thing called a reflector. You

1:13:23

listen to what someone's doing and

1:13:25

then you give your interpretation of it. It

1:13:27

doesn't matter because you're not trying to

1:13:29

impersonate them. You're trying to give your

1:13:31

interpretation of what they've done. And what will

1:13:33

happen is your interpretation will be different. And

1:13:36

if you listen to jazz musicians, that's

1:13:38

what they do all the time. They're

1:13:40

listening to each other. There's

1:13:42

a great story of Herbie

1:13:45

Hancock was talking about Blue

1:13:47

Note, the record label. And

1:13:49

he said, what was amazing was playing

1:13:51

with Miles Davis, because Herbie Hancock was part

1:13:53

of Miles Davis' band. And he said,

1:13:55

he said, one night we were playing, and it's an old

1:13:57

man, Herbie Hancock's an old man, and he tells his story. He

1:14:00

said, we were playing and we were playing so

1:14:02

right. Everything was so right. The audience were right. The

1:14:04

band were right. We were so tight. We were

1:14:06

so on it. We were swinging. We were completely there.

1:14:08

And then I played a chord that was so

1:14:10

wrong. And you could see him

1:14:12

wince as an old man at

1:14:14

the memory of what he did as

1:14:17

a young man. And he said,

1:14:19

and it was so wrong. And

1:14:21

Miles made it

1:14:23

right because Miles didn't hear

1:14:25

a mistake. He heard

1:14:27

something interesting. That's

1:14:31

proper. That is proper, isn't

1:14:33

it? Oh, God,

1:14:35

if only we could all hear

1:14:37

mistakes as an inspiration. Wouldn't

1:14:39

it be brilliant? Wouldn't it be brilliant? Yeah.

1:14:42

Oh, that's taking us somewhere else. That's

1:14:44

brilliant. Absolutely. I

1:14:46

think that's the lovely thing about... The

1:14:48

one thing I love about stand -up is

1:14:50

the ability for the audience to interject

1:14:53

and change the entire course of an evening.

1:14:55

And I love that uniqueness. I love the fact

1:14:57

that every night is different. I love the

1:15:00

fact that people join in. I don't want people

1:15:02

to be quiet. I want them to shout.

1:15:04

I want them to have ideas. I want them

1:15:06

to sometimes beat me. I want them to,

1:15:08

you know, because if they've won, all right, you're

1:15:10

fucking great. We've got something exciting going on.

1:15:12

You know what I mean? It doesn't have to

1:15:14

be a battle all the time. It's just

1:15:16

the idea is that any time of performance isn't

1:15:19

about, I'm so sorry. I'm suddenly aware of

1:15:21

where I'm going with this. But

1:15:23

I'll finish it. The

1:15:25

idea is it's a dialogue.

1:15:28

Performance is a dialogue. It's not

1:15:30

monologue. If you're just

1:15:32

reciting things, you're reciting things.

1:15:34

But it's like you're listening to the audience. You're

1:15:37

listening to how they react and the pace

1:15:39

of which they react and how you want them

1:15:41

to react. And you're listening to what they

1:15:43

say and all of that. And

1:15:45

so for me, I

1:15:47

think jazz and improvising is one of

1:15:49

those great, great things that just makes

1:15:51

you feel so happy. It

1:15:53

makes me feel happy. Hmm, then

1:15:56

we should definitely put it into the time capsule. That's

1:15:58

fantastic. Well, unfortunately, we have to put

1:16:00

one more thing in, which is something you want

1:16:03

to get rid of. But you don't strike me

1:16:05

as a sort of person who wants to reject

1:16:07

that many things from your life. No,

1:16:09

I don't think so. What

1:16:11

would I want to put in there? My

1:16:14

dad's cooking. I've

1:16:18

got a photograph of my dad

1:16:20

hoovering at Christmas. with a

1:16:22

Christmas hat on and he's laughing and singing and

1:16:24

the reason we got a photograph is because

1:16:26

we had to document it. So

1:16:31

domestically he was rubbish. My mum went into

1:16:33

hospital to have my brother and she was

1:16:35

in there for I forgot what was wrong

1:16:37

with her but she had she had to

1:16:39

spend a couple of months in hospital in

1:16:41

the lead -up to my brother's birth and

1:16:43

my dad used to send us out to

1:16:45

the neighbours for tea and Everyone in

1:16:47

the street was an uncle or an

1:16:49

auntie and so you got sent over,

1:16:51

you know We had uncle Jim and

1:16:53

auntie Marge and all of that and

1:16:56

then John and IV and all that,

1:16:58

you know And and we had Uncle

1:17:00

Dave and Penny they were the best

1:17:02

ones Dave and Penny were the best

1:17:04

Dave was a carpet fair and Penny

1:17:06

used to be a panned person She

1:17:08

was a panned person and we always

1:17:10

used to like You know because we're

1:17:12

all young kids, there was a pair

1:17:14

of people and she used to fish

1:17:16

fingers and arctic roll, you know,

1:17:18

obviously, those were the star

1:17:20

dishes. But I remember we'd go

1:17:22

in and my mum, my dad always used

1:17:24

to try and do Sunday lunch and it

1:17:26

always ended up as fish fingers and baked

1:17:28

beans. I remember going in to see my

1:17:30

mum in hospital, can't stand the fish fingers

1:17:32

and baked beans. So my dad's cooking would

1:17:34

be one of the things we could put

1:17:36

in there. I think

1:17:39

I think what I'd like to

1:17:41

put in is probably my youthful

1:17:43

intolerance. I think I've become more

1:17:45

tolerant as a person and I hope

1:17:47

so. So I think

1:17:49

my youthful I would

1:17:51

very much... But I still do it to an extent,

1:17:53

you know what I mean? I still

1:17:55

think that mustard -coloured corduroy

1:17:57

trousers are an indicator, know

1:18:00

what I mean? And you see it and you

1:18:02

just think, I don't want to fucking meet this person.

1:18:05

Yeah, I apologize, but do you know what I

1:18:07

mean? And I think I shouldn't be intolerant, but

1:18:09

I am. And I

1:18:11

kind of, I

1:18:13

think I'd like to

1:18:15

put my abrasiveness into the

1:18:17

time capsule. There

1:18:19

are lots of people

1:18:22

who I'm really grateful

1:18:24

for who have been

1:18:26

incredibly kind and supportive

1:18:28

when they shouldn't have. When

1:18:30

I was, you know, I think

1:18:33

alcohol I'd love to put in there.

1:18:35

Drugs as well put drink we

1:18:37

put drink drugs and intolerance in there

1:18:39

I'm very glad that I don't

1:18:41

do any of that anymore. Hmm,

1:18:44

but you're right about that that intolerance and

1:18:46

That not seeing another person's point of

1:18:48

view not taking the time to try

1:18:50

and understand what somebody's saying to you

1:18:52

when you just go no I disagree

1:18:54

now you're wrong and We all suffer

1:18:56

from that to an extent we all

1:18:59

do that so that thing where you

1:19:01

just kind of go actually everyone's got

1:19:03

some it Everyone's got

1:19:05

something and you know, I

1:19:07

love the fact like where I

1:19:09

live, I live in Tooting and

1:19:11

I can open the, I've

1:19:13

got first floor for that. You open

1:19:15

the kitchen and there's a little balcony

1:19:17

out there, it's not very big. There's

1:19:20

a little balcony and next to me there's

1:19:22

someone. My neighbours got balcony. On the

1:19:24

other side they got balcony and then one

1:19:26

across they got balcony. And opposite they

1:19:28

got balcony over there, balcony over there, balcony.

1:19:30

And we've got this little rear window

1:19:32

New York scene going on into him. You

1:19:34

know what I mean? And

1:19:37

everyone brings something.

1:19:40

And I wish I'd kind of

1:19:42

known that earlier. Yeah, I

1:19:44

absolutely understand that. Anybody gets to

1:19:46

a certain age, they look back

1:19:48

at their youthful self and think,

1:19:50

if you just shut up a

1:19:52

bit more and take the time

1:19:54

to listen to what people were saying. Me

1:19:57

and my mates, because the people I started

1:19:59

performing with was Kevin Day and... James McCarber,

1:20:01

and now James McCarber is sadly dead.

1:20:03

But Kevin is now the person who

1:20:05

writes the funny lines for Gary Linnaker.

1:20:08

And Kev's a great performer. And

1:20:11

Kev, me and Jim used to like, we were just

1:20:13

like, we were just like this gang. And we, you

1:20:15

know, you go to the comedy store, there were two

1:20:17

shows, right? You have the early show and the late

1:20:19

show, and the late show starts at midnight. So if

1:20:21

you were doing a gig in London, you'd do the

1:20:23

gig, you'd get your money, you'd have a drink, and

1:20:25

then you'd head over to the store for the start

1:20:27

of the second show. and you'd hang out in the

1:20:29

back bar and that's where everyone went. You hung out

1:20:31

in the back bar and you chatted and

1:20:33

whoever was managing that night at some point would

1:20:35

lean round and go, well, you shut the

1:20:37

fuck up. Some people are working and shouting at

1:20:39

all the comics. And you'd

1:20:41

always know when a comic was doing well because

1:20:43

the back bar would shut up and come another

1:20:45

look. I always remember when

1:20:47

Harry Enfield started performing as

1:20:49

a stand -up. and by

1:20:51

himself, because he was in double act called

1:20:53

Dusty and Dick, and they stopped that, and

1:20:56

then he did stand up by himself. And

1:20:58

that's when he did Chumley. And when

1:21:00

he first did Stavros, everyone

1:21:02

stopped. Everyone fucking stopped. You couldn't get a

1:21:04

drink at the bar. You couldn't get a

1:21:06

meal at the kitchen. None of the security

1:21:08

were there. Everyone would come out and watch

1:21:10

him because he was on fire. And

1:21:12

you can see it with comics when they

1:21:14

hit a point and they burn. They've

1:21:17

realized how good they are. And

1:21:20

they've got a bit more headroom. And

1:21:23

it's about six months,

1:21:25

this period of time, I

1:21:27

think. And I saw it

1:21:29

in Lee Evans and I saw it in Jack D.

1:21:31

When you see this period of

1:21:34

time when for six months

1:21:36

they're king and everything

1:21:38

they do. And

1:21:40

it's a remarkable period

1:21:42

in a comedian's life.

1:21:44

And it's amazing to

1:21:46

see. And me and...

1:21:50

and Jim Miller used to charge down

1:21:52

to that back bar. And you

1:21:54

know, we're all of 23, 24. We'd

1:21:58

be going up to these slightly older comments

1:22:00

going, your shit, you should retire. You should have

1:22:02

gone a long while ago. In

1:22:06

fact, we were known as

1:22:08

the Brat Pack. Well,

1:22:12

it's been really fantastic to talk to

1:22:14

you, Mark. It's Thank you for having

1:22:17

us on. I've really, really enjoyed it.

1:22:19

Good. Good. So have I, enormously. I

1:22:21

knew I would. I could listen

1:22:23

to you all day, so... I could speak

1:22:25

all day. Because

1:22:29

I'm speaking about me. Oh,

1:22:34

brilliant. Thank you, mate. Well, listen, man,

1:22:36

it's a real delight, and hopefully I'll

1:22:38

see you outside Bats The Arts Centre

1:22:40

soon. Yeah, in the flesh. Wouldn't that

1:22:42

be nice? And I look forward to it.

1:22:44

I shall give you a great big hug. Man.

1:22:48

It will be reciprocating. I'm

1:22:50

to hug everyone. Don't think it's special just for

1:22:52

you, you know. Once I can, once I can,

1:22:54

I'm I'm going to be arrested. I

1:22:56

won't let you go. Take

1:23:00

good care, my love. Oh, lovely. Thanks,

1:23:02

mate. Great to see you. Look after yourself.

1:23:04

Bye, mate. You

1:23:11

have been listening to my time capsule

1:23:13

with me Mike Fenton Stevens and

1:23:15

my lovely guest Mark Thomas even more

1:23:17

of him than before Thanks for

1:23:19

listening. Hopefully you know all the stuff

1:23:21

I usually say after an episode

1:23:23

about subscribing rating reviewing contacting us the

1:23:25

theme tune and a cast plus

1:23:27

and if you don't then it's at

1:23:30

the end of all the other

1:23:32

nearly 500 episodes We release which are

1:23:34

free to listen to any time

1:23:36

you like so find it there. You

1:23:38

can even listen to Mark's original

1:23:40

episode and see where we cut things out,

1:23:42

but I think this extended version is

1:23:44

better. I hope you had a

1:23:46

lovely Easter. I got lots of eggs and

1:23:48

had family fun, even with all the madness

1:23:50

going on in the world, thanks to nearly

1:23:52

the elephant. Or Trump, Trump, Trump, as

1:23:54

some people call him. Still, at least he

1:23:56

taught us all how to make a fortune on

1:23:59

the stock market. No, no, it's

1:24:01

not inside a trading. Something I would

1:24:03

obviously never accuse the Prime Minister of

1:24:05

the United States of. The

1:24:07

best way to make a small fortune on

1:24:09

the stock market is to do what Donald

1:24:11

himself did, obviously. You start

1:24:13

with a huge fortune. Bye!