Live at The Apollo (2004) s11e05 Episode Script

Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome your host for tonight, Katherine Ryan! Hello, Hammersmith Apollo.
I am TV's Katherine Ryan and I like to talk a lot about celebrities, but you've got a lot of good ones.
There are some celebrities in Britain that I would not say a bad word about.
Mo Farah - love him.
He is a British hero.
An Olympian, a good man, a good father, a Somalian who acquires gold on land, nothing I don't like about that.
He is perfect.
You can't say a bad word about Taylor Swift.
Do we have any Taylor Swift fans in? "Of course we are.
Shake It Off! We love her! We love Taylor Swift.
" She's friend to all women, except if you follow her on Instagram, you will notice that that circle of friends is limited to Victoria's Secret models only.
They come on stage with her, they're her girl squad.
"Why do you have them on stage with you, Taylor Swift?" "To illustrate that I am just as hot as them but also have a talent, OK?" She's friends with Lena Donovan too.
You know why that is? So that when people like me want to be friends with Taylor Swift - and I love Taylor Swift! Of course I want to be friends with Taylor Swift - she can be, like, "No, we don't need you.
"We're already friends with one human woman.
" Nobody is that perfect.
I like flaws.
I knew that Taylor Swift would mess up and she did mess up.
A few weeks ago, Nicki Minaj - a very curvaceous, black, R&B singer - tweeted, "I think I would've been nominated for more awards "if the women in my videos were slim," and, essentially, white.
And Taylor Swift, friend to all women replied, "Nicki, I have always supported you.
"If I win, you can come on stage with me.
" Really? Oh, I knew it, Taylor Swift.
I got you.
Back your white privilege right this minute.
What's Nicki Minaj even supposed to say to that? "Oh, t-t-thank you, Taylor Swift.
That's ever so kind of you, ma'am.
"I don't know.
I don't know if I got no business "up here on stage in front of all these white folk.
"I'd better hurry up and finish the laundry before your daddy get home.
" Not cool.
People worry about me.
They worry about me because I'm single.
Really, if you are a lady who is single after a certain age, people will start to get upset.
I get letters all the time, from women exclusively.
I got one a little while ago and the lady must've been 200 years old, because she wrote this letter on, like, stationery with beautiful calligraphy - it's a dead art - and she wrote, "Dear Katherine, we saw your show "and we were very worried to hear that you're single.
" Like, really? You saw the whole show and that was the problem? She's like, "My brother Ray is also single.
" Oh, there you go! Ladies, that's why we're single.
Not because we choose it but because we haven't met Ray.
She went on to offer me a date with Ray.
She said, "We'd be willing to accompany Ray on the Megabus "to London.
" Whoa, whoa, whoa! I know the only time somebody takes a bus to meet someone they've seen on TV is to kill them.
I did not attend.
But men don't get these letters, that's what winds me up.
I work with a tonne of men, they never Look at Leonardo DiCaprio.
Famously single for years.
He and I have the same number of Oscars.
Nobody's writing him.
"Dear Leonardo.
"We recently saw you muff-diving all those supermodels on your yacht "and we were so worried.
"My brother Ray is also single.
"Nobody wants to fuck Ray.
" I've got a problem with Jews.
Anyone else? Please, don't put your hands up.
I was dating a Jewish man this year.
I fell in love with him and he split up with me simply because I'm not Jewish, and I genuinely did not know that religion still behaved this way.
I am a blonde-haired, blue-eyed, white, middle-class woman in 2015.
I am entitled to everything.
It's not OK for his people to treat me the way my people quite enjoy treating everyone else.
He said, "We can have no future, Katherine.
"What if we were to have a baby? "I imagine that you would not consent to having him circumcised.
" I was like, "First off, "why are you imagining the dicks of babies we don't have?" And secondly, you're right.
I've lived in England so long, I didn't even notice that's one of the ways that I've changed, because back in North America, all the men are routinely circumcised.
I checked that.
And here, it's just not done and I guess, all of a sudden, I am against genital mutilation in all its forms.
But what gets me is I've never been in a relationship where the man said to me, "You know that baby we haven't got? "Would you cut its cock?" And the answer, "No, don't worry," was a deal-breaker.
I don't hate all Jews, guys.
Of course not.
I hate one Jew, but that's how it starts.
I am a mother.
My daughter's such a cool kid.
She's called Violet, she's six years old.
I took her to a charity event a little while ago.
It was a youth homeless charity and I went because Prince Harry would be there, and I am normally not allowed within 100 yards of that fine man.
And it was full of posh people and I've learned that posh people think that only other posh people care about them, because they had a young man speak and he himself was once homeless.
I thought, "Great, we're going to see some real-world stuff.
" No.
18-year-old boy comes up to the microphone, three-piece suit, he's like "Yah, so, like, a year ago, "my parents were totally micromanaging my life.
"And so I left and I stayed on friends' couches and in summer homes.
"I was utterly homeless.
" That's not homeless unless the couch smells of piss and is outside a Tesco Metro.
"They withheld my trust fund.
"Do you have any idea how difficult it is "to be on a juice cleanse when you're homeless?" I hated him! I looked around the room trying to find the eyes of anyone else who hated this prick.
Nothing.
They're all like, "Yah, sounds bad.
" There was silence in the room as he took a drink and my six-year-old goes, "White people.
" I was like, "Yeah.
" That's what I'm saying.
And he wasn't even white.
That's such a beautiful thing, when a child can look beyond someone's skin colour, see the white inside of him and hate it.
I am 32 years old and I love it.
Give me a cheer if you're a woman over the age of 30.
Some of them won't cheer.
"I know, I should've killed myself five years ago.
" Ageing is great.
Ageing just means you didn't die.
We grow in value with every day, not the other way round.
Would you trade your life with a teenage girl's life? Do you remember what it was like when we had no power and no money? When we did our own eyebrows? No, thank you.
And who dates a teenager?! You know that guy who got done for taking a 15-year-old to Paris? Anyone who's been on holiday with a teenager knows that man deserved a medal, not prison.
"Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah! "Do you know Titanic is based on a true story? Blah, blah!" I recently went home with a 25-year-old.
It was weird.
I've not been with a 25-year-old since I was 14.
Inappropriate.
It's very inappropriate.
Do you know what he said to me? He said, "I think it is very scary that you're 31.
" He said that to my face.
"I think it is very scary.
" I said, "Why? "Do you know what the difference is between me now and me at your age? "Now I have more money, so what are you afraid of? "My disposable income, is that what it is? "Ooh! I get too many manicures for you, my feet are too soft, "my entire body is too electrolysised for you, young man? "What is it? My house is too nice? My thread count's too high? "Was my driver rude to you? "Maybe you think I'm in a rush to have a baby? "Well, say, hello, I've got one.
"She is not a fan of yours, you little fuck badger.
She hates you.
" The main message from the media is, "Do not fancy a child.
" We've got that.
That's a terrible thing to do.
"Do not fancy a child, but just try to be a woman who looks like a child "so that people fancy you.
" What? "Like a little baby.
Like Cheryl Cole.
"Like a little baby woman.
"Gorgeous.
Absolutely gorgeous.
" So beautiful it makes you forget she's garbage, that's how hot that chick is.
So pretty.
Don't feel bad, some of you feel bad.
Cheryl Cole would glass each of you in an alley tonight.
"No, not me.
I'm just a little gorgeous baby.
" "Are you talking to me? Are you talking to me, Cheryl Cole?" You ever been in a room with that thing? It's this big.
If she was born in the winter, she would not have made it.
Done more damage to the north-east than Margaret Thatcher.
But she's gorgeous.
Beautiful.
So pretty.
She looks like my six-year-old in a wig.
"I am the nation's sweetheart.
"The nation's sweetheart," and I know I can't do a Geordie accent, but I don't care, no.
I don't care.
It's a bit more UKIP Calypso when I do it.
I don't care.
"Because I'm the nation's sweetheart.
" You're not, you are the answer to the question, how beautiful do you have to be to make the nation forget about how you drunkenly assaulted a nightclub worker? I don't even believe she's human! Nobody human is that pretty, even God is throwing everything he can at this thing - malaria.
It won't die.
Nah, I can't do it.
Of course I love Cheryl Cole.
Of course I want to be friends with Cheryl Cole, just so anyone else tries to be friends with her, she can be like, "No, no.
I'm already friends with one human woman.
" Hammersmith Apollo, please join me in welcoming my first guest.
I am in stitches every time I'm in his presence, it's the hilarious Henning Wehn.
UK! Yeah, let me quickly introduce myself.
My name is Henning.
The German comedy ambassador.
Not the easiest of jobs.
But let me get one thing straight, we Germans, we like a laugh.
No, honestly, we really do.
We really do.
Just like the Brits.
The only difference is, Germans laugh once the work is done.
Rather than instead of.
And that indeed is the main cultural difference.
What a fantastic turnout here this evening.
Is there There's almost bound to be someone else from Germany in the audience.
Blimey.
Chris.
Yeah.
By the way, Chris and I, we're just doing exactly the same thing the Brits do whenever they travel abroad.
We just carry on speaking our language regardless.
Why do people move abroad? It's always for one of two reasons, isn't it? Either you want to broaden your horizon or you're not needed back home.
And usually it's the latter, but no matter, no matter your motivation, once you live abroad, you become a lot more patriotic.
A lot more nationalistic.
In my case, that isn't very good.
Well, I was already firmly right-wing when I was still living back home in the Ruhr valley.
It hasn't got any better since.
I mean, these days, I get national pride out of the strangest events.
Now, I remember reading in the paper a couple of years ago that Germany had won the World Championships in marbles.
On reading, I was like, "Yey-hey!" Yet, until reading that, I didn't even know anyone over the age of four did play marbles.
I remember, I remember when we won Pope.
Did you remember when Germany won the Catholic Church? I know, far more recently, we lost it to the Argies, but, far more vividly, I remember how great it was when we won it.
I was like, "Yey! Super!" "Super! Super.
" I was over the moon.
It was like winning the football World Cup again.
I know full well, if, at the time of the Pope election, if I'd still been living back home in Germany, I would've reacted completely differently.
I would've just said, "Oh, no, not that reactionary Bavarian twat.
" But once you live abroad, you embrace everything about your country, everything remotely German.
Like the royal baby.
Number two.
"Yey!" If you live abroad, you do assimilate to a degree.
Like, on stage, on stage, there is never any doubt about my nationality.
On stage, I properly German it up.
But in everyday life, in many ways, these days, I'm as British as they come.
Like, not too long ago, I had a groin hernia.
I'm not saying that's a British trait as such.
A starting point for this little anecdote.
A groin hernia is not painful, but it's incredibly annoying and the worst bit about it is your body gives you very irregular pressure on your bladder.
You really don't know when you have to go to the toilet and I was in one of those situations going home after a gig on a night bus, and then the bus stopped at red lights and I realised, dear, oh, dear, I have to have a slash right now.
So I went up to the driver and said, "Sir, sir, "let me off, let me off, I have to have a piss.
" The driver said, "No, sorry, mate.
"Can't.
It's not a proper stop, it's just red lights.
" "Sir, I'm really sorry about this, I'll have to piss here.
" So I got my knob out All of a sudden, he could open the doors.
It wasn't against health and safety any longer, so me jumping out, finding a tree, pissing behind a tree was all one and because of the time spent with the driver, it had all gone on a split-second too long.
All I'm saying, there was already a good amount of liquid going down the inside of my trouser leg, so I had to wait in the middle of the night, behind a tree, I had to wait in the pitch-black.
I had to wait for my piss trousers to dry Your Honour.
Luckily, it didn't come to that, but it was embarrassing enough as it was and at that point, I had to get home.
So I looked down my trousers and, well, they had sufficiently dried.
I tell you what, I'll take the next night bus into London town, I'll have a nice late-night kebab, nice cup of tea, then I'll take a cab home and the world will not see me until after the operation.
That was my plan.
So I get on the next night bus, going to London town, get off at Tottenham Court Road and walked up to the kebab shop, and had all them health worries in my head.
So, will the NHS be able to treat me properly? Will this knock years off my life expectancy? Will I ever be able to become a father? So I had all those existential worries, so I wasn't really paying attention to what I was doing, so when I walked into the kebab shop, I didn't see the step leading into the kebab shop, so I tripped over that step, immediately lost my balance and fell in, headfirst.
So, there I was, three o'clock in the morning, on all fours, on the floor of a kebab shop, in piss trousers thinking, "Blimey! How British am I?" Thank you very much.
You have been an absolute delight! Thanks so much.
See you very soon.
Bye-bye.
Thank you.
Henning Wehn.
Well done.
My next guest is absolutely incredible.
He's the kind of comedian that comedians gather to watch.
I would go as far as to say he is the future of British comedy.
Please, welcome - oh, you're in for a treat - it's the exquisite James Acaster.
Yeah.
Tonight, I want to tell you about a friend of mine.
He works in a casino.
And, one day, he Is DICE plural and DIE singular? Or is DIE plural? Anyway, he killed two people by mistake.
Say he's my friend.
He's not really my friend.
I'm on the jury.
I shouldn't say friend, should I? They make that very clear.
"He's not your friend, mate.
" I see him every day, he seems like a nice guy.
There was someone else called James on the jury.
Got confusing.
How we got round it, right, everyone would call HIM James One and me Wolf.
I got to choose my own name.
It's pretty cool.
Me and James One hit the town, cutting it up.
I was making an effort for once, dressed to impress, I had my best tie on.
Paisley, paisley makes the girls go crazily.
Chatting to a lady at one point, she was lovely.
Lovely, lovely lady.
She's a masseuse, big respect.
I tried to give massage to partners in the past.
Not easy, is it? Not sexy massage, drag your minds out the gutter, just normal massage.
You know, just normal massage you do in a relationship.
You know, normal, just normal.
Normal stuff.
Normally what? You're normally in bed, ain't you, normally, for a massage with your partner? Normally in bed.
End of the day, fair to say.
End of the day, bed.
Don't do a massage in the morning, that's far too decadent.
Save it to the end.
Lights out, aren't they? Lying down.
Completely dark, ain't it? Just lying there and only one of you knows that a massage is about to take place.
If you're not in on it, you're sitting there, you've got your eyes closed and you're thinking to yourself, "I'm going to go to sleep now.
I'm going to go to sleep.
" You're lying there, feeling safe, just me and the person I trust most in the world.
The last thing I'm expecting at this point is an ambush.
And then, the partner will turn to you in the dark, like a coward, spineless, and they'll say, "I've got a genuine muscular complaint "that I really should get seen to by a trained professional.
"However how would you like to improvise a massage on me "with your zero expertise?" "Would I ever? Let's get this light back on.
" Then the masseuse will assume the position.
Which, if you've ever received a massage from a partner before, you'll know the position in question is sitting on them.
Again, I don't know if you've ever paid for a professional massage this move rarely crops up.
Park themselves on your lower back - it's too familiar.
Get your partner to do it, you get what you pay for, you cheapskate.
They're sitting on you, just sitting on you! Just sitting on you.
You know, like a bully does.
Just sitting on you like a bully.
And then, they start guessing.
Just having a flying guess all over your back, doing moves they've half-remembered from films they've seen.
If you can't see what I'm doing at the back there, I'm just using the heels of my hands.
You want to put them either side of the spine and then, you want to put your full weight on that in the hope that that's OK.
Wing that, chance it - it's not your back.
And just move them out in a pattern that, from where you are, looks nice.
It's pleasing to your eye if not to their actual back.
Nice and symmetrical all the way up.
A bit of shoulder work, obviously.
You're not stingy, are you? Some shoulder work while you're there.
What you're doing there, just gathering all the skin and muscle a nice chunky pinch and just let it go and do it again.
That's all that is.
Letting it go, just move it somewhere else, put it back where it was.
That's that move.
Like an arcade claw that never wins anything, never gets any toys.
No toys.
No toys.
Hardest part of jury duty.
I'll tell you what it is.
The debates.
We had to go off, just the jury, in a little room and debate the case every day.
Everyone else had opinions, except for me.
I felt stupid.
In the end, I just played devil's advocate.
That's what you do if you don't have an opinion.
It's clever.
Because devil's advocate, you don't need an opinion.
You just say the opposite to what everyone else is saying.
It's not on you because it's not you.
It's the devil.
Who, let's not forget, is a certified rotter.
I was playing devil's advocate from the get-go.
Day one, first debate we ever had, everyone else on the jury, they were saying how the murder was really bad.
Prime opportunity for a little DA.
I piped up, "Hey, guys.
"To be fair, we're all going to die one day anyway.
"These people just died a little earlier "than they would've in the first place.
"Cut this guy some slack, let him walk.
" Went back to the hotel, I rang my mum up.
Said, "Hey, Mum.
"I played devil's advocate in court today, you'd have been proud of me.
"I looked real clever.
" She said, "Did you lead up to it by saying, "'Just playing devil's advocate'?" I went, "Should I have?" She went, "Undoubtedly.
"Otherwise, it just sounds like your own horrific opinion.
" Day two involved a lot of backpedalling.
Had a similar problem with "no pun intended".
A couple of days later, we're having a debate, I piped up.
"Hey, guys.
"No pun intended, "but do you think it's possible that the gardener planted evidence?" So what? So what? Back to my hotel, I rang my mum up.
I was like, "Hey, Mum.
"I said, 'No pun intended,' in court today.
You'd have been proud of me.
"I looked real clever.
" She said, "Did you say, 'No pun intended,' "at the end of the sentence?" I went, "I said it at the top.
" She went, "Right.
That does sound like you knew fully well "you were heading into a pun and did very little to change course.
" "Therefore, the pun was fully intended, James.
" What I learnt from those two experiences is, if you make a pun in polite conversation, people will hate you more than that time you openly defended murder.
You have been a joy to speak to.
Thanks for listening to me.
Bye! James Acaster.
Thank you so much for listening.
Let's hear it again for my tremendous guests - Mr Henning Wehn and James Acaster.
I've been Katherine Ryan.
I'll see you soon.