Adrian Edmondson

Speaker 10:01

BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, Podcast.

Presenter0:04

Hello, I'm Lauren Laverne and this is the Desert Island Discs podcast. Every week I ask my guests to choose the eight tracks, book and luxury they'd want to take with them if they were cast away to a desert island. This is an extended version of the original Radio 4 broadcast and, for rights reasons, the music is shorter than the original broadcast. I hope you enjoy listening.

Presenter0:48

My castaway this week is the comic actor and musician Adrian Edmondson. He rose to fame in the BBC sitcom The Young Ones and as part of the creative team behind the comic strip. Along with friends and co-stars Alexei Sale, Ben Elton and Jennifer Saunders who he later married, he ushered in a new wave of British comedy and his anarchic chemistry with Rick Male made him a star. After the Young Ones, they dialed up the slapstick and created something even grottier. bottom. Some critics were horrified, but the show was, appropriately enough, considering the amount of frying pan-based violence it depicted, a big hit. The Beckett-like bleakness of their double act was no accident. The two had bonded over the playwright when they first met as drama students. In more recent years, Adrian has returned to acting, with TV roles in War and Peace, Aspy Among Friends and a much-acclaimed appearance as Scrooge for the RSC. He says, It's an enormous pressure being funny. There are rewards and getting laughs is very nice, but there is a price you pay. Adrian Edmondson, welcome to Desert Marvel. Thank you very much indeed.

Adrian Edmondson1:48

Thank you very much.

Presenter1:50

So, Adrian, you've created some memorable comic roles in your career. I wonder who your comedy heroes were.

Adrian Edmondson1:56

Yeah.

Presenter1:56

I think you were Broken.

Adrian Edmondson1:57

Yep. Laurel and Hardy.

Adrian Edmondson1:58

Um Laurel and Hardy, Spike Milligan.

Adrian Edmondson2:00

Flanders and Swan.

Adrian Edmondson2:02

I think Laurel and Hardy have stayed with me the longest. I judge people by whether they like Laurel and Hardy or not.

Presenter2:07

And what was the appeal? Why did you like them?

Adrian Edmondson2:09

I think all comedy is just passed on. I think it's all the same. And I think that's the first recorded version of all the jokes. And you can watch any comedy today. I could show you where that joke is somewhere in Laurel and Hardy. I was sent to a boarding school and I didn't know the goons because I was too young to know them when they went out. And a kind of special came on the telly. It was called The Last Goon Show of All. And to go along with it, they produced this kind of book of scripts. And I bought the book of scripts, took it home.

Adrian Edmondson2:40

And I remember my dad saying, too silly. And I

Speaker 22:43

No, yeah.

Adrian Edmondson2:44

I got this uh tape recorder, his his Grundig Reel to Reel, and I recorded all the Guncho scripts on my own, because I'd never heard them. So I just kind of made my own version of them.

Presenter2:54

And how did that compare to the real thing?

Adrian Edmondson2:56

Well, when I eventually heard the real thing I was very disappointed'cause they got it wrong.

Presenter3:00

And you must have

Adrian Edmondson3:00

I've kind of learned the construction of jokes.

Presenter3:02

You must have met some of your comedy heroes, not Laurel and Hardy, obviously, but Smite Spike.

Adrian Edmondson3:05

I met Spike in Dublin airport once. I was terrified of sort of saying hello. But I eventually stole the courage and and went up and said a high spike.

Adrian Edmondson3:16

I don't know if you know it, I I try and do comedy as well. I do this show Bottom. Have you ever seen it? And he said, No.

Adrian Edmondson3:24

So you see, the problem is, I know all the jokes.

Adrian Edmondson3:28

I thought at the time that was very arrogant of him, but now I kind of know what he means. I've got bored with jokes.

Adrian Edmondson3:36

In the end.

Presenter3:36

Do

Adrian Edmondson3:37

I feel I've seen them all.

Presenter3:38

Well, we've got lots to talk about and as I mentioned, acting was the thing that came first for you. And your acting career actually began when you first played the Angel Gabriel at primary school, apparently with such regularity that your mum eventually just kept the costume to dust off with the Christmas decorations.

Adrian Edmondson3:53

My dad was a teacher for the Armed Forces and we moved every year. I went to a different school every year until I was twelve. And uh I played The Angel Gabriel four times. And I think by the end the audience were basically just coming to see me.

Presenter4:06

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson4:06

What got you the part, do you think? I had this shock of white hair.

Adrian Edmondson4:12

and I looked kind of otherworldly.

Adrian Edmondson4:14

I looked like an angel.

Adrian Edmondson4:16

If you can believe that, looking at this kind of balding, grim face you see before you now.

Presenter4:21

I can believe that. I mean, it's quite a contrast to Vivian and the young ones, which is my first introduction to your oeuvre. Yes. Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson4:23

Right.

Adrian Edmondson4:25

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson4:27

Yes, yeah.

Presenter4:29

So you obviously have many creative strings to your bow. Alongside acting, you're also a musician, writer. What gives you the most satisfaction, I wonder?

Adrian Edmondson4:38

I've always enjoyed the fact that I flip between them all.

Adrian Edmondson4:41

And no one can really

Adrian Edmondson4:43

work out what I do. I I think it's been a problem for me in the in the long run.

Presenter4:48

Are you always looking for the next thing? Do you have a best thing?

Adrian Edmondson4:49

My best thing is yet to come.

Presenter4:52

Mm.

Adrian Edmondson4:52

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson4:53

I think it is, actually.

Adrian Edmondson4:55

I think it's coming.

Presenter4:56

Do you have a sense of where that's going to be, what it's going to be like?

Adrian Edmondson4:59

It's going to be a new play that someone else has written and I'm going to make brilliant.

Presenter5:05

Music's a huge passion for you, obviously, Adrian, and you're here to share your discs. I wonder how the experience of whittling down your final eight has been.

Adrian Edmondson5:13

Well, it's been weird. I've been listening to this programme, you know, I think I turned Radio 4 on when I was about 18 and haven't turned it off yet. So I've been listening to it since then.

Presenter5:16

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson5:22

And I've always sort of imagined what my my eight discs would be and

Adrian Edmondson5:27

They've actually always been based on what I like rather than what they relate to. This list is.

Adrian Edmondson5:35

What it relates to.

Presenter5:36

So you've come to tell us a story with your music?

Adrian Edmondson5:37

Yeah.

Presenter5:38

Well, let's dive in.

Adrian Edmondson5:39

I hope so.

Presenter5:40

With your first choice.

Adrian Edmondson5:42

Tell us about disc number one.

Adrian Edmondson5:43

My dad

Adrian Edmondson5:45

He wanted me to be cultured and civilized, and we travelled the world. He was he was his geography teacher working for the forces and uh

Adrian Edmondson5:53

Everywhere we went we had this little record player, sort of folded up into a suitcase.

Adrian Edmondson5:57

and his little collection of fifteen classical L P s. And every Sunday we had to sit down, put a classical record on, and play chess.

Adrian Edmondson6:07

I've hated classical music ever since.

Adrian Edmondson6:10

and he stopped playing chess with me when I started to beat him.

Adrian Edmondson6:13

But alongside Civilization, there was a little pile of singles that I think were my mother's choices, which I found very much more exciting. And amongst them is this record, Downtown by Petula Clark. What did you love about it? I like it even more in retrospect. I mean, it's just big and noisy and brash, but it's got a kind of sadness to it. And I wonder if my mum was sad. Even Petula sounds sad. Where is this downtown? It sounds like no one's reaching it. It certainly wasn't in Bradford or Nicosia or Limersole, all these places we were living in. The 50s and the 60s were quite grim. Everyone thinks the 60s are being kind of flower power and revolution, but I think most of us were on bread and jam, you know, and it was all a bit second-handy. So downtown's got a kind of tristesse to it that I still like. We used it when Rick was doing Kevin Turvey, The Man Behind the Green Door. It was a kind of fictionalised version of Kevin Turvey, and I was his bestmate, and Robbie Coltrane was his stepdad, let's say, in Inverted Commons. And we sing Downtown at the end of that as well. And I think that it's got the same impetus there, which is...

Adrian Edmondson7:20

Where is it?

Adrian Edmondson7:22

Please let us go there.

Presenter7:24

The lights are much brighter there. You can't forget all your troubles. Forget all

Speaker 17:31

All you care, so go downtown. Things will be great when you're downtown. No final place for sure. Downtown, everything's waiting for you.

Presenter7:52

Petula Clark and Downtown. So let's go back to the beginning, Adrian Edmondson. You were born in Bradford in nineteen fifty seven to Dorothy and Fred, and you were the second of four kids. As you mentioned, your family travelled quite a bit because of your father's job as a teacher. How would you describe him as a person?

Adrian Edmondson8:09

Um he was not without a sense of humour, but

Adrian Edmondson8:12

He was essentially on the cusp of working class and lower middle class,'cause grandad just had a a stall in the market, and I think he he wanted to be upper middle class.

Presenter8:22

Q is aspirational.

Adrian Edmondson8:23

Yeah, and um

Adrian Edmondson8:25

He didn't know how to get there.

Presenter8:26

It sounds like there's a bit of anxiety and turmoil under the surface there for him. Could you sense that in him?

Adrian Edmondson8:32

Yeah.

Presenter8:32

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson8:33

When I was seven, I was saying good night, it was my birthday, and he said, Now you're seven, and I was going to kiss him good night, and he said, Now you're seven.

Adrian Edmondson8:40

And I think we can forget all this kissing thing and just shake hands.

Adrian Edmondson8:43

which I thought was very kind of, you know, seems very reasonable and everything.

Adrian Edmondson8:48

But

Adrian Edmondson8:49

Thinking backwards, it's kind of like a Fellini moment in the film. It c it replays a lot'cause I never saw him shake hands with my older sister or my younger brothers, you know. It felt very personal. And as we'll go on to find out, and when we eventually went to Uganda,

Speaker 18:52

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson9:04

I was the only one sent away. Why was I the only one abandoned? I really don't know. So that's the kind of long-term problem I've got with dad.

Speaker 19:10

Uh

Presenter9:10

You would just have to do that.

Adrian Edmondson9:13

Yeah.

Presenter9:13

Hmm.

Adrian Edmondson9:14

And uh it's it's never been resolved and never will be because he's not here.

Presenter9:17

So was there a feeling that your your relationship with him was different to the relationship that your siblings had?

Adrian Edmondson9:22

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson9:23

I think it was a sort of old-fashioned uh

Adrian Edmondson9:26

misogyny and the fact that he he probably thought my my elder sister wasn't.

Adrian Edmondson9:31

Worth investing in because she was a girl. And I think I was the big project.

Adrian Edmondson9:36

And the project failed, and therefore he didn't try it on my younger brothers.

Adrian Edmondson9:40

That's my reading of the situation after 66 years.

Presenter9:44

And what about your your mum? Dorothy's still alive. She's in in her nineties. What was her role in the family? And as you say, moving every single year, very kind of itinerant. What role did she play?

Adrian Edmondson9:46

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson9:51

But very

Adrian Edmondson9:54

Well, I think he wasn't actually in the army, but uh he sort of had the rank of oh, he was allowed into the officers' mess, and I think she very much played the role of

Adrian Edmondson10:04

army wife, and perhaps subjugated her own wishes and desires.

Speaker 110:08

Mm-hmm.

Adrian Edmondson10:09

to kind of follow him. He I think he was he was quite forceful.

Adrian Edmondson10:13

I think his decisions were usually the ones that were were followed. He used to shoot off.

Adrian Edmondson10:19

So he'd suddenly be away in Uganda and we'd join six months later.

Presenter10:22

What were you like at school? Because obviously a different school every single year until you were 12.

Adrian Edmondson10:27

Well, I had this other problem,'cause my name was Adrian. And uh in the sixties in Bradford and the other schools I went to, everyone thought it was a girl's name. Oh, you had a girl and you must say, Adrian, you must meet a girl. And uh I would have to have a fight.

Adrian Edmondson10:42

at every school I went to about my name.

Adrian Edmondson10:45

So I wasn't very good at that. But I mean, I d I did know about

Adrian Edmondson10:49

The fun of violence.

Adrian Edmondson10:51

You can see how funny it was.

Adrian Edmondson10:54

Remember pushing Garry's head into the gravel.

Presenter10:54

Even in the

Presenter10:57

So that's where that came from. Yeah. And all of that kind of cartoon violence that you had later. And also Vivian being the name of everyone's character, which is exactly.

Adrian Edmondson10:59

You know

Adrian Edmondson11:00

God's

Adrian Edmondson11:01

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson11:05

Yeah, Vivian. Exactly. And there's a joke in Viv in The Young Ones about Vivian being a girl's name.

Adrian Edmondson11:12

It comes from the same stem.

Presenter11:14

Did you become one of those kids who's good at adapting to a new environment?

Adrian Edmondson11:18

I don't think I did. I think it took a long time.

Adrian Edmondson11:22

When I was eventually sent away,

Adrian Edmondson11:25

I then spent six years, for the first time living in the same place for longer than a year, and for the first time being with the same school friends for six years. So I I eventually established myself.

Speaker 111:33

Hmm.

Adrian Edmondson11:38

And as off.

Adrian Edmondson11:39

Found someone to be.

Adrian Edmondson11:41

But my parents didn't know that person. I was a very separate person. There was a bit when they were in Uganda, eventually in Uganda, and Idi Amin was in power. Well, he came into power when we were there.

Presenter11:44

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson11:52

And um people were getting popped off all over the place, bodies in the river, and uh the Postal Service stopped. And there was a a period for about I dunno, your brain plays tricks with you. It's s it's either two, three, four, five, six months or something, where I didn't get a letter.

Adrian Edmondson12:08

And uh

Adrian Edmondson12:10

I remember thinking of that, Ted.

Adrian Edmondson12:12

I might be on my own, that's what I remember thinking.

Adrian Edmondson12:15

It was when Virgin Records first came out and they had that at um Camembert Electrique by Gong.

Adrian Edmondson12:21

Which I bought because it's only 59p.

Presenter12:22

Swirl Goblin.

Speaker 112:22

Uh

Adrian Edmondson12:24

I mean, I bought it for the price point.

Adrian Edmondson12:28

But on the first track, the lyric ends, You Can Kill My Family, My Family Tree.

Adrian Edmondson12:33

And it was sort of my only record. Oh god, this sounds grim. I didn't think it would go like this today. But there you are. Do you remember what you felt?

Adrian Edmondson12:43

I felt detached already. Felt very separate'cause the rest of them are all.

Adrian Edmondson12:48

A family. The rest of my family all have broad Yorkshire accents, and I talk like this.

Presenter12:53

You used a very interesting phrase when a moment ago you said, I found someone to be.

Presenter12:59

When you were in school and in the same place for more than w a year at a time.

Adrian Edmondson13:03

Yeah.

Presenter13:04

Most people would say I found out who I was.

Adrian Edmondson13:06

Yeah.

Presenter13:06

It strikes me that they're very different things.

Adrian Edmondson13:09

Yeah. I don't think I've found out who I am yet.

Adrian Edmondson13:12

I'm looking forward to that.

Presenter13:14

Well, before we do, let's hear some more music. Disc number two, what are we going to hear?

Adrian Edmondson13:19

As I said, my dad did have a comic side, and he had this one comedy album, Flanders and Swans at the Drop of a Hat, was the album. And it had a picture of the two of them on the front wearing dinner jackets and bow ties. And I think that's who my dad wanted to be: someone who had urbane dinner parties. We never had dinner parties.

Adrian Edmondson13:38

The first track on slide two

Adrian Edmondson13:40

There's quite a rude word in it, and there was no swearing in our house.

Adrian Edmondson13:44

Dad's parents were heavy Methodist evangelical Christians, but this

Adrian Edmondson13:49

Song of the Weather twelve couplets about

Adrian Edmondson13:52

How bad the English weather has the word.

Adrian Edmondson13:55

Bloody in it.

Adrian Edmondson13:57

And I remember me and my sister just sort of

Adrian Edmondson13:59

Asking for the record to be put on, having to listen to side one all the way through, and then.

Adrian Edmondson14:05

The lint cloths would come out and it go back on the spindle and he'd press the button, clunk, bang, and the cartridge would land on it. And we'd lean in close and close. And yeah, two grown middle class men and my dad and my mum all singing bloody. It was a kind of the first joke I heard.

Speaker 114:21

It was it was a c it was

Adrian Edmondson14:25

That I remember first proper thinking that is brilliant.

Adrian Edmondson14:30

And it's it's never really got

Adrian Edmondson14:32

Much better since then.

Presenter14:33

Bleak September's mist and mud Is enough to chill the blood.

Adrian Edmondson14:41

Then October adds a gale!

Speaker 214:44

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson14:44

Wind and slash and rain and hail

Speaker 214:46

Uh

Adrian Edmondson14:48

Uh

Speaker 214:48

Dark November brings the fog

Speaker 214:51

She will do it to a dog.

Speaker 214:56

Freezing wet December there

Speaker 215:02

Bloody January again, and we will drink this farm.

Presenter15:07

Song of the Weather by Flanders and Swan. So Adrian Edmonton, when you were twelve.

Adrian Edmondson15:12

Mm-hmm.

Presenter15:12

Your family were living in Uganda, but your parents made the decision that of the four children, you, you alone, would be sent to boarding school in North Yorkshire. Do you remember how it was explained to you that the others wouldn't be going?

Presenter15:25

I don't think it was.

Presenter15:27

You must have missed your family desperately.

Adrian Edmondson15:30

Yeah, I remember a lot of blubbing and uh when I first got there, but once all the tears dry up, uh, we all became the same people, you know. The school is just full of

Adrian Edmondson15:40

people who are emotionally repressed, lonely, unloved and feeling abandoned eventually get over it and sort of subsist within the world without kind of causing too much trouble.

Adrian Edmondson15:51

I'm still incredibly high maintenance.

Adrian Edmondson15:55

emotionally and um

Speaker 115:56

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson15:57

That's where it comes from.

Adrian Edmondson15:59

Is there a lot of stakes?

Adrian Edmondson16:01

There was a lot of beating, and there was no pastoral care of any sort, and absolutely no love.

Adrian Edmondson16:10

I've worked it out now, that's that's the main thing that was missing for six years, was there was not a scintilla of love.

Presenter16:13

Mm-hmm.

Presenter16:18

And also to be put in that environment at 12. You know, that the changes kids are going through at that time.

Adrian Edmondson16:21

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson16:24

Yeah.

Presenter16:25

So to be taken out of your family, put into an environment where you're not loved and going home twice a year, I think you said.

Adrian Edmondson16:32

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson16:33

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson16:34

It is a cataclysm, uh a moment of of

Presenter16:37

You know, it was a different

Adrian Edmondson16:38

But you know, I was a different person.

Presenter16:39

Mm-hmm.

Adrian Edmondson16:39

from from that moment on.

Presenter16:41

In what way different?

Presenter16:45

Damaged, essentially, you know. Did you feel abandoned by your parents? Yeah, absolutely.

Adrian Edmondson16:53

Yes, that's the the only word.

Adrian Edmondson16:56

Especially'cause it was always six months at a time.

Adrian Edmondson16:59

You'd go home for Christmas and summer.

Presenter16:59

I must have a good idea.

Speaker 117:00

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson17:02

As a lovely matron, Matron Brown used to come round and

Adrian Edmondson17:07

Soothe all the crying boys. What an awful job.

Adrian Edmondson17:12

It used to sort of soothe us to sleep, and it took about three weeks.

Adrian Edmondson17:16

And you saw it happen with the next batch.

Adrian Edmondson17:19

And uh everyone turned into

Adrian Edmondson17:22

The same kind of emotionally slightly crippled person. I mean, everyone was functioning, you know. You know, they were basically training people to be empire builders. And the empire was crumbling all around us. Every place my dad went, Cyprus, Bahraini and Uganda, we eventually got evacuated from because the empire was crumbling. So there was nowhere for these empire builders to go with their kind of stoicism and their...

Adrian Edmondson17:46

Stiff upper lips.

Presenter17:48

Were there any positives to the experience? You know, you that spark was still in you, you wanted to rebel. I wonder about, you know, the drama department or any teachers.

Adrian Edmondson17:55

Yeah, or anything like that.

Adrian Edmondson17:58

There was the school play and uh I was in every school play and there was the house arts festivals were were my thing. There are some embarrassing uh programmes. I've seen a couple of them where I just do everything, you know

Adrian Edmondson18:12

Apart from write the play, I'd direct it, produce it, star and it, paint the scenery, do the lights.

Presenter18:17

Still can't settle to one thing. Even then.

Adrian Edmondson18:18

Out to one thing. And then you'd there'd be the music side, and we'd I'd be in the band, I'd live and do this and that.

Adrian Edmondson18:25

So it didn't kill your creativity? No, if if anything, it probably fostered it, you know.

Presenter18:29

And sometimes the the impetus to break the rules and be creative came into conflict with each other,'cause I know that you got the part in Hamlet in Sixth Form, but rehearsals were interrupted because you ran away from school.

Adrian Edmondson18:42

Well

Adrian Edmondson18:43

I only ran away because I was going to be expelled. What were you going to be expelled for? The crime was throwing up in the prefect's waste paper bin.

Presenter18:51

Thereby hangs a tail.

Adrian Edmondson18:52

I wasn't a prefect. Oh, so it wasn't my bin. And the headmaster got me in. I was wearing two pairs of pants as usual for the usual flogging. But he he didn't want to flog me this time. He said he was going to suspend me and uh they were thinking of expelling me.

Adrian Edmondson19:06

So I did the only sensible thing and ran away.

Adrian Edmondson19:08

And I ran away to Hull. What was the plan? I was going to get on a boat and shimmy up the anchor chain.

Adrian Edmondson19:14

like tinting. Uh get on a cargo boat and reveal myself when we were halfway across the Atlantic and uh be recognized as a stalwart fellow and uh a new life as an adventurer would take take over and I would be the

Presenter19:26

Yeah

Adrian Edmondson19:28

The fixer in

Adrian Edmondson19:30

Sort of nineteen forties and fifties films.

Presenter19:32

And how did it actually work out?

Adrian Edmondson19:32

How did it actually be?

Adrian Edmondson19:34

Well, it was the middle of that sort of crisis in the early seventies, three day week and uh the electricity going off and everything and uh whole there was no ships.

Adrian Edmondson19:44

I remember shimming up the wall and looking over, and there wasn't a single ship.

Adrian Edmondson19:48

In Hull Docks.

Presenter19:49

What did you do?

Adrian Edmondson19:51

I hung out for a couple of days.

Adrian Edmondson19:54

And eventually I I ran out of money and um

Presenter19:56

Rana

Adrian Edmondson19:58

gave myself in and it was going to be

Adrian Edmondson20:01

expelled, but th that's when they realized that we were halfway through Hamlet.

Adrian Edmondson20:05

And I was Hamlet, and Hamlet was going to be difficult without Hamlet.

Adrian Edmondson20:10

So they let me back in on the promise that I joined the army.

Adrian Edmondson20:14

When when I left

Adrian Edmondson20:17

I didn't.

Adrian Edmondson20:19

I'm afraid that didn't happen.

Presenter20:21

And what on earth did your parents make of this behaviour? Were they back in the UK by that point?

Adrian Edmondson20:26

They'd got back they'd just got back.

Adrian Edmondson20:28

When I gave myself in, I rang Bradford and dad came and collected me.

Adrian Edmondson20:33

We got in the car.

Adrian Edmondson20:35

And we were driving back, so half an hour had passed, he hadn't said a single word.

Adrian Edmondson20:40

Eventually he said Adrian

Adrian Edmondson20:43

What you going to do with your life?

Adrian Edmondson20:46

I thought I was in so much trouble already that I might as well just

Adrian Edmondson20:50

Go whole hog and I said I want to be an actor.

Adrian Edmondson20:55

And uh

Adrian Edmondson20:56

He pulled over into a lay by and turned the engine off and put his head in his hands and

Adrian Edmondson21:02

rocked silently back and forth, and then he looked up at the roof and said, Adrian

Adrian Edmondson21:08

You'll never get a mortgage.

Adrian Edmondson21:12

And um

Adrian Edmondson21:14

He was wrong.

Adrian Edmondson21:17

Only about ten years later I had one for about a quarter of a million quid, I remember telling him quite proudly.

Presenter21:22

How did he take her?

Adrian Edmondson21:23

He didn't really respond in the way I wanted him to. I wanted some penitence.

Presenter21:28

You wanted that moment of him admitting that

Adrian Edmondson21:29

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson21:30

But he he wouldn't give it.

Presenter21:32

He'd been wrong.

Adrian Edmondson21:32

Yeah.

Presenter21:34

Time for some more music, I think, Adrian Edmondson. Disc number three. What are we going to hear, and why?

Adrian Edmondson21:39

School, as I said, was was quite restrictive. Everything was compulsory and uh every minute was taken care of and even our our minutes of sort of uh downtime, as it were, were full of clubs, Glee Club, model making club. And the only one I really liked was one we petitioned for, which was Disco Club.

Adrian Edmondson21:57

And Disco Club uh happens like this. You go into a classroom.

Adrian Edmondson22:01

You move the desk to the size of the room. You get the school record player out.

Adrian Edmondson22:06

point five of a watt

Adrian Edmondson22:08

And uh you put on sugar sugar by the arches.

Adrian Edmondson22:11

And dance

Adrian Edmondson22:13

I remember it being sugar-sugar is it

Adrian Edmondson22:16

A lot of people think it's a syrupy pop song. To me, it's The Serpent in the Garden of Eden.

Adrian Edmondson22:21

I was around twelve, thirteen and we'd only just found out well I'd only just found out what sex was. Someone had shown me the page in the book in the library. And we should dance one on one, boy on boy.

Adrian Edmondson22:32

And it's not about sexual orientation, it was about

Adrian Edmondson22:35

being aware that there was

Adrian Edmondson22:38

This thing could happen in the future, and that you might be doing this with a girl.

Adrian Edmondson22:43

this dancing thing, and it was very wild and very intense.

Adrian Edmondson22:48

And you would dance one odd one and you would choose a partner?

Presenter22:49

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson22:51

Me and Martin.

Adrian Edmondson22:52

We're doing sort of pants people dancing, but one on one.

Presenter22:55

Eye contact? Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson22:56

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson22:57

Thank you.

Presenter22:57

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson22:58

Yeah.

Presenter22:59

Do you know where he is now?

Adrian Edmondson22:59

No.

Adrian Edmondson23:01

He's a a captain of industry.

Adrian Edmondson23:05

I doubt he'd like to be mentioned, as I'll leave his surname out of it.

Presenter23:09

But this is for him.

Adrian Edmondson23:10

Yeah, this one's for you, Martin.

Presenter23:12

It's your guy

Presenter23:16

Honey, honey

Presenter23:19

Do all my can.

Speaker 223:21

Uh

Speaker 223:22

Yeah.

Presenter23:23

Yeah, got me.

Speaker 223:23

Uh

Presenter23:24

We want

Speaker 223:28

Uh

Presenter23:28

Honey

Presenter23:31

I show that sugar got a l

Speaker 223:35

You are my chance Uh Uh

Adrian Edmondson23:38

Uh

Adrian Edmondson23:38

And you got me wanting

Presenter23:42

SugarSugar by The Archies. So Adrian Edmondson, after A Levels, you went to Manchester University to study drama. You'd obviously had a torrid time at school. What were your first impressions of your new academic home?

Speaker 123:49

Uh

Adrian Edmondson23:49

He dumps it.

Adrian Edmondson23:56

Um first impression was that you could smoke.

Adrian Edmondson24:00

That's what I remember mostly. I remember going to the first lecture we ever went to.

Adrian Edmondson24:04

David Mayer was a lecturer at talking about Greek tragedy.

Adrian Edmondson24:09

We were all uh, you know, thir thirty kids in a eighteen year olds, nineteen year olds in a in a room. Everyone lit up and we were young and healthy and we could chain smoke, so we we were chain smoking about

Adrian Edmondson24:20

Twenty minutes in you couldn't see the bloke at the front. It was it was hilarious.

Presenter24:24

It sounds a world apart from the repressive boarding school atmosphere. Did you feel free?

Adrian Edmondson24:26

The repressed

Adrian Edmondson24:30

I did. I struggled to make friends again. Actually w once I teamed up with Rick, which was about the beginning of the second year, things started to change.

Presenter24:34

Mm.

Presenter24:40

So, how did that happen? He was one of your fellow students, he's on the same course as you.

Adrian Edmondson24:43

The same course as you? Yeah. There was only sort of 15 boys in each year. And.

Adrian Edmondson24:50

What I've got I won't call it talent what I've got is bravery.

Adrian Edmondson24:55

And I certainly had then. And I did a lot of acting in that first year. People would use me because I wasn't afraid. And I'd give them 200% and they could dial it down. A lot of people would only start around 35% and it's hard to get them up. The other thing that was happening is that we were terrified of not getting equity cards because it was a closed shop union.

Adrian Edmondson25:19

Very hard to get into be a professional actor without a without an equity card. And in the second year, Rick had a couple of old friends from his school turn up in the first year, and they'd hit on this wedding lunchtime theatre.

Adrian Edmondson25:31

At this pub the band on the wall, which is still going actually.

Adrian Edmondson25:34

They were worried about getting enough material together because they were going to improvise, so they asked me to join them'cause I'd done so many things in the first year. We became Twentieth Century Coyote, which is the name Rick and I sort of took on for the next several years.

Presenter25:48

So this was in year two. Had you been aware of him before that? Had you seen him around?

Adrian Edmondson25:50

How'd you be

Adrian Edmondson25:52

I'd just seen him around.

Presenter25:54

What did you make of him?

Adrian Edmondson25:55

On the very first day at uni I was on a bus.

Adrian Edmondson25:59

And um

Adrian Edmondson26:01

There was a guy in front of me with long greasy hair. He kept flicking it up like that, um like like he was the Fons but he

Adrian Edmondson26:08

It was lank, greasy hair. And then he had a packet of number six and he he tapped both ends on the packet and I thought, what a

Adrian Edmondson26:16

And then he started blowing smoke rings, and that annoyed me even more because I can't blow those. And we both thought Laurel and Hardio were the best.

Adrian Edmondson26:24

Of comedy, and the other thing we shared was our love of waiting for Godo.

Adrian Edmondson26:29

We were the only people.

Adrian Edmondson26:32

that thought it was a funny play.

Adrian Edmondson26:34

I I still think it's a very funny play.

Speaker 126:34

I think

Adrian Edmondson26:36

And what we had was this thing called the Steam Joseph Studio, a little German church, in the middle of the campus.

Adrian Edmondson26:41

And we're allowed to do whatever we liked in it, whenever we liked.

Adrian Edmondson26:45

Every Monday night was studio night, and the rest of the department would turn up.

Adrian Edmondson26:48

You know, the three years, about 100 people, you'd have a guaranteed hundred in the audience, do your stuff.

Presenter26:53

So what sort of performances were you putting on?

Adrian Edmondson26:56

Oh.

Presenter26:56

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson26:56

One I remember was that we bought a pair of pink duvet covers from Brentford and Islands.

Adrian Edmondson27:01

We were gonna

Adrian Edmondson27:02

string them up from the studio roof and pretend to be God's testicles and talk about the world. Very, very kind of way to forgotten it, really. You know, t talk about what was happening, you know, what what what our role in it was. But the

Speaker 127:15

Hmm.

Adrian Edmondson27:18

Brentford and Islands, you can say this now because I don't think it exists anymore. Very cheap, very rubbish. We fell in, you know, as we were doing the tech, we worked out they wouldn't hold the weight. So we changed it immediately into how to get a man out of a bag. That's a sort of.

Adrian Edmondson27:31

Quick we could be in those days.

Presenter27:32

Did you build up a following quite quickly?

Adrian Edmondson27:34

I think each year had their

Adrian Edmondson27:36

their little comic group and I think we were our years. I think we saw it all as wake up in the morning and see what was going to happen today. There was no plan.

Adrian Edmondson27:46

When we left uni.

Adrian Edmondson27:48

Uh Rick and I, we were waiting for

Adrian Edmondson27:49

Still worried about. I mean, no one knew who you couldn't get an agent in those days because if you didn't have an equity card, you couldn't get into any job without an equity card. So the only way was through variety contracts, which is why we started doing the Lunchtime Theatre, because they apparently gave them, but they never did. So we became comedians by accident, basically.

Presenter28:10

So the ambition for both of you is to become more active.

Adrian Edmondson28:12

But Rick wanted to be a sex god, but through acting.

Presenter28:16

Tech tita.

Adrian Edmondson28:17

Yeah.

Presenter28:19

I think we'd better have some more music. Disc number four. What are we going to hear next?

Adrian Edmondson28:23

This is uh On My Radio by The Selector, and this is really about the time straight after uni when we started to kind of make a name for ourselves in the comedy store club to begin with, and then the comic strip.

Adrian Edmondson28:37

Did we think we were the bees knees? We knew we were good. So I think you can say that without sounding too big-headed. We got a good reaction and we enjoyed it, and we

Adrian Edmondson28:47

We were with a group of friends and it all felt very dynamic. You know, Dawn and Jennifer came in, there was Pete and Nige, there was Alexi. It was a it was a big family unit. Everything was new'cause there were no venues to play, so we had to invent venues. So we invented the comic strip club and we just felt like we were

Adrian Edmondson29:05

In the middle of it, the selector and on my rate, all that sort of two-tone stuff was at the same time. And it's just, it really conveys the excitement of kind of walking down Walker's Court and going into the comic strip club. And the kind of we were, you know, up on our feet and we were going. It was a moment of, yeah, it was when it was happening.

Adrian Edmondson29:32

Alright I'm He said he loved me, but he had to go.

Speaker 129:39

Uh

Adrian Edmondson29:39

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson29:40

What should I do?

Speaker 129:42

He's just gonna see. Uh

Adrian Edmondson29:43

Uh

Speaker 129:43

Uh

Adrian Edmondson29:43

Shoot.

Speaker 129:43

Uh

Adrian Edmondson29:44

It's just a

Speaker 129:45

Uh

Speaker 129:48

Uh

Adrian Edmondson29:48

Uh

Speaker 129:48

Uh

Adrian Edmondson29:49

I'm a Regina, I'm a Reggie, I'm not ready.

Presenter29:57

The Selecta and On My Radio. So Adrian, by nineteen eighty you were a denizen of Soho with fellow alumni of what would become the Comic Strip Club. Now it was called that because you shared your venue with a strip club. We did. You were there at the vanguard of this nineteen eighties alternative comedy scene. Did you feel like you were part of a sea change?

Adrian Edmondson30:16

It did feel different. It felt very weird because Paul Raymond was in there most nights.

Presenter30:21

So he's the owner of the Raymond Review box.

Adrian Edmondson30:23

He's the end of the Rome Review Bar and our theatre was one of the theatres within the Rome Review Bar, the other was doing strip shows every two hours. And the the barmaids were topless.

Adrian Edmondson30:33

Which was kind of weird for alternative convenience, as we became known, having your cake and eating it, I think.

Adrian Edmondson30:39

There is a a strapline on the bottom of our poster.

Adrian Edmondson30:43

Taken from um

Adrian Edmondson30:45

Summer review

Adrian Edmondson30:46

They said we were gorillas of new wave humour.

Adrian Edmondson30:51

You know, a lot of magazines were were featuring us and we were we were thought of as groovy and and revolutionary.

Adrian Edmondson30:59

I would love to be groovy and revolutionary.

Adrian Edmondson31:03

But I don't know if we were.

Adrian Edmondson31:05

I mean we were definitely different to the comedians that was on tele sort of you know DJs and

Presenter31:08

Mm-hmm.

Adrian Edmondson31:11

The kind of jokes, you know, two mok blokes walk into a pub, that sort of thing.

Presenter31:15

Hmm.

Adrian Edmondson31:15

The jokes, anyone could tell the jokes.

Presenter31:17

That kind of old school light and entertainment. It was a big contrast to that.

Adrian Edmondson31:19

Entertainment.

Adrian Edmondson31:20

Yeah, there was no misogyny, there was no racism, you know, we we we had a kind of different political style, so I don't think the comedy was particularly political.

Presenter31:29

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson31:29

Except for Ben's sort of set really.

Presenter31:31

And out on the

Adrian Edmondson31:32

We were different. Although Rick and I always thought we saw ourselves in a line of double acts from Laurel and Hardy through Morecambe and Wise to us. You know, we that that's the kind of trajectory we we we thought we were

Presenter31:47

So you felt quite connected to this history that was had a long comic tradition, whereas actually people from the outside were seeing you as these en fant terrible coming in and t tearing everything up.

Adrian Edmondson31:50

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson31:51

Where is it?

Adrian Edmondson31:57

I've seen footage of what we did and it it does look very different. You know, there's a there's more energy in it than anything else. There's a lot of excitement, there's a lot of swearing, there's a lot of rudery.

Adrian Edmondson32:08

And there's very few actual jokes.

Adrian Edmondson32:12

It's about hysteria rather than comedy.

Presenter32:12

It's about his

Presenter32:14

So tell me about that, because it's it's really about especially in the live performances, which which would go on to be such a big part of what the two of you did together especially. It was mostly touring actually.

Adrian Edmondson32:18

Which

Adrian Edmondson32:25

Yeah.

Presenter32:25

And it is about creating an atmosphere that is electric, slapstick violent.

Adrian Edmondson32:30

Every time we created something, we didn't know whether we'd done it again or not.

Adrian Edmondson32:35

Especially with the live touring. It was always very worrying. We'd turn up every first night and think, is this the time when no one...

Adrian Edmondson32:43

Laughs, you know. So you must have pulled it. Is someone going to stand up with the back and shout?

Adrian Edmondson32:49

But

Adrian Edmondson32:51

They're not funny.

Adrian Edmondson32:53

So you aren't Uh

Presenter32:54

Every tone.

Adrian Edmondson32:54

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson32:55

From the very early days, from the comic strip club, we the Dangerous Brothers, which was our main act, was a pair of sort of psych

Adrian Edmondson33:03

Cottics who were trying to tell a cracker gag what's green and furry and goes up and down, gooseberry in the lift. That's the joke. But we'd extend it to 15 minutes and it'd be about being very angry about not understanding what it was and and how to tell it and fighting a lot of fighting, a lot of hitting. So we just use that as a seed to to be

Adrian Edmondson33:25

Hysterical.

Presenter33:27

Adrian, many listeners will have grown up watching you as the anarchic Vivian in the young ones, as I did.

Adrian Edmondson33:31

Society

Presenter33:32

Frayed denim, motorhead-type waistcoat, four metal studs on the back of the jacket and then across his forehead.

Adrian Edmondson33:38

Bruh.

Adrian Edmondson33:39

Well, Vivian was a kind of amalgam of Sir Adrian Dangerous from the Dangerous Brothers. And.

Adrian Edmondson33:45

What I'd been at university. So I I was the boy who'd driven his motorbike up the stairs of the cottage to impress the girls. Did it work? No. I mean, all that kind of attempt at kind of seduction that that's in the young ones is straight out of our playbook, you know, and what happened to us in real life.

Presenter34:04

Can I remember?

Adrian Edmondson34:06

We were very bad at

Adrian Edmondson34:09

Life.

Presenter34:10

Did the flat resemble your student digs at all? Rick was in Hall's, but you weren't.

Adrian Edmondson34:13

But you weren't. Well, by the second year, he was in this thing called the Cottage, which was basically what the young ones was focussed on.

Presenter34:19

Okay.

Adrian Edmondson34:20

Yeah.

Presenter34:20

I just rem I remember the scenes in the bathroom vividly as a little girl. They really made quite an impression.

Adrian Edmondson34:23

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson34:26

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson34:27

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson34:28

It wasn't that far away from from the reality, I don't think.

Adrian Edmondson34:32

Any of the young ones.

Presenter34:34

The young ones looking back on it, it's interesting because I think that was a 14-week job for you.

Adrian Edmondson34:38

He was.

Presenter34:39

But it's had such a huge impact on your life and made a lasting impression on other people.

Adrian Edmondson34:44

I think I've talked about the young ones for longer than I've I made it, you know.

Adrian Edmondson34:49

This seems rather odd.

Adrian Edmondson34:52

I don't watch it.

Adrian Edmondson34:54

So I'm not in the Kfang Club.

Adrian Edmondson34:56

as it were. And I think I annoy a lot of people on the street when they they give me a line and there's obviously a punch line that I did once and I don't have it.

Adrian Edmondson35:07

And I know what they mean'cause I'm I'm the same with the Bonzo Dog Doodle band. I I know every single part of the Bonzo Dog Euro and I can repeat anything at any time.

Presenter35:14

Then I

Speaker 135:14

Uh

Adrian Edmondson35:17

So I know what they're after.

Adrian Edmondson35:20

And I don't know why I don't want to give it to them. That is interesting, isn't it?

Adrian Edmondson35:26

I should try and be kinder about it, really.

Presenter35:28

Adrian, the next big T V success of your career was being part of the comic strip Presents. That ran for many years.

Adrian Edmondson35:32

Yeah.

Presenter35:36

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson35:36

They kind of ran alongside each other.

Presenter35:37

Yes, on different channels. There are BBC and channels

Adrian Edmondson35:39

The first episodes went out within a week of each other.

Presenter35:42

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson35:43

So we were in competition with ourselves.

Presenter35:45

And the comic strip, you know, that that all went on for a very long time. And you married your fellow actor, comedian and writer, Jennifer Saunders. Was it love at first sight for the pair of you?

Adrian Edmondson35:50

Can we do it in my

Adrian Edmondson35:52

Was it

Adrian Edmondson35:56

It took us four years to get together.

Adrian Edmondson35:59

Are there a

Adrian Edmondson36:00

I think it was love at first sight, and we were both in other relationships.

Adrian Edmondson36:05

Which failed at different times. So there was a kind of

Adrian Edmondson36:09

overlapping of kind of relationships.

Adrian Edmondson36:12

Until we are finally

Adrian Edmondson36:14

Separate people at the same time.

Presenter36:16

Do you remember the moment when

Adrian Edmondson36:18

Yep.

Presenter36:18

Both references.

Adrian Edmondson36:18

Uh

Presenter36:18

Uh

Adrian Edmondson36:18

I was in love with her from the time I saw her.

Adrian Edmondson36:22

I think it took her a little longer, but because I'm damaged. But, you know, she got over that. And.

Adrian Edmondson36:30

I would always sit as close as I could to it.

Adrian Edmondson36:36

Classic school public schoolboy seduction routine. I know, if I just sit close to her, maybe she'll like me.

Adrian Edmondson36:44

Um

Presenter36:44

So there are photos of you kind of gazing adoringly at her on on set.

Adrian Edmondson36:48

There are strange photos of us of when we toured Australia with the comic strip in the early eighties, back to back.

Adrian Edmondson36:55

Sort of nestled into each other like that. And we weren't a couple at the time, you know.

Adrian Edmondson37:00

So it's weird to think of.

Adrian Edmondson37:02

And eventually I remember going out to my car.

Adrian Edmondson37:06

And um

Adrian Edmondson37:07

There was a cigarette

Adrian Edmondson37:09

Carlton under the windscreen wiper of the cart and uh on it it said

Adrian Edmondson37:15

I love you.

Adrian Edmondson37:17

Love Jennifer.

Adrian Edmondson37:20

And that was the first time I knew. And

Adrian Edmondson37:23

Yeah, we got we got it on.

Adrian Edmondson37:26

I think we'd better have some more music, Adrian.

Adrian Edmondson37:29

This one's about Jennifer, really. She introduced me to country music. I've been a kind of.

Adrian Edmondson37:34

Rock and then punk and two-tone sort of person that hadn't really.

Adrian Edmondson37:39

discovered country music and then together we discovered Cajun music.

Adrian Edmondson37:44

and we had an album called Another Saturday Night.

Adrian Edmondson37:47

On it is a track called Jolie Blonde by Van Bruce. And Jolie Blonde is a kind of Cajun for Pretty Blonde.

Adrian Edmondson37:56

It took me uh a while to discover that she wasn't a natural blonde, but she was very pretty and this song has always been my song about her.

Presenter38:16

Don't leave.

Speaker 238:18

Totally faith.

Speaker 238:21

Chappie T.

Speaker 238:24

Jolly car

Speaker 238:26

Bhatite buttonale la veca

Presenter38:38

Jolie Blanc by Van Bruce. So in the nineties, Adrian, you and uh Rick Mill created Bottom. It ran, so to speak, for three T V series. You also toured it extensively. Now for anyone who hasn't seen it, how would you describe the setup?

Adrian Edmondson38:52

It's uh

Adrian Edmondson38:54

Two losers.

Adrian Edmondson38:55

One aspirational, one bluntly philosophical and violent, and uh they have no one but each other.

Adrian Edmondson39:04

and they live in a squalid flat,

Adrian Edmondson39:06

And

Adrian Edmondson39:08

Never meet women.

Presenter39:12

That about sums it up.

Adrian Edmondson39:12

That sums it up.

Presenter39:14

It had that very bleak, Beckett-like feel, which took the two of you back to, you know, what you bonded over first at Manchester University.

Presenter39:23

And then in 1991 you both performed Waiting for Godot in London's West End. That must have been a real full circle moment for you both.

Adrian Edmondson39:27

That must have been

Adrian Edmondson39:30

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson39:31

We'd both done it at school.

Adrian Edmondson39:33

And, you know, it had brought us together.

Adrian Edmondson39:35

And

Adrian Edmondson39:37

We just had the opportunity and I think he was a funny bloke, Samuel Beckett. If you ever read anything about him, everyone talks of him being a very humor. He always got a lot of laughs. There's a famous sort of craggy picture of him. I think people think he was a serious, kind of somber man from literature, you know. But I think he was a he he wanted people to laugh. That's what I think. I mean, we didn't alter it, you know, we d we just did it. They're very bleak but very funny jokes.

Presenter40:07

You and Rick did your final live tour together in two thousand three. What made you decide to call it a day?

Adrian Edmondson40:14

Oh, it was a very a long list of

Adrian Edmondson40:18

Reasons

Adrian Edmondson40:20

I think my main reason was I wanted to do other things.

Adrian Edmondson40:24

Rick never quite understood the decision.

Adrian Edmondson40:27

Uh which has always been a

Adrian Edmondson40:29

That's kind of source of

Adrian Edmondson40:31

Sadness really.

Adrian Edmondson40:32

I'd had enough, and I thought we'd gone over the top of the mountain.

Adrian Edmondson40:36

And I said I thought we were looking down.

Adrian Edmondson40:39

It would become increasingly sadder, and not in a funny way.

Adrian Edmondson40:44

You know, I I think it would have looked more and more desperate. I thought the 2003 tour looked a bit desperate.

Presenter40:51

So you were unhappy, but but he wanted to keep going.

Adrian Edmondson40:55

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson40:56

He did.

Adrian Edmondson40:59

And

Adrian Edmondson41:00

He'd hit his head.

Adrian Edmondson41:02

Get his head in.

Adrian Edmondson41:04

ninety eight.

Presenter41:05

They had an accident on a quad bike.

Adrian Edmondson41:06

I had an accidentary squad bite, so you know. And uh we did uh a feature film and two tours after that, so you know.

Adrian Edmondson41:13

It didn't completely stop him or anything, any

Adrian Edmondson41:15

But it his head was becoming more of a problem.

Adrian Edmondson41:20

Hitting his head just made it made it harder for him to understand.

Adrian Edmondson41:24

That, um

Adrian Edmondson41:25

what what I was trying to get at.

Adrian Edmondson41:29

I don't know if I can even explain what I was trying to get at.

Adrian Edmondson41:32

Why would you get bored of a successful thing?

Adrian Edmondson41:34

Sort of refers to what I said near the beginning, where you know, I still think the best is to come, and I didn't think I was going to get.

Adrian Edmondson41:42

any better just doing that?

Adrian Edmondson41:45

It wasn't exciting me. Doesn't mean I'm not incredibly proud of it. I love everything we made.

Adrian Edmondson41:51

But I just

Adrian Edmondson41:53

Didn't want to do any more.

Adrian Edmondson41:55

And then we

Adrian Edmondson41:57

An awful thing, can I hand.

Adrian Edmondson42:01

What?

Adrian Edmondson42:02

I'd ring him together for lunch.

Adrian Edmondson42:05

And every time I rang him and get to lunch, he'd he'd think that I was

Adrian Edmondson42:10

Coming to say let's start again.

Adrian Edmondson42:13

And um

Adrian Edmondson42:15

It was very difficult.

Adrian Edmondson42:17

In those later years.

Adrian Edmondson42:20

And eventually he

Adrian Edmondson42:22

He kept on asking us so much, and I said, We couldn't even get a commission these days. They never asked for a fourth series of bottom on the telly. So.

Adrian Edmondson42:32

I hit upon the idea of

Adrian Edmondson42:34

Alright, let's write.

Adrian Edmondson42:36

A couple of episodes of a new series, Handed In

Adrian Edmondson42:40

They'll say no, and then it's not my fault anymore. So he dashed off a couple of.

Adrian Edmondson42:45

Of episodes.

Adrian Edmondson42:47

of a thing called Hooligan's Island, which is a kind of

Adrian Edmondson42:50

Richie and Eddie on a desert island. We'd done it in one of the live shows. And uh

Adrian Edmondson42:54

Thank you.

Adrian Edmondson42:55

Platty well bought it.

Adrian Edmondson42:57

I wanted to make it.

Adrian Edmondson42:59

Then we started trying to write it.

Adrian Edmondson43:01

Properly.

Adrian Edmondson43:03

And

Adrian Edmondson43:07

He wasn't there.

Adrian Edmondson43:09

Anymore.

Presenter43:10

He hadn't made a full recovery.

Adrian Edmondson43:12

Yeah.

Presenter43:14

Rick obviously died way before his time, he was just fifty six in twenty fourteen and you were a Pallbearer at his funeral almost ten years ago now.

Adrian Edmondson43:16

Just

Presenter43:23

I wonder when you think back, are you able to

Presenter43:26

Think about the good times that you had together more. What are your memories of him?

Adrian Edmondson43:29

I think of the writing room.

Adrian Edmondson43:32

All the time. We spent more time in the writing room than anywhere else.

Adrian Edmondson43:36

And I remember just laughing like drones.

Adrian Edmondson43:48

His bum.

Adrian Edmondson43:54

His mum wrote me um

Adrian Edmondson43:57

Lovely letter.

Adrian Edmondson44:01

I wrote to her after he died.

Adrian Edmondson44:03

And uh she wrote back.

Adrian Edmondson44:06

saying all she could remember.

Adrian Edmondson44:09

was us just la You could see us out in the garden in a couple of deck chairs, just laughing and laughing and laughing. You could never tell what was quite so funny.

Adrian Edmondson44:18

Well

Adrian Edmondson44:22

It was funny. It was good fun.

Presenter44:24

Mm-hmm.

Presenter44:27

And you gave that to so many people too.

Presenter44:30

Do we have some more music?

Adrian Edmondson44:32

Well this song is really

Adrian Edmondson44:35

About the fear we had.

Adrian Edmondson44:37

Uh before every tour.

Adrian Edmondson44:39

That that we no longer had the magic. And it's um

Adrian Edmondson44:44

Saturday Gigs by Mot the Hoopel. And Mot the Hoopel were about ten years before us, but the song sort of speaks of that

Adrian Edmondson44:51

Never quite knowing where the success has come from. You know, they it goes through the list of their dates and how they were they got popular and then they weren't popular and we we didn't really

Adrian Edmondson45:00

I have a great playlist in the van because Rick didn't really like much music. He didn't really like Doctor Feelgood, Mott the Hoopal and Little Richard. But Saturday Gigs was was our song. Would bring a small tear to our eye.

Speaker 145:20

Member the Saudi Gates, we know

Speaker 145:24

Way down to your mouth by the side of the gates.

Speaker 145:30

Uh

Adrian Edmondson45:30

Wait up.

Adrian Edmondson45:32

We do have the tickets for the fantasy. We're twelve and six at the time, a fairy tale.

Adrian Edmondson45:44

On site

Presenter45:47

Mot the Hoople and Saturday gigs. Adrian Edmondson, I quoted you at the beginning of the programme saying it's an enormous pressure being funny. There are rewards. Getting laughs is very nice, but there is a price you pay. What's the cost been for you?

Adrian Edmondson46:02

It's

Adrian Edmondson46:03

Put a kite

Adrian Edmondson46:04

constriction on expressing myself in other ways.

Adrian Edmondson46:08

So

Adrian Edmondson46:10

I always have to

Adrian Edmondson46:12

fight the baggage of being a comedian and all the other things I do.

Adrian Edmondson46:18

You know, I've I've loved being a comedian. I've never thought of myself as a comedian.

Adrian Edmondson46:23

And I've always thought of myself as a writer and an actor.

Adrian Edmondson46:26

I think Eddie and Vivian are.

Adrian Edmondson46:29

They're just parts I played.

Adrian Edmondson46:30

Is Arthur Lowe a comedian?

Adrian Edmondson46:33

Money is

Adrian Edmondson46:34

doing Dad's Army but then sort of in Peter Barnes's plays, you know, you think comic effect is doesn't mean you're being a comic.

Presenter46:43

It's not stand-up.

Adrian Edmondson46:44

Never

Adrian Edmondson46:45

I've got nothing to feel

Adrian Edmondson46:47

annoyed about.

Presenter46:48

Well then you've got

Presenter46:50

So much professional success. I wonder what your parents made of that. I know your your dad died many years ago, but y your mother's still around. I mean, I'm particularly interested in your dad's reaction, considering he

Adrian Edmondson46:55

You die

Presenter47:03

was hanging his head at at the thought of you becoming an actor.

Adrian Edmondson47:06

Well, I I don't think anything I'd created was up his street. Sometimes he'd say, What are you going to do next? and uh you'd tell him he'd say, Hm, will there be bad language in it?

Adrian Edmondson47:19

Yes. Well, yes, that's what I do.

Presenter47:20

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson47:23

They loved it when I did the Dales.

Presenter47:25

So that was a

Adrian Edmondson47:25

Well there was a travelogue on the Dales, they ran.

Presenter47:28

Travel or walking show exploring the

Adrian Edmondson47:29

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson47:31

Exploring the when I finished um

Adrian Edmondson47:34

doing comedy, as it were. It was very hard to find what I was. I didn't know I didn't have a plan instead of doing that. So I just sort of threw myself at everything.

Presenter47:44

Mm-hmm.

Adrian Edmondson47:45

Trying to be someone else.

Adrian Edmondson47:47

Finding someone else to be.

Presenter47:49

In recent years you've played many more straight roles on T V and in the theatre.

Presenter47:53

Is that a path that you're happy to continue to tread for now?

Adrian Edmondson47:56

Absolutely adore it.

Adrian Edmondson47:58

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson47:59

There's a you know, it's catharsis. It's like blues music. Blues music isn't miserable. You you sing blues music to get rid of the blues.

Adrian Edmondson48:08

And uh that's sort of what

Adrian Edmondson48:10

Acting is a bit really.

Presenter48:11

Acting does that for the

Adrian Edmondson48:12

Pretend it would be someone else.

Adrian Edmondson48:15

I went for therapy eventually and um

Adrian Edmondson48:18

That didn't really work out.

Presenter48:20

Why not?

Adrian Edmondson48:21

I don't know. Black didn't say anything either.

Presenter48:22

He didn't say anything.

Adrian Edmondson48:24

No, I

Adrian Edmondson48:25

It was an extraordinary amount of money. I think it was about 10 quid a word. You know, and none of them were answers.

Presenter48:29

Yeah

Adrian Edmondson48:32

You know, and he put me on the happy pills and I I was terrified that it wouldn't be me.

Adrian Edmondson48:36

So I stopped taking those and I found a different way out. I found um a book

Adrian Edmondson48:41

by a guy called Jules Evans called uh Philosophy for Life and Other Dangerous Situations, which is about Stoicism as a philosophy, not st not stiff upper lip Stoicism. It's sort of modern day CBT.

Adrian Edmondson48:55

We're not upset by things that happen. We're upset by what we think about things that happen, and we can change what we think. We can't change the things, we can change what we think.

Adrian Edmondson49:06

I've changed m what I think about.

Adrian Edmondson49:09

my past and my dad and I've I've I've come to terms with all that.

Presenter49:14

And what about that that melancholy? Is that still a part of you for you you know, you described acting as catharsis. Is that connected to your creativity, do you think?

Adrian Edmondson49:21

Is that connected?

Adrian Edmondson49:24

I think it is. And uh you want to keep some link with it, don't you? But I'm I'm not the uh

Adrian Edmondson49:30

Glass half empty Guy was.

Adrian Edmondson49:33

Think I'd become glass half full.

Presenter49:36

We'll drink to that.

Adrian Edmondson49:37

Yeah.

Presenter49:37

Cheers.

Adrian Edmondson49:38

I'll drink the full glass.

Presenter49:42

Time for your penultimate disc, Adrian Edmondson. What's it gonna be?

Adrian Edmondson49:45

Well part of the kind of struggling to find another identity had a lucky kind of accident in it, the Bonzo Dog Dudar Band, Neil Innes in particular.

Adrian Edmondson49:54

who, you know, has always been my absolute hero, invited me to join

Adrian Edmondson49:58

with several other

Adrian Edmondson50:00

Comics

Adrian Edmondson50:02

And fill in for Viv Stanchell at a kind of reunion gig.

Adrian Edmondson50:06

And we did that and then uh they went on tour and

Adrian Edmondson50:10

Most of the comics fell out, and just me and Phil Jupiters basically joined the Bonzo Dog Doodar band. Can you imagine joining the band that was your favourite thing as a teenager? I mean, it blew our minds. We were at a dinner with the rest of them, you know, around the table, and Neil said, and now that we have two new Bonzos, we just couldn't believe it that it was us. We were in the band. We made a new album and everything. But the Bonzos have been a constant in my life. One of the things that brought me and Rick together as well. And I'm bored by the Bonzo Dog Doodle Band number. I used to sing latterly with them on the stage, and it's.

Adrian Edmondson50:52

It's one of the funniest pieces of music there is.

Speaker 150:54

At the local dance whilst posing by the door

Speaker 150:58

A large effect would I come on the floor?

Speaker 151:02

About the band my voice was heard, quite suddenly it had occurred to me I'm

Adrian Edmondson51:07

I'm bored, I'm bored With everything I touch and see, I'm bored With exposés of L S D I'm bored With France and Arch with new L P and so I roll I'm bored

Presenter51:26

I'm bored. The Bonzo Dog Doodar Band. You've recently been combing through your life, Adrian Edmonton, writing your autobiography. How has it felt for you spending time looking back? Is there any advice you were itching to give your younger self?

Adrian Edmondson51:39

It's helped me kind of um be better, I think.

Adrian Edmondson51:43

It is catharsis.

Adrian Edmondson51:45

kind of settling some things.

Adrian Edmondson51:47

I think I've probably been harsh to my dad in this programme.

Adrian Edmondson51:51

And uh he wasn't a bad person. He was just from a different era, you know. He he was ten when the war started.

Adrian Edmondson51:58

I had sort of fifteen years of rationing.

Adrian Edmondson52:01

They never there was never any money about, you know, he

Adrian Edmondson52:04

Of course he was worried about mortgages. You know.

Presenter52:07

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson52:07

Uh

Presenter52:07

Uh

Adrian Edmondson52:07

Um but on the other hand it's a shame you didn't ever kind of

Adrian Edmondson52:11

a larger appreciation of life, you know.

Presenter52:13

Yeah. He wanted a different life for you than than the one that he

Adrian Edmondson52:15

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson52:16

I think he wanted he wanted me to have the life he didn't have.

Presenter52:17

Yeah, you wanna go?

Presenter52:19

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson52:20

And um

Presenter52:21

It's easy to be sympathetic to that when you're older yourself, I think.

Adrian Edmondson52:26

Gave up.

Adrian Edmondson52:27

So I'm yeah, I'm sympathetic to that now.

Presenter52:29

Do you have fewer regrets than you did having looked back in that way?

Adrian Edmondson52:33

The Stoicism helps a lot.

Adrian Edmondson52:36

That regret is is a pointless emotion. You can't help feeling regret, but you should work out that you can't change it. So you should learn how to deal with it going forward. Always go forwards. Speaking of which, it's almost

Presenter52:50

On your next adventure, you'll soon be sent to your desert island.

Adrian Edmondson52:53

Dmme.

Presenter52:54

I wonder about the practicalities. Will you be able to fend for yourself?

Adrian Edmondson52:57

I'm really good at carpentry and all that sort of stuff. I I shall build a house very quickly and

Adrian Edmondson53:03

I'm a brewer, I'm a cook.

Presenter53:05

Well, I know that you've grown up.

Adrian Edmondson53:06

I'm a gardener.

Presenter53:06

Prize-winning vegetables. No, in your local

Adrian Edmondson53:07

Now when you

Adrian Edmondson53:10

Country show? I have. I've won I've won second prize for my cucumbers.

Presenter53:10

Country show?

Adrian Edmondson53:15

Exhibitions! I should have put that in the intro. But I shall die of loneliness. In you know in the space of two weeks. So all that

Presenter53:19

And

Adrian Edmondson53:22

Scale is pointless.

Presenter53:23

He'll wither away in lonely splendour.

Adrian Edmondson53:25

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson53:26

I'm quite um

Adrian Edmondson53:29

I'm quite needy.

Presenter53:31

Well, one more track before we send you there. Your final choice today. What are we going to hear?

Adrian Edmondson53:34

What are we gonna

Adrian Edmondson53:35

Well, we spent a lot of our life down in Devon, which is where we call home. And we've spent a lot of our lives,'cause a lot of work is also in London, going up and down the A three O three with three kids in the back seat.

Adrian Edmondson53:47

my lovely daughters and uh

Adrian Edmondson53:49

They've been very long suffering with us, really.

Adrian Edmondson53:53

A lot of the early nineties were taken up with kind of listening to Disney and

Adrian Edmondson53:58

I can do the whole of the Little Mermaid soundtrack for you if you like. But the album that eventually we all settled on that we all liked and we all played over and over again, they were called the Dixie Chicks at the time. Wide Open Spaces, they're now just called The Chicks. And Wide Open Spaces is a fantastic song.

Adrian Edmondson54:16

It's about kids leaving home.

Adrian Edmondson54:19

They're all good singers, Beatty thinks she isn't, but

Adrian Edmondson54:22

I bet she is, and the three of them would be doing three-part harmonies, belting it out, driving down the A303.

Adrian Edmondson54:29

It's one of the wonders.

Adrian Edmondson54:32

of my life.

Presenter54:33

Place our win.

Presenter54:36

But what it holds for her she hasn't yet guessed she needs

Presenter54:43

Wide open spaces. Uh

Presenter54:49

Room to make a big must day

Adrian Edmondson54:52

Uh

Adrian Edmondson54:52

She

Speaker 154:54

Uh

Adrian Edmondson54:54

New faces, she knows the highest day.

Presenter55:05

Wide Open Spaces by The Chicks. So Adrian Edmondson, it's time. I'm going to send you away to the island. I'm giving you the Bible, the complete works of Shakespeare.

Adrian Edmondson55:13

Abby.

Presenter55:14

And you can take one other book. What would you like?

Adrian Edmondson55:17

Well, I'm going to take

Adrian Edmondson55:20

play text of Waiting for Godo. I was looking at it

Adrian Edmondson55:24

A couple of nights ago.

Adrian Edmondson55:26

trying to choose. And uh I worked out that

Adrian Edmondson55:30

There's a lot I don't understand about it.

Adrian Edmondson55:32

If I play Vladimir.

Adrian Edmondson55:34

So I'm I'm going to work on being Vladimir. I'll do all the parts, obviously, just like I did

Adrian Edmondson55:40

But the goons.

Adrian Edmondson55:43

And I'd be excellent at all of them.

Presenter55:45

It's the perfect play for the island, really.

Adrian Edmondson55:46

It is really, yeah.

Presenter55:48

Yeah.

Adrian Edmondson55:48

Try and drum up an audience among the monkeys.

Adrian Edmondson55:52

There will be monkeys.

Presenter55:53

I assume so.

Adrian Edmondson55:54

So

Presenter55:54

You can also have a luxury item, what will that be?

Adrian Edmondson55:57

I know it's illegal, and I'd like it to be properly medically made, not made in some

Adrian Edmondson56:02

Bozo's shed in the back garden. I'd like to take a tab of acid.

Adrian Edmondson56:07

I've never taken any hallucinogen.

Adrian Edmondson56:10

I've drunk an awful lot of things.

Adrian Edmondson56:12

A friend of mine uh talks about acid.

Adrian Edmondson56:15

And says it

Adrian Edmondson56:18

It changed him beneficially and um

Adrian Edmondson56:23

Opened

Adrian Edmondson56:25

The dorsed perception.

Adrian Edmondson56:30

And I

Adrian Edmondson56:32

Having just written my autobiography.

Adrian Edmondson56:35

Having tried to.

Adrian Edmondson56:38

Work out who I am, I realize I'm still incredibly confused.

Adrian Edmondson56:43

I'm still floundering around.

Adrian Edmondson56:47

And I'd love to understand.

Adrian Edmondson56:50

Who I am.

Adrian Edmondson56:53

To be honest, I'm not afraid of the

Adrian Edmondson56:56

Downside, because I'm going to be dead anyway.

Adrian Edmondson56:59

So the island is the place to do it because as I've said I'm not going to last so I'll do it.

Adrian Edmondson57:05

See if I'm there.

Adrian Edmondson57:07

and then expire.

Presenter57:09

Well, Adrian, I'm not sure that it's necessarily legal or advisable, but there are precedents in our long history on this program, and it's your island.

Presenter57:18

So you may have your luxury item.

Presenter57:21

And finally, which one track of the eight that you've shared with us today would you rush to save?

Adrian Edmondson57:25

Would you rush to save?

Adrian Edmondson57:29

Family is everything.

Presenter57:31

Adrian Edmondson, thank you very much for letting us hear your desert islandists.

Adrian Edmondson57:35

It's been an absolute honour.

Presenter57:51

Hello, it was lovely to chat to Adrian, and I hope he's very happy on his island. There are more than 2,000 programmes in our archive which you can listen to. They include Adrian's wife, the comedian and writer Jennifer Saunders, and other members of the comic strip, Dawn French, Ben Elton, and Alexi Sale. You can find all of those programmes if you search through BBC Sounds or on our own Desert Island Disc's website. The studio manager for today's programme was Steve Greenwood, and the producer was Sarah Taylor. Join me next time when my castaway is the racehorse trainer, Lucinda Russell.

Speaker 158:53

Hear brand new satire on the Friday night

Presenter58:55

A comedy podcast from BBC Radio 4 with six summer specials.

Speaker 259:00

Hello, I'm Dom Jolly and I'm going to be bringing you a mashup of interviews, features, prank calls in Dom Jolly Breaks the News. Oh, sorry, was that my fault?

Presenter59:11

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Speaker 159:13

I'm Catherine Beauhart, and in TLDR, I'll be digging deep into one of the week's big stories.

Presenter59:19

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Speaker 159:39

or anywhere else.