Sara Pascoe

Presenter0:00

Hello, I'm Lauren Laverne and this is the Desert Island Discs podcast from BBC Radio 4. Every week I ask my guests to choose the eight tracks, book and luxury, that they'd want to take with them if they were cast away to a desert island. For rights reasons, the music's shorter than on the original broadcast, but you can find a version with longer music tracks on BBC Sounds. Listeners will also get access to episodes 28 days earlier than everyone else. I hope you enjoy listening.

Presenter0:46

My castaway this week is the comedian and writer Sarah Pascoe. Her comedy is omnivorous, taking her from stints on crowd-pleasing shows like QI, Taskmaster and the Great British Sewing Bee to critically acclaimed stand-up, which often blends the intellectual with the observational. One successful Edinburgh run riffed on Nietzsche and the possibility of her boyfriend cheating on her with her doppelganger. She's also a screenwriter and the author of three books, including her debut novel Weirdo, which last year won the inaugural Gilly Cooper Prize for Fiction. She was born in Dagenham and raised by a single mother, who, she says, delights in telling everyone how unfunny she was as a child. In fact, she chanced upon Stand Up after seeing her then-boyfriend's turn at an open mic night. Of performing, she says, The last thing that goes through my head beforehand is always, why do I do this? This is such a stupid job. Then while I'm doing it, I'm not thinking of anything except the next line and manipulating the room. It's like playing an instrument. Sarah Pascoe, welcome to Desert Island Discs. Thank you for having me. So let's start on stage with stand-up then, Sarah. That's a bit of a compulsion for you, I think. Why are you addicted to it?

Sara Pascoe1:55

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe1:58

I think because it's something that I will never be good enough at.

Sara Pascoe2:03

Which is not me admitting I'm very bad at it. But there is something that's what's that's how the compulsion fits in. And actually, that's where I don't remember saying that thing about it being like playing an instrument, but I think it is a version of an instrument, but you're playing yourself. I don't mean that in a pretentious way. You're plumbing your own experiences and ideas and thoughts and trying to communicate them as well as possible. But in this framework of hopefully, people will laugh at certain points of this, and it never feels like it's done.

Presenter2:31

Yeah.

Presenter2:33

You're always trying to get better. You're always trying to improve. But I am interested in that idea of the audience and their part in all of that as well. That idea of kind of manipulating the room, you know, playing the room, feeling that energy. Tell me about that.

Sara Pascoe2:40

That is well uh

Sara Pascoe2:43

You are

Sara Pascoe2:45

Well the word manipulation I don't think I would use now. I mean not I I obviously meant it in a context then, but actually I do think it's about communication. The audience make at least fifty percent of the show. I d play Dublin last weekend and everyone loves going to Dublin. Obviously Irish audiences are incredible and electric in their own

Sara Pascoe3:03

Unpredictability.

Sara Pascoe3:04

And um there was a point where a man went to the bathroom and then we all did a prank on him.

Sara Pascoe3:10

Where I pretended that I'd suddenly gone into something very gratuitous, and I was sort of miming, making love with the mic stand, and the audience were just shouting at me, boo, get off, I want my money back. And every single one of them did it, which wouldn't happen in Basingstoke. Right. And yeah, so you come out as a comic, and I guess you make some offers, like this, this, this, and you sort of suggest a tone, and the audience meet you, or they add, or they go, no, no, no, we're too polite for that. We want it to be like a play, don't involve us. And then together you make something, and that's how it feels. Like, even if you have a very tightly scripted set, it feels like the audience, it's only that version that they see and that you experience all together in that room.

Speaker 23:19

I

Speaker 23:38

We want

Presenter3:53

Yeah. And what's it like for you writing to silence as a being in a room on your own without that feedback from the audience?

Sara Pascoe4:01

With stand-up, people who don't haven't done it always think the worst thing must be a heckle, and they always think that that would be the nightmare and you'd burst into tears and go home and be so sad. The way you heckle yourself in your own brain when you are trying to write something is so much worse. And it's so loud when there's, as you say, in the silence, because every single sentence there is a critic in your brain going, who cares? And this is so bad. And you have to go, yes, but I'm still going to finish it and I'm going to make write a bit more and then I'm going to edit it and make it better.

Presenter4:33

Yeah. Sarah, I think we better get to the music. Yeah. Quick, smart. Your first day.

Sara Pascoe4:36

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe4:37

Tell us about it. So I've really overthought this whole I'm on a desert island thing and I've tried to create a spectrum for every mood for myself and there will be songs that I just think and this is one that will just pierce through whatever mood you are in and make you feel connected to life again. This song if it was on an advert would make me buy anything. I love the story in the song, the whole idea of this sort of this preacher and the converts and it feels to me really bass sexy, if that makes sense as well. I think Sammy Davis Jr. has such an incredible

Speaker 24:46

Okay.

Sara Pascoe5:12

Sexy voice. Even if I'm really sad on the island and I haven't seen a dolphin today, I would put this on, and then suddenly I'm on my feet, and everything's going to be okay.

Presenter5:21

It's going to be okay. I feel like dolphins would come out of the sea and possibly. Of course, they would. And then I'd go.

Sara Pascoe5:24

Of course they were. And then I'd go, right, I just put this song on again. That's what the dolphins want.

Presenter5:28

They would be.

Sara Pascoe5:29

They would love it. So, this is The Rhythm of Life by Sammy Davis Jr. Or not by him, but performed by Sammy Davis Jr.

Presenter5:29

Yeah.

Speaker 45:36

Daddy started out in San Francisco, tooting on his trumpet loud and mean. Suddenly, a voice said, Go forth, Daddy. Spread a picture on a wider screen. And the voice said, Daddy, there's a million pigeons. Waiting to be hooked on new religions. Hit the road, Daddy, leave your common law wife. Spread the religion of the rhythm of life. And the rhythm of life is a powerful beat. Puts a tingle in your fingers and a tingle in your feet. Rhythm in your bedroom, rhythm in the street.

Presenter6:06

Rhythm of Life, from the soundtrack to Sweet Charity performed by Sammy Davis Junior with Films Ensemble. So Sarah Pascoe, you were born in London in 1981, grew up in Romford, the eldest of three daughters. Tell me about your mum and dad, Gail and Derek. How did they meet?

Sara Pascoe6:21

Well they met in a way that we didn't know was unusual at the time. But my mum had all these scrapbooks in the house with pictures of her sitting outside my dad's house, these Polaroids of her and other girls. So she'd seen my dad on television and I think it was Top of the Pops. His band was on Top of the Pops once. He was in a band in the 70s. They genuinely were at school together and one of their dads became their manager and they released a couple of songs. My mum saw him on TV and said she absolutely knew in that moment she was going to marry him and have his children. But what is so incredible about my mother is that it didn't then like weirdly happen fate. She made it happen. She found it where he lived. This is very practical manifesting. Yeah. Yeah. Practical. Yeah. Before manifesting was invented you had to get on a bus to dagger. She's on his lawn. Yeah, on his lawn. And she sat out there and so she knew him to say hello to and the other people in the band and

Presenter6:57

Practical

Speaker 26:57

Yeah.

Presenter7:00

Does that do it?

Sara Pascoe7:09

And what what was this band called? Flintlock. Flintlock, okay. That's the name of a gun.

Presenter7:11

Okay.

Sara Pascoe7:13

And at some point, after my dad wasn't in the band anymore, because it wasn't a sort of a long career, my dad didn't want to be famous.

Presenter7:20

So he was in Flintlock and he was quite young himself. Your mum obviously a teenage fan as well. Yeah.

Sara Pascoe7:20

So he

Sara Pascoe7:21

He was quite

Sara Pascoe7:25

Yeah, I think my dad was in the band from 17 to 19, so really young.

Presenter7:28

It's a real

Sara Pascoe7:31

Some version of they went on a date or started dating, but essentially they were very young and got pregnant accidentally with me. And then they had two more children together.

Presenter7:39

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe7:42

Yeah.

Presenter7:42

So your mum was nineteen when she had you. And what what impact did that have on you and your sisters having a mum who was, you know, closer to you in age, lots of energy, but also figuring her life out at the beginning of her life? Yeah.

Sara Pascoe7:54

Yeah, I didn't realize my mum was young until probably I was 16 and she was 36. I had my first baby at 40, whereas I was 20 when my mum was 40. So it's, you know, I had this whole life my mum never got. And because my mum had left school early with not lots of qualifications, she did everything the hard way, which is with kids. My dad, and I say this with love, was never going to be able to support us or contribute financially. So it was all on my mum.

Presenter7:55

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe8:25

And

Presenter8:25

Wow, all three

Sara Pascoe8:26

All three of us. They they got married after my sister Cheryl and then they were already broken up by the time they had Christina. So my mum really was by by herself when she had two of us and a baby. She did evening courses and she started working in administration and the health service and then she worked her way up. And now she my mum has a PhD, which is astonishing. Not because she's not a very intelligent woman, but because

Presenter8:26

Both made this.

Presenter8:32

Yeah.

Presenter8:34

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe8:47

She has had, you know, a little bit like how she insisted on marrying my dad. She has clawed her way.

Sara Pascoe8:54

to financial stability.

Presenter8:56

Tell me about yourself a little bit. I mean, in your teens, you said you were a feral teenager. Yes. What did that look like? Tell me.

Sara Pascoe9:05

Cheryl and I just wanted to go out. We wanted to look at boys, talk to boys. We liked dance music in the 90s. So I started going clubbing when I was 14 and Cheryl started. That means Cheryl was 12. And so we were... So she was going to clubs with you at 12. In Romford, they did not care how old you are. And this is so dark to talk about it now. And can I just say we had no trauma from doing this? But yes, we went clubbing and we hitchhiked home sometimes. And my mum obviously had to go to bed because she had to go to work. This is why I say feral. It wasn't that my mum didn't care. She cared a lot. She just couldn't stop us. She tried to lock you in, didn't she? She did lock us in. She would hide the keys. We weren't allowed door keys at this point. So there was a point where we would have to wait for her to get home from work to get in from school because we couldn't be trusted. And.

Presenter9:19

We were

Sara Pascoe9:52

She locked the windows, we just broke it. We broke a window really high in the bathroom that she didn't know about and there was a ladder in the back garden and it was like behind the shed so my mum didn't know that what we would do to get back in is put the ladder up against the house and we'd just wait for her to go to sleep or we'd sometimes get home and wake her up because we'd have to fall into the bath from this sort of high window. Sometimes she didn't realise, sometimes she was too tired to care, but she definitely did try to stop us.

Presenter10:17

Well, I think we're probably here some music on that note, Sarah.

Sara Pascoe10:19

Not

Sara Pascoe10:19

Is it gonna be? Well, so uh the other thing that happened to me uh at fourteen

Sara Pascoe10:24

It was that Cheryl and I were deeply in love with many boy bands, but in particular the boy band Take That. Why take that as your favourite?

Presenter10:30

Uh

Sara Pascoe10:32

Favorite swan?

Sara Pascoe10:33

I think the whole theory about sort of projecting your your love and your early sexual feelings onto very safe men that you were will never meet is um a really lovely part of growing up actually. Being a teenage girl

Presenter10:47

No, and actually

Sara Pascoe10:49

No, and actually I think now I can't.

Presenter10:51

Are you studiously av

Sara Pascoe10:52

Uh

Presenter10:52

Boys.

Sara Pascoe10:52

Uh

Presenter10:52

Into the

Sara Pascoe10:53

Ashling was in the one of my best friends, Ashling, who's godmother to my children, Ashling Beau. She was in the Take That movie that they made a couple of years ago. And I queued up for the premiere and I knew that Take That were there and Ashling was on this red carpet with them and then the queue was a bit long and I was just like no. I just had this instinct of like don't.

Presenter10:57

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe11:10

Meet them. I actually don't want that chapter in the story.

Sara Pascoe11:14

I just don't want to say an idiotic thing and see that thing cross their face. I understand that. Yeah, where they're just like, oh, that's disappointing. Oh, that's annoying. I'm pretending not to be bored by you. But they'll be with you.

Presenter11:18

I understand.

Presenter11:23

But they'll be with you

Sara Pascoe11:24

On the island.

Sara Pascoe11:25

In a way, yes. Forever, yes. With this song, which is Never Forget, and I never will, take that.

Speaker 411:34

On this breath of life was so long

Speaker 411:39

We love walked a thousand miles

Speaker 411:44

Sometimes stroll hand in hand with love.

Speaker 411:49

Everybody's been there

Speaker 411:53

Dangerous on my mind, I would stand on the line of hope.

Speaker 412:00

Mommy

Presenter12:01

Take that and never forget. So Sarah Pascoe, you told me a lot about your mum in the last section and and that your mum and dad split when you were still quite young. Tell me a bit more about your dad now. He eventually remarried and moved to Australia. How much do you remember about when he was part of your ordinary family?

Sara Pascoe12:06

And the

Sara Pascoe12:13

Be to us

Sara Pascoe12:19

Life. We were definitely really glad that my parents broke up.

Sara Pascoe12:22

And I think it's really important to say that because when your parents are unhappy and they make a decision to make themselves happier, I think parents really worry about things like what the effect be on their children. I remember we were just relieved. We weren't like

Speaker 212:32

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe12:35

Where's Daddy? You're like, great. Those people seem really miserable. Let's hope this is better for them. And then I think what we had was very common is that we saw our dad every two weeks at a weekend and we would go bowling or to Canvy Island and play the arcade games and things like that. And I think my dad definitely got to do all the fun stuff with us and my mum did all the boring stuff, which was really hard.

Presenter12:53

Which was really

Sara Pascoe12:54

Um what did you

Presenter12:54

And what did you make of him then? If you're not spending all that much time with him and when you are with him, it's always fun. That that dad can become quite a kind of romantic figure in the imagination, especially if, you know, they're a musician, a sax player like your dad. Let me just correct you.

Sara Pascoe13:09

I hate a saxophone. I hate the sound of the saxophone.

Sara Pascoe13:13

I hate jazz. Listening to as someone noodle away.

Presenter13:18

One noodle away on

Sara Pascoe13:18

Uh

Presenter13:18

Saxon.

Sara Pascoe13:19

Someone practicing an altosaxphone I think is probably the worst sound in the world. I think that might be wild.

Presenter13:25

I'll add a few on your list today.

Sara Pascoe13:27

No, no Baker Street. And actually, if a boss go is playing it, I sort of go, I'll get back on the tube.

Sara Pascoe13:33

Um I'm saying all this a little bit retrospectively. This is child me. I used to have a joke about um how jazz reminded me about being neglected. And that is a joke. It was a joke I used to have, but it's also true. My dad

Sara Pascoe13:46

I think he still lived in our house, but he the coat cupboard, he covered it with carpet underlay to soundproof it and then would lock himself in there playing the saxophone.

Presenter13:51

Sound

Sara Pascoe13:54

And what were you doing? He was looking after us, so that's me in the me and the ki where were you? I was just in the sort of kitchen making a hot chocolate, you know, w watching Telly with the cupboard playing the saxophone for hours and hours and hours, yeah.

Speaker 214:04

Yeah.

Presenter14:04

And he was in a cupboard playing the saxophone for hours and hours.

Sara Pascoe14:08

Okay. I'm saying all of this with love. We all survived, I should say, and everyone's fine. But I didn't think of my dad as a romantic figure in terms of following his dreams or being a creative. I didn't, but I also didn't think that being a musician was something that was out of reach. And did he give you?

Presenter14:22

Uh

Sara Pascoe14:23

you any advice about following your creative passions? There's something that my mum really hates, but there was a point after I so I tried to get to drama school for two years after my uh A levels and didn't get in and then I went to university. And when I finished university

Sara Pascoe14:39

I told him on the phone in Australia that I was going to do a teacher training thing so that I could do supply teaching. I just found out that supply teaching at this point was like £145 that you could get for a day of supply teaching. And I couldn't believe it. And I was like, so I could do that. I could do supply teaching. And then I could do auditions. And I could just not do it if I got an acting job. And he said, don't have a backup. It basically said, make it work or starve to death. Essentially, he said, you have to make it work if you've got no choice. And what do you think of that advice now? I think it's brilliant advice unless you are a sensible parent.

Sara Pascoe15:14

My mum was so. My mum's advice, which again I think was pretty great. She said.

Sara Pascoe15:20

Fine, do what you like, as long as you're not borrowing money off me. So he basically said, you can, but I'm not going to bankroll this.

Sara Pascoe15:27

If you can't pay your rent, that's on you. So both of them were pretty.

Sara Pascoe15:31

hands off. And so I was very liberated.

Presenter15:34

Well, on that note, I think we should get back to the music, Sarah.

Sara Pascoe15:36

Yes, my favourite thing my dad has ever done is last year he released an 18 C D collection.

Sara Pascoe15:43

40 Hours Long, which is improvised jazz, him on saxophone and his friend Chris Martin, not that one, from Coldplay on a piano, and it's inspired by James Joyce's Ulysses, which is one of my dad's, if not my dad's favourite book.

Sara Pascoe15:57

And with everything going on with AI and technology, the fact that my dad did something that was so analogue.

Sara Pascoe16:05

I just loved it so much.

Presenter16:06

And so so, you know, this is your dad noodling away on the sax. Yes. It sounds like maybe you've changed your mind about saxophones.

Sara Pascoe16:13

This is what I think they call it flooding in therapy. If you're scared of spiders, they throw hundreds of spiders at you. This album is my exposure therapy. Exposure therapy is out, and now I'm listening to this. And I think I'm going to make a show about this album. Because you remember, they did like My Dad Wrote a Porner, and it was the funniest podcast ever. I think I'm going to do like My Dad did a 40-hour Ulysses improvised jazz album. Who wouldn't want to come and see that? Exactly. I'll buy my tickets now. Yeah. So, this is Telemachus by Derek Pascoe and Chris Martin.

Presenter16:16

You scared of

Presenter16:19

So exposure there.

Presenter17:42

Telemachus, Derek Pascoe and Chris Martin. So Sarah Pasco, by the time you were twelve, you decided that you wanted to become an actor. Where did that urge come from, do you think?

Sara Pascoe17:48

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe17:53

I've got no idea. I know that lots of people have a backstory of like seeing someone else acting really well and going, oh, wow.

Presenter17:58

Mm-hmm.

Sara Pascoe18:00

I want to do that, but I remember staying at my dad's house actually with my sister Cheryl and waking her up and going, Do a play with me. I've decided to be an actor. So I didn't let her go to sleep. I was making her do scenes with me. You often did two handers with Cheryl, didn't you? Lots of school assemblies? Yes. We did one that was a two-woman version of Oliver.

Presenter18:13

Cheryl.

Sara Pascoe18:20

Where I was Fagan and she was the artful Dodger. Oliver wasn't even in it, just not interested in Oliver. So we really subbed it down. Yes, and we ch we actually put loads of songs from other musicals in it. Because I remember the bit I remember is singing I Feel Pretty to the audience'cause we really wanted to say I Feel Pretty So Witty and Gay. Like that was so why did we do Oliver if that was the song I wanted to sing? But anyway, so we did stuff like that. So sometimes it was just really

Presenter18:23

Did right

Speaker 218:23

Yeah.

Presenter18:25

So we

Sara Pascoe18:42

I wouldn't have said this at the time, but like idiotic. And then I did have educational ones where I didn't think they were telling us enough about climate change. I didn't think they were talking to us about things like shoplifting. I got caught shoplifting in body shop and then was like I need to tell the others. It's illegal.

Sara Pascoe18:56

And I started a bully line. So I got volunteers from the year 10 and 11 to join me in the sixth form block and we were gonna like be like um vigilantes and we would sing Lean on me in assembly.

Speaker 219:01

Uh

Sara Pascoe19:08

How do you talk?

Speaker 219:08

How did that go?

Sara Pascoe19:08

Oh, I was very popular.

Speaker 219:08

Hello?

Sara Pascoe19:10

No one ever came to visit us for help because we were the dweebs, Lauren, is the so is the twist. So it was more like a.

Presenter19:17

Yes. Lining up to bullies, please assemble here. And here's where you'll find us. Yes. So, yeah, what did.

Sara Pascoe19:20

Yes, here's where you'll find us.

Sara Pascoe19:24

Uh The other kids.

Presenter19:25

Let's make a fold.

Sara Pascoe19:25

All of that.

Presenter19:26

Happy.

Sara Pascoe19:26

Um

Sara Pascoe19:28

Definitely, I knew I wasn't popular before, and when I say that, I always did have a friend. I wasn't completely lonely, and I think people have much, much worse stories of being bullied at school. But I hated school, I knew I wasn't liked, and I didn't know how to make people like me. I didn't know how to be in inverted commas, cool, but I also just didn't know how to be normal, actually. In what way? Tell me about that. Oh, God, just.

Sara Pascoe19:51

I just do the thing. I just do the annoying thing. I would just it would just be wrong.

Sara Pascoe19:56

Okay, here's an example, Aaron.

Speaker 219:57

Robert?

Sara Pascoe19:58

Everyone was coming back off holidays saying they'd kissed someone. I didn't kiss anyone till I was sixteen, but I lied about it a lot at school. So I would buy Shoplift a magazine, like just seventeen, and I'd fill out the quiz saying that I'd slept with so many people I couldn't remember their names, and then I would like leave it out on the table for someone to see.

Sara Pascoe20:17

I was a liar. I told them that Mariah Carey was my babysitter and that she was coming over from Miami to look after me and give me singing lessons. I told them there was a jacuzzi bath in my house and Take That's Limo had broken down on my road and they'd had to come in and borrow the bath.

Speaker 220:23

I told them those

Sara Pascoe20:31

And I, people, when you lie, quite often don't say, I don't believe you. They just don't want to be your friend.

Presenter20:34

Yeah just

Presenter20:36

It's interesting that though, that you you still have this kind of you know, it sounds like you've got a lot of self confidence, a lot of gumption. You want to kind of get out and you're reaching out to people. It's not like you're crushed by their rejection.

Sara Pascoe20:47

But it's not like

Sara Pascoe20:49

Rejection. This is where I think early life is really important because I've had this theory always that, like, if you think of a human being as like the earth, you have the crust, which is how people have treated you recently, you know, how people at work feel about you, friends, loved ones, and that can be quite solid. And then you've got this sort of really movable magma bit underneath where there are lots and lots of doubts and you have lots of experiences and you can have really bad days. But your core, if your early life, if you had a parent or parents or other carers who just thought you were the best thing when you walked into a room, that really does set you up for life. So that's what I think.

Speaker 221:01

You know.

Sara Pascoe21:24

My parents were really young. For the first eighteen months it was just me. They didn't know what they were doing, but I had all of their attention and I really did believe everyone should look at me. And I do just think it gave me this little rock-solid core of like an entire room booing and I'd be like, I deserve to be here.

Presenter21:41

So all the going out is happening then, you know, when you get to fourteen, you're kind of going out raving and everything from

Sara Pascoe21:44

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe21:46

People from drama club.

Presenter21:48

So

Sara Pascoe21:50

When my mum was out with one of her boyfriends, I had had a party to try and make people be my friends. So all of these people who didn't like me came to my house. And this is before like Facebook things and when this would be on the news, but my house got really trashed and the police got called. And then my mum comes home, the house is full of smoke, and there's bin bags full of like bottles and cans and the furniture's broken and it's disgusting. And my mum, I was begging her to hit me. I was so sorry. I was like, please hit me, please hit me. And she didn't hit me. She made me join a drama club in a church hall on Wednesdays and Sundays. And my mum said, I'll keep you off the streets. And I auditioned to be in the Wiz and played Glinda. And then I was really like, okay, this is my life now. The GCSEs don't matter.

Sara Pascoe22:29

And then, oh, I was actually like, in your face, mum should have hit me when you had the chance. Now I'm going to be a star.

Presenter22:35

Um I want to find out what happened next, but first I want to hear disc number four please.

Sara Pascoe22:39

Please Sarah, what's it gonna be? This is probably my favourite song.

Sara Pascoe22:43

In 2001, I got a job in Italy for three months doing uh teaching English as a foreign language. And we would get in the car every morning to drive to a school. And we would we must have all have been, I think I was 19, 19 or 20. And then we had one tape at the beginning of the tour, which was Red Hot Chili Peppers, Californication. And then by the end of the tour, we also had a Beatles, Best of the Beatles. We had two albums, but the best music. And there was something about just looking out the window, that early morning, blue sky, sun.

Sara Pascoe23:13

And every song off the California Caitian album makes me feel like a sun is rising in myself and I really love this song that we're about to listen to which is Scar Tissue by the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

Speaker 423:24

Sky tissue that I wish you saw Side Captain Mr. No It Paul Close your eyes and I'll kiss you Cause with the birds I'll share With the birds I'll shed it so lonely With the birds I'll shed it so lonely Push me up against the wall Young tuck girl in a push-up bra

Speaker 423:51

I'm falling all over my

Presenter23:53

Red hot chili peppers and scar tissue.

Presenter23:57

So Sarah Pascoe, your punishment ended up becoming, well, a life changing moment for you. Tell me about that turning point. How did things change once you started going to theatre school?

Sara Pascoe24:04

You bet that

Sara Pascoe24:08

Well, I realised that people outside of school wouldn't automatically assume things about me, or that they might find things funny or interesting where people at school had thought it was weird and stupid. Can you give me some examples? I'm trying to think. In terms of like being loud, okay, the classic annoying thing about people who are learning musical theatre is that they sing in public places, you know, and they sing and they want to harmonise. And if you're on a train with them, you think I'm going to move courage. Meeting other people who were like that, and that's what they did with their energy, was really great for me.

Presenter24:42

Mm-hmm.

Presenter24:43

And what about your kind of inner life at this point? I mean, today, I think you've said that you've got the stand ups mix of like total self possession in some ways, but then a lot of insecurity in others. Was that what you were like back then? How was the mix as a teenager?

Sara Pascoe24:46

This point

Sara Pascoe24:52

But then

Sara Pascoe24:54

Uh

Speaker 224:54

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe24:59

I don't know if I was insecure. I definitely thought I was very ugly and unfortunately, like all teenage girls, hugely fat. So that sounds like insecurity, it is insecurity, isn't it? And also it's so surprising, like lots of people probably, when I look back at pictures of myself and go, there's this picture of me in a tree. And I remember on this day, like being so upset at my grandad's house that someone had taken a picture of me, didn't want anyone to take a picture of me. And I'm so skinny. And it's just like, it's so awful that teenage girls quite often do have such a dysmorphia that they're not right for the world. And that translates into, oh, it must be my body, it must be what I look like. So you felt that very strongly. Yes, very strongly.

Speaker 225:09

Yeah.

Speaker 225:22

Mm-hmm.

Presenter25:29

To match

Presenter25:33

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe25:35

But I don't think I felt that performing because I didn't mind being looked at in that way. Okay, yeah. So that was me.

Presenter25:39

Okay, yeah, so that was maybe a place you could control and kind of

Sara Pascoe25:44

guide how you were being perceived. Yeah, or maybe I just wanted to do it so much I then didn't care. Or I was then I had an opposite. So you've got dysmorphia at one end and then what you have is delusions of grandeur at the other. I thought, which is maybe I will be the next Christina Aguilera. Because I think at that age I still could have, because my dad had been in a pop band, I definitely thought there could be a route.

Speaker 225:56

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe26:05

Two international superstars.

Presenter26:07

Stop.

Presenter26:09

Well, that brings me onto your audition for Michael Barramore's amateur talent contest, My Kind of People.

Sara Pascoe26:09

Well

Sara Pascoe26:11

Oh.

Sara Pascoe26:14

Yes, so again, fourteen, I met a boy called Darren at this drama club.

Sara Pascoe26:19

And he was going to go to Whiteley's shopping centre and it was a lot about people at school. I thought if I go on this programme, I'm not going to tell anyone at school, they're just going to be watching it on Saturday night with their families, and they'll be like, oh my God, I know her and she's amazing. But I hadn't ever sung with sheet music before. I'd only rehearsed this song over and over again with the tape and it was more than words by extreme. But it was too low for me.

Sara Pascoe26:42

I couldn't sing it and um I didn't know when to come in so I went up on stage. I remember Michael Barrymore being hugely tall and I was so shocked that he was wearing makeup, which obviously everyone does in T V. And he said something to the crowd and then all of a sudden I'm standing there and all these people in the shopping centre they s sort of like look over the barricades at you.

Sara Pascoe27:00

I was wearing a red velour top.

Sara Pascoe27:02

And the piano's playing and playing, and I don't know when this song comes in, because I only know it when the man sings. And then I realised, okay, this is rubbish, and everyone at school is not going to think I'm amazing. And then I just thought, I'll just have a small cry. And then the audience started singing the song at the chorus. So I then joined in with them. And here's the thing about my delusional self-confidence. I walked really quickly. Darren didn't wait for me, understandably, to get the tube back. And I walked really quickly at the shopping centre. And three people stopped me to say, well done. And I now know that's because I was a child and they were kind. But at the time, I thought no one had noticed me crying and I'd smashed it.

Sara Pascoe27:39

Because two people told me, like, well done for getting up there. What they were saying was, you know, that was in itself brave. Keep going. Yeah. And then a woman told me, You've got a very pretty voice. And so I got the trend. It's like.

Presenter27:44

Keep going. And then a woman told me you've got a very pretty voice.

Sara Pascoe27:50

Oh my god, I think it went really well. People were like running up to me to say well done. Yeah, and then just waited to see myself on television and I was cut out. But I did learn something about myself, which is that I am the kind of person who will get on a tube to a place they haven't been to before and try. And if I have any kind of career now, it's because I've done that lots of times.

Presenter28:09

And you were tenacious. I mean, after you finished your A levels, you spent years auditioning for drama school and you didn't get in.

Sara Pascoe28:10

Tenacious.

Sara Pascoe28:15

No, I made a collage of my rejection letters because I felt the rejection was very important. Because, Lauren, I thought there would be a stage in my life where I'd reflect on and here's my rejection. Well, here we are. Here we are. But I thought it would be at the Oscars.

Presenter28:25

Will you

Speaker 228:26

Thoughts today?

Sara Pascoe28:28

But this is a very good secondary design.

Speaker 228:28

But this is a very good

Speaker 228:31

Uh

Speaker 428:31

Alexander.

Sara Pascoe28:33

I did terrible auditions, that's the thing. I then realised that people actually got coached for their speeches, read the plays, went to see the plays, watched all of the versions. I never did that. I didn't take it very seriously. I was sort of lazy because I thought I was so good. And so it's really lucky I didn't get in. Really lucky. And actually, there was a relief in going, oh, I'm not very good at it. And failed sideways so brilliantly because I had already been doing stand-up for a few years when I realised, oh, I'm not a very good actor.

Presenter29:02

Well, I want to get there, but I think we should have some music before we do. Why are you taking this one to the island?

Sara Pascoe29:07

Right, there's going to be bad days on the island. There are definitely going to be days where it'll be too samey and I will be depressed. I think this song would be a jolt in your arm no matter what time you heard it. I think it would remind you that you are alive. Yeah, this is like a tonic on the island. So this is Get Off by Prince.

Speaker 429:29

I cannot put this in a way so not to offend or unnerve.

Speaker 429:34

There's a ruin going all around that you make them get inserved.

Speaker 429:39

The city rain, you know what, and baby, who knows how long?

Speaker 429:44

It's time for me to say what's right when all I wanna do is wrong Get up Twenty three positions in a one night stand Get up I'll only call you after you say I can Get up

Presenter29:59

Prince and the new power generation and get off. So Sarah Pasco, tell us how the switch happened and your ambition went from acting to stand-up.

Sara Pascoe30:09

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe30:10

Well, stand-up wasn't for its own sake. I was using stand-up as a stepping stone for acting. And never ever say that in a green room of comics. They will not respect you. They will say, why are you here? Get out. There's a show called News Review at the Canal Cafe. It's topical. Six weeks actors do it and they write a lot of the sketches and you sing sort of satirical, you know, songs with the words changed. And I did that for six weeks and I thought, oh, I could perform as a character and this might help with acting. Or I might eventually be able to ask a casting director to come and see me. So I performed as a character a few times and then I realised

Presenter30:44

What was your character?

Sara Pascoe30:46

She just held a guitar and didn't play it.

Sara Pascoe30:49

That

Sara Pascoe30:50

Yeah, but I realized then you could get more, there was much more availability. Having tried to be an actor for so long, which was I did lots of writing letters, I did lots of going to meet theatre companies or telling people that I was in this amateur production of this or I'm doing this thing over there. Would you see me for this thing? The fact that stand-up, you could just text a man and go, Can I have five minutes tonight? And the answer was always yes, especially if you're a woman.

Sara Pascoe31:13

It was very enticing and exciting to me. So I texted a man in Balham in a pub, and they had a new wet night on a Tuesday.

Sara Pascoe31:21

And I went and had two large glasses of wine, which is too many, but I was so nervous and I couldn't imagine him saying my name and me going up on stage.

Sara Pascoe31:30

And I'd written five minutes about how high school, the musical, was unrealistic, because obviously I'd had a terrible time at secondary school and it was making out that school was fun for people. So I'd written a version of secondary school, the musical, which I thought was more realistic. And

Sara Pascoe31:43

I performed it to 12 people who smiled at me so politely. No one laughed at me, but I did have that feeling of this is where I belong. Thank you. So, what was that like? Tell me about that. I think it's a neurochemical reward, partly. If you do something that really scares you, what you get afterwards is this rush of I survived it. But I remember getting back on the Northern Line from Balham to Barnett and feeling like, oh, I'm a one-man band. I'm in touch with something from Shakespeare's Times. I go to town squares and I tell people the news. I tell people my business. I'm a town crier. I'd had two glasses of wine, but what I was high on was.

Presenter31:50

Tai T

Presenter31:52

Now what

Sara Pascoe32:14

I was scared and I did it and now I've done it, now I know what that feels like, now I want to do it more and I want to do it better and I wanted to write stuff.

Presenter32:23

Isn't it? Because I what one of the things that is maybe unusual about you is that you're not scared of like not being bad, having to work it out. You know, the the fact that they didn't laugh, thinking, Oh, okay, I can do that. To not be scared to be bad is like the biggest gift you can have. I think you can learn.

Sara Pascoe32:31

Work it out.

Sara Pascoe32:39

I always said that about being content with mediocrity.

Sara Pascoe32:42

Perfectionists really, really, really, really struggle.

Sara Pascoe32:46

Whereas if you're content with mediocrity, like I remember when I first got offered Live at the Apollo, all of this just sounds like I'm so bad at my job, but I got when I got offered Live at the Apollo, I was really aware I was very new to be doing Live at the Apollo, which at that point was such a you've arrived show.

Sara Pascoe32:59

And I thought, what would you rather? Never doing live at the Apollo or being the worst ever person on Live at the Apollo. I'd rather be the worst ever person who ever does live at the Apollo. And that is a nicer way to live, actually, as long as you are trying to not be the worst one ever. So you're that first.

Presenter33:14

Skig in Balam

Sara Pascoe33:15

Yeah.

Presenter33:15

And nobody laughed. 2007.

Sara Pascoe33:17

Yeah.

Presenter33:17

I think. And then so by the mid-naughties, female comics are really in demand. And there's this new generation coming up, and you're part of it. I mean, tell me about that.

Sara Pascoe33:18

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe33:20

See

Sara Pascoe33:23

New general

Sara Pascoe33:27

I think for a long time people thought audiences wouldn't enjoy.

Sara Pascoe33:31

Comedy from women. And I wasn't around enough to know if that was ever true. You do get the odd gig. I definitely have had the odd gig where people get up to go to the toilet when the woman comes on. But by the time I was starting comedy, it was very infrequent. And it would be at a place where you kind of knew, you knew from the sign outside the door. You'd be like, oh, okay, this is a place where men have come to escape their wives.

Sara Pascoe33:53

The idea of you being here is confronting to them, but it was very few and far between. And T V audiences, I think they realised that they were having so many all-white, all-male panels. And it's not that that's morally bad, that's a whole other conversation. It's boring. It's boring. And that's what I loved about the conversations about the women that I admired in comedy. It wasn't like, oh, we should let them have a go. It was, oh, my God, like...

Sara Pascoe34:18

They're they're coming.

Sara Pascoe34:20

All right, Sarah. Well, it's time to go to the Music, you're six Choice is Next, what are we going to hear? This for me, and I know on the desert island I probably won't be doing any gigs unless suddenly the dolphins look like they need cheering up, but this is what I would listen to if I needed to change my heartbeat before I go on. So it's your hype track? It's my hype track. Is that what they're called? Yeah. It's my hype track. It's my walking up and down with headphones on, hoping no one comes into the room or knocks on the door.

Speaker 234:38

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe34:44

So it's rock star by NERD, and that sounds funny really dies. And there's something about that as well as an acronym that no one ever really dies. Do you believe that? And obviously, dying on stage means a very different thing to dying in real life, but I also like the idea of like no one ever really dies, you know, like live it, be here in this moment, and take that out there to them. Quite often, I feel.

Sara Pascoe35:00

Very sluggish just beforehand. And I think actually it's a sort of weird way of your body being nervous that you sort of feel exhausted and that's scary. And this song makes you go, oh no, okay, now I'm too pumped up. Okay, now I feel like I'm going to go and have a fight with someone. And it's a good track for livening you.

Speaker 435:34

We don't see that you're gonna end up Better call your boy, cause it's not a name You can't be me, I'm a rock

Presenter35:47

NERD and Rockstar. So Sarah Pascoe, you've used your own life as material quite a lot in your career, and you've described yourself as an oversharer. Is there anything that you've lived to regret saying or talking about?

Sara Pascoe35:56

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe36:00

Not yet, but my children are still young. I think my fear would be one day them being embarrassed at school because of something I've said. And my husband is very cautious. So meeting my husband was good because he said, I really don't want you talking about me freely. Which means if ever I do want to mention him, I also have to check it with him. And even more, when we started trying for children, doing IVF, I couldn't do stand-up about it because it was far too raw. And then I only really spoke about infertility once I had children and it was reflexing. And I also think that's because I couldn't be funny about it until I sort of knew the ending of it.

Presenter36:29

And I also think

Presenter36:33

Yeah, that's that's there's something in that isn't there where you're in the experience still. It's only once you're out the other side of it that actually you can look back. So at what point did you s with the IVF did you start to think, Okay, actually I might w

Sara Pascoe36:37

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe36:40

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe36:46

I want to talk about this, right? When Theo was eight months old. So it was really like, oh, I definitely have a son who's definitely, he survived, he's alive, he's here. I then felt I wanted to share things with people who I knew would be at different stages of it. The other thing with comedy is that people won't laugh unless they know you're okay. You can't tell them the stuff you're not okay about. You can definitely tell them all of your experiences once you are alright with it. But otherwise, they'll be worried about you. But the IVF thing, what I loved is that there were people in the audience who were about to start it or considering it, or he wanted to, she didn't, or she. My husband was the reason we did IVF. I wanted to stop. I was 40 and I was like lying in the sand. And my husband was like, please, please, can we at least look back and go, we really tried our best, like we did everything. And there was something about sharing that. It felt like a positive way to talk about something that people feel very isolated in.

Speaker 237:03

You call

Speaker 237:05

Uh

Speaker 237:19

I

Sara Pascoe37:38

Uh

Presenter37:38

And what was that? What kind of response did you get from people? They must have been coming up to you, sending you messages.

Sara Pascoe37:38

And what was

Sara Pascoe37:43

That's what I really love about Stand Up is that you get you get the odd Instagram message with someone like, here's a picture of my six-month-old. I came to your show when we just found out our embryo hadn't taken. And you wrote back so nicely when we said, and it's like, now we've got this baby. And not that there has to be success stories. There are lots of people who try IVF and they have to stop because it's too expensive or it doesn't work or just their body doesn't respond. All of these really, really difficult things. But I think my main takeaway is like... It's so brave of people to try. It's such a big thing to put your body through. So it's like any anyone who does it should be so proud of themselves. And that's what that's what I tried to do when I was talking about it more on stage.

Sara Pascoe38:22

So, I mean

Presenter38:22

You've also been writing books in more recent years and you know you started out writing your own story. Uh you wrote about the abortion that you had when you were seventeen on your seventeenth birthday in that book. And I know that some people who meant wanted the best for you advised you not

Sara Pascoe38:25

Mauritius.

Sara Pascoe38:33

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe38:40

Well, my agent at the time, who's a brilliant agent, and it was really good advice because you can't put things back in the box. It does become part of your research pack. It's in the public realm of the public. Yeah, if you've said you've had mental health problems, if you've said you had something traumatic going in your life, that's going to be a question every time every time you need to promote something. And I think the thing about me and the oversharing is that the sharing always feels like so much more important than any

Presenter38:49

If you have realm and

Speaker 238:50

If you've said you've had um mental health

Speaker 238:57

And every

Sara Pascoe39:05

Privacy, and actually I'm not embarrassed. I've I've never really felt uncomfortable talking about a biographical detail apart from sometimes when that book came out when it was um it would be a member of the public I didn't know. And that feels oddly. We're talking there's people in another room, there's microphones, it feels public.

Sara Pascoe39:23

But if we didn't know each other and you'd sat down and next week at Bustop and ask you, I just read your book. Oh, and you were sixteen and you got pregnant and that bit maybe that that would feel like, Oh God, this lady knows something about me I haven't told her So I did have a couple of moments of that, but it were not regrets.

Speaker 239:32

Uh

Presenter39:32

I haven't talked about it.

Presenter39:34

So I did have a

Presenter39:36

Yeah.

Presenter39:38

All right, Sarah, I think we'll go to the music now. You've got a seventh choice today. What's it going to be? So.

Sara Pascoe39:43

This is a Um for my husband. Uh Till Yeah.

Sara Pascoe39:47

Yes, it's Australia.

Presenter39:48

So how did you meet?

Sara Pascoe39:48

Uh

Presenter39:48

Uh

Sara Pascoe39:48

Uh

Sara Pascoe39:49

We met at a comedy festival in Australia, but I don't remember. And then we got introduced in Edinburgh and apparently I turned away to pet a dog when he was introduced to me. But then he was still living in Australia but he had the same agent as me. He was married, I should say, to somebody else, his wife. And then he and his wife divorced and he moved to England for his career.

Sara Pascoe40:10

He's a lot younger than me, and we were really, really good friends. So, I'm really surprised that we got married and had children. But it turned out to be the love of my life. So, when we got married, the night before, we bought a bottle of champagne to drink in our hotel room, and my husband had done like a mixtape of all of the songs that reminds him of me and us of each other. And this is quite a saucy song, I think, called Best Friend by 50 Cents. And he did send this to me before we sort of got together when we were still best friends. So, my best friend at this point, we were both single, he sent this song to me, and I didn't really read between the lines, but I listened to it again for this show, and I was like, Oh my god, this boy fancied me! Rich in subtext. Yes.

Speaker 440:47

If I was your best

Speaker 440:50

You round all the time. I want you round me all the time.

Sara Pascoe40:53

A beer

Speaker 440:55

If you promise you'll be mine Girl promise you'll be mine He said he's just

Speaker 441:01

Uh-huh. Now girl, that's not the ten. Come on. Either he is or he ain't your man. He say he's just a friend. If I was your best friend

Speaker 441:11

I want you round all the time. I want you round all the time.

Presenter41:17

Fifty Cents and Best Friend. Sarah Pascoe, you and your husband Steen now have two small boys. Has becoming a parent changed the way that you work?

Presenter41:28

Hmm.

Sara Pascoe41:28

Yeah.

Presenter41:28

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe41:28

Um, in that I have no time to work and the triangle needs to be right. But sometimes my work feels so stressful that the the balance is very hard. So what's the triangle then? Where what so the triangle? So it should just be like, okay, the whole top of the pyramid should be my two children. And then after that, and I'm sorry to say this, the dog.

Presenter41:34

Hmm.

Speaker 241:34

Uh

Presenter41:40

The triangle

Sara Pascoe41:48

And then it's my husband. But and then the bit where I get to a really fast track into feeling who I am again, which is so important for me to be able to go back to my family and be a good parent who is really available for them.

Presenter41:48

Then

Speaker 241:48

It's my

Speaker 241:58

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe42:00

is stand-up comedy. So when they were really little and I would go out and gig. I remember Shapi Korsandi saying to me, Why are you here when your baby's so small? And it's like, this is better than a spa weekend. Twenty minutes on stage working through stuff that's happening. That I find the most refreshing. I'd rather have that than a massage. I want to work, you know.

Presenter42:17

And and you know your husband, he's an actor and has has done stand up in the past as well. Is there a sense when you're navigating day to day life, obviously you know where the lines are and the boundaries are for both of you, but is it s like say something is there a mu yeah, like you're at a family do, someone says something, do you ever like lock out?

Sara Pascoe42:21

This is what

Sara Pascoe42:26

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe42:28

But is that

Sara Pascoe42:30

Is there a mu

Sara Pascoe42:33

Someone's

Sara Pascoe42:35

I slightly in the show.

Presenter42:36

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe42:38

Say someone says something. His parents stayed with us for a month recently, which was wonderful. They live in Australia. It is so amazing and it's so important to steen. He lives so far away from his family, you know, so great.

Sara Pascoe42:49

But there were a couple of times where one of his parents would say a thing and he seen would see the look in my eyes and he'd just go, No And that means absolutely don't write that in the notes on your phone. I don't want to say that regurgitating

Presenter43:00

You were reaching for

Sara Pascoe43:02

Yeah, he sees the minute that that my eyes went. The facial expression went, Is that a thing? Is there something there? I could use uh and is that no, it's good. It's good to have boundaries.

Presenter43:02

Yeah, yeah.

Presenter43:05

He didn't like

Presenter43:13

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe43:14

Uh

Presenter43:14

And it you're having the conversation. Yeah.

Sara Pascoe43:15

And also I don't want I don't want to upset people and that's the other thing. It would break my heart if I said something about his mum or dad in a funny way and people laughed. And then it becomes a joke to you, you forget it's about a real person who might find out one day.

Presenter43:28

We talked a bit earlier about the self-doubt that you have experienced over your life. And I know that there was a a sense of continually reaching for a way to impress those unimpressible peop people for quite a while.

Sara Pascoe43:40

Pressable peak

Sara Pascoe43:42

Yeah.

Presenter43:42

Yeah. Yeah. Uh where are you at with all that now? You know, do you think that that becoming successful has helped you feel more secure?

Sara Pascoe43:43

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe43:51

Well, the really wonderful journey that I had, and I do think this is healthy, is that I thought if I achieved certain things, people at school would want to be my friend. And I achieved those things and they still did not want to be my friend. And the example I would give to you is that when I was on the programme, Would I Lie to You?, I had a Facebook message from someone who went to my school saying, can you stop going on my favourite programmes and ruining them? So that's what happens. The people who don't like you at school will probably never learn to love you. And letting go of that, I think, is the journey. Is wise. Yeah.

Presenter44:15

And select

Presenter44:19

Yeah. Uh

Sara Pascoe44:20

Uh

Presenter44:20

Well listen, it's time to cast you away to the desert island. You're not going to be bothering anyone there, Sarah. It's just be you and the island. How do you feel about the prospect? You've you've sounded quite positive about it so far.

Sara Pascoe44:20

This

Sara Pascoe44:24

And just

Sara Pascoe44:30

I'm really looking forward to this, Laura. Tell me about it. Even like the noises you play at the beginning, the seagulls, I can just see me lying back.

Presenter44:30

What?

Sara Pascoe44:37

Reading the Bible, having a lovely time. Yeah. So you're going to be fine. I think so. The problem I'm going to have is that I've got a plant-based diet and I think I am going to have to probably learn how to, for sustenance, just find an animal I dislike and eat him.

Presenter44:41

I think so.

Presenter44:45

And I think I am

Sara Pascoe44:52

Yeah. Where would you start? Fish? I was thinking rats. Rats? Dunno. I was imagining some kind of like beach rat. Less idyllic when you say beach rat. There's a beach rat, but this is what I'm imagining. He's fat. He doesn't want to live anymore. He's had enough. Yeah. Fine. Put him out of his misery.

Presenter44:59

It's less idyllic when you see.

Presenter45:05

It doesn't

Presenter45:09

Well, wonderful.

Presenter45:12

One more tune before we put you on the horns of that dilemma.

Sara Pascoe45:15

To cheer everyone up after the depressed rat, I just date. So I really, like fangirl, love self-esteem.

Presenter45:17

Press ratio.

Sara Pascoe45:22

When I had Theodore, and I did experience such a complete destruction of self, like complete ego death, who am I? Who was I?

Sara Pascoe45:30

other than taking care of this person. And people online kept talking about self-esteem and this self-esteem handle that was so good called Prioritize Pleasure. And I started listening it to it before on the way home from gigs because it felt like someone was reminding me about the whole life I'd lived beforehand.

Sara Pascoe45:47

in terms of dating and having feedies and having crushes and then having

Sara Pascoe45:51

Times where you don't want anyone anywhere near you and just being a young person living life, navigating things, felt like she kept plugging me back into what everyone else was doing who wasn't at home pumping milk in the night. And I'm so grateful for her. And then I went to see her at Brixton Academy. I love every single song on this album, but this one just makes me fizzy. And it's Wizardry by Self-Esteem.

Speaker 246:02

In the night.

Speaker 446:15

We're still texting then, but I'm certainly not your friend. I don't know where this burgh, but I know where it ends. What could you possibly be getting? By asking how I've spent things that you've seen. I know you want me back, I know, I know.

Speaker 446:33

But you can't say that, cause you yellow my hunger.

Presenter46:36

Yellow

Speaker 446:40

Times my investors makes me feel reckless

Presenter46:44

Self-esteem and wizardry. So, Sarah Pascoe, I'm going to send you away to the island. I'm giving you the Bible, the complete works of Shakespeare, and you can take another book of your choice. What are you going to go for?

Sara Pascoe46:50

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe46:56

I think I'm going to take a book because I'll be rereading all of these things. I'm a big reader, so I will be reading every day. The Bible will be read, all of Shakespeare will be read. And then in terms of a reread for me, I'm thinking George Orwell's 1984. Okay. Because it stands a reread. There's a lot going on in that book. But I also think it's a book that might make you feel grateful to be away from civilisation.

Presenter47:17

Mm.

Sara Pascoe47:18

Yeah. Even though it was written such a long time ago, and it's such a terrifying read, and there's lots of things going on in the modern world that are really terrifying. So me on my island reading again doesn't affect me anymore. You're not going to want to eat a rat after reading 1985. Oh, of course.

Presenter47:30

I'm not sure.

Sara Pascoe47:31

Of course. Oh my god. Oh, the end of 1984 is that his face's going to look less appetizing by the don't spoil.

Presenter47:31

Oh my god.

Presenter47:37

Yeah, yeah.

Presenter47:38

I see quite the

Sara Pascoe47:40

Yeah.

Presenter47:40

Bye.

Sara Pascoe47:41

Okay, that beach rap would be like, she's reading 934. I'm getting out of here. I'm not going to be able to do it. I'm good for another day. Yes, leave me alone. Fire up the Barbie.

Presenter47:45

I'm good for another day. Yes, leave me alone.

Sara Pascoe47:48

You can also have a luxury item. What would you like? I think I'll take a typewriter because I think as long as I don't get sand in the works, I would love to be able to write some things with complete absence of audience, not for anyone else but for myself. Some terrible poems that I read to the sea, really enjoying my sort of non-computer generated life. No screens, but just tip, tap, tap, tap, tap, still enjoying words and saying things and writing up about my feelings. Oh, lovely. Yeah.

Presenter47:50

What would you like?

Presenter48:15

Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. It's yours. Plenty of ribbon as well. And finally, which one track of the eight that you've shared with us today would you save from the waves first if you had to?

Sara Pascoe48:25

Yeah.

Presenter48:25

Yeah.

Sara Pascoe48:25

It's between My Dad and Take That, which tells you how much I love

Sara Pascoe48:29

It's difficult. Tells you how much I'll love to take that. But I will save my dad's actually. So this is Telemachus who's getting saved.

Sara Pascoe48:37

Because it's connected to somebody that I care about and inspired me, but also because it's the longest.

Presenter48:42

Uh

Sara Pascoe48:42

Yeah.

Presenter48:42

Uh Uh

Sara Pascoe48:42

Uh

Presenter48:42

Sarah Pascal, thank you very much for letting us hear your desert islandists. Thank you for asking about them.

Presenter49:11

Hello, I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Sarah. It sounds like she'll get on very well with those dolphins on the island, but the beach rat had better watch out. We've cast away many comedians, including Harry Hill, Joe Brand, and Sarah Millikan. The studio manager for today's programme was Giles Aspen. The assistant producer was Christine Pavlovsky. The executive production coordinator was Susie Roylands. The content editor was Mugabe Turia and the producer was Paula McGinley.

Presenter49:37

Next time, my guest will be the TV presenter, Cook, and one half of the hairy bikers, Cy King. I do hope you'll join us.

Speaker 250:06

Hi there, I'm Izzy Judd and I'm so pleased to be back with the Music and Meditation Podcast Series 6.

Speaker 250:12

We'll be talking about everything from reframing anxiety to getting a good night's sleep, so if you need to find some moments of calm in your day, subscribe to the Music and Meditation podcast on BBC Sounds.