Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
Writer and comedian, best known as co-creator and performer of The Fast Show on BBC Two.
On the island
Eight records
I think it's particularly appozite given the current political situation in the world. I also have a strange image when I was thinking about this of this little love train going past.
My mum was an opera singer, but the song I'd like to hear her sing is a traditional Welsh song called Ean Wain Theto. It means to see you again and it's a dreadfully manipulative song about Wales actually.
Punk rock emerged and uh it's almost laughable now but the effect that the the Sex Pistols especially had was quite astonishing. And when I heard this record I played it to this friend of mine Martin and we were both astonished by the kind of power of it and the impact it had
My dad is uh a very passionate music lover as as well as my mum. And my dad introduced me to Caruso. What you can hear with this voice is extraordinary because the degradation of sound quality with the orchestra, I mean it sounds like me in a you know, in a couple of strangled cats and a few maracas, and yet still you can hear this astonishing voice.
I would also like to use this song as a tribute to the drummer John Watson who very sadly died a couple of years ago.
I think is best um female vocalist, um quite certainly in, you know, the world of parp. Um it's sublime and I would definitely take it.
My Mum will tell you. that that Tabaldi is better than Callas, and I know what she means, and there is sometimes a strange quality about Callas' voice... But as a kind of dramatic Singer, and again, the passion that you can hear is absolutely extraordinary.
Tumbling DiceFavourite
there's only one band really for me in terms of uh the the greatest rock and roll band in the world as they've been describing.
In conversation
Presenter asks
0:23Do you mean we won't be laughing at such things [poncing around in silly wigs] in a few years' time, or that you'll be just tired of doing them?
I was thinking oh it might be it might be an embarrassing spectacle more than anything.
Presenter asks
1:37You don't like the adulation, do you like it?
I must enjoy some aspect of performing and therefore the response to that, or I would just write. But as I get older I do think that's what I should do.
Presenter asks
4:03Does it mean then when you're out and about and spotting these [characters] that you're always kind of sitting on your own shoulder, always observing yourself, observing the world, thinking, can I use that?
I don't think it's very healthy pursuit actually... to sort of pursue it and to regard everything as potential to use to make somebody laugh, I don't think it's probably very healthy. You destroy your own spontaneous law. Yeah, you remove your response.
The keepsakes
Presenter asks
11:10Are you saying you're lazy or you lack discipline or you lack ambition?
I don't I'm not lazy and I don't uh but academically I think I'm lazy. I've always worked quite hard and I've never I've never shirked my work, Sue.
Presenter asks
14:31Why doesn't [talent] come to the surface sooner?
Well, Charlie and Dave didn't drop out, they were good boys. They saw their courses through to the end and got very good degrees.
Presenter asks
30:56What would you miss most [on a desert island]?
A company, I think.
“I don't think it's very healthy pursuit actually. I don't you know,'cause laughter is supposed to be spontaneous expression of joy. You know, it's what hey, along with music, Sue, it's what separates us from the edibles.”
“I tend to want to work in a team both I always write with somebody else, I always collaborate, I never write by myself.”
“I love an empty church, me. But, you know, put a vicar in it and I'll run screaming.”