drifts in. He has the jovial air of a corrupt small-town cop. I’ve not seen him for years and, in the meantime, his face looks like it’s had kids. I go through the intros for the show
Welcome to The Frankie Boyle Clip Show. There’s nothing like being on television. And let me tell you, reading out this shit, to you pricks, for this money, is nothing like being on television.
Hello and welcome to the show that made the Crossbow Cannibal refuse to pay his licence fee. Feels good, doesn’t it, knowing that cock is currently watching video tapes of Minder wishing I had tits and he had a lifespan of 300 years.
‘I prefer the first one!’ says Gerry, and I agree, having included the second one so I had something to give up. I launch into the rest at a pace calculated to delay discussion.
The show that masturbates to the Oscars’ Obituary Montage.
The show that’s laughing with you, not at you. Ahahahahaa! Oh no, wait a minute, it’s at you.
The show of clips you could find for yourself on YouTube. If porn didn’t exist.
The show that three of your personalities only agree to watch because they’re scared of your dominant personality, a murderous lesbian midget.
30 minutes that will leave you sweating like Peter Andre on Countdown.
The show that eats your pussy with neither skill nor enthusiasm.
The show that knows you felt a hand running up your leg on a crowded bus. You grabbed the hand and held it up, saying, ‘Whose hand is this?’ Only to find out that it was your own.
Hey! Mongo! It’s evening. The bright ball of wonder has yet again left the sky, so take your hoof from out your pants and once more suckle at my TV teats.
Hey, friendless! Yes, you! Wipe the dribble from your fleece and once more feast on my distractions. Together we can get you half an hour closer to the dawn of another worthless day.
‘Ehhh …,’ starts Gerry.
‘We only need six or something,’ I interrupt. ‘It’s just intros, we can come back to it …’
We nod, both agreeing to different things.
The first clip we’re doing is of some hugely misguided children’s show from the 80s, teaching yoga to little kids. It’s set on a farm and hosted by a real sandpit haunter calling himself Yogie Okie Dokie. We see him bending the kids into various positions.
It’s amazing how flexible kids are when they’re drunk. Yogi Okie Dokie is only his first name. His surname is Pokey Chokey.
‘Now the lawyers are worried about that … we can’t actually imply that he’s a paedophile …’ Gerry havers.
‘The lawyers?’ I ask. ‘It’s a joke. I don’t think anyone would really think his surname was Pokey Chokey. Or that his first names are Yogie Okie Dokie …’
‘You can’t imply that he’s a paedophile.’
‘Fuck, look at the show. I mean … fuck!’
There’s a clip of that wee toddler that smokes in fucking Papua New Guinea or somewhere.
Of course, he doesn’t smoke any more. He’s dead now. His little brother uses his skull as an ashtray.
‘We can’t say that,’ murmurs Gerry.
‘Why not?’ I ask and open another Diet Coke because maybe this would be easier if my brain were dead.
‘He’s not dead.’ Gerry is getting exasperated. ‘So the lawyers say that we can’t say that he is.’
‘It’s a joke. They’re saying we can’t say anything that isn’t the literal truth? He’s going to sue? He’s out in the fucking jungle. He’s hardly … getting driven on a moped to a clearing where they all sit round and watch fucking clip shows.’
We keep hitting bits the lawyers have vetoed. They have suggested replacements, the lawyers have written jokes. I have met lawyers and these are the sort of jokes you would expect them to write. It’s not immediately obvious that they are jokes.
The final clip is a terrible video about how to use the techniques of a magician to pull women. We type the last joke up in a way that it can be altered if there’s a legal problem.
These are the techniques that Debbie McGee [an older magician’s assistant] warns [a] young magician’s assistant about, before heading home to another night of being sawn in half so Paul Daniels [a magician] can watch her [them] eat her [their] own arsehole.
I suggest that we start the show with me in an armchair, cradling a huge horn. I will explain that not all of the jokes are literally true and that when I say something not meant to be taken literally I will blow a note on my mighty horn. Perhaps we should change the title of the show to The Horn of Balathor.
‘Where is Balathor?’ says Gerry
‘I thought of it as more of a what – Balathor the Green. Balathor the Mighty.’
Another producer comes in and this idea sort of catches fire. Yes, we could call it The Horn of Balathor. It’s only a fucking clip show. Perhaps I could appear at the bottom of the screen when I blow the horn, like the guy on sign-language programmes. Maybe there could be different sizes of horn, depending on how offensive the joke is. There is a clip from the 70s that suggests black people can’t swim. I suggest we do the line:
Of course it’s a ridiculous racial stereotype to say black people can’t swim. How do you think AIDS got to Europe?
And then I come on with one of those huge Alpine horns that rest on the ground and give a blast so loud it would actually blow the speakers on people’s TVs. I’m thinking that will keep me in the papers long enough that my arse will remain un-raped. I maintain to the guys that it could work as a show. Fuck it, it could work as a show, or has my judgement just gone? Yes, my judgement has gone but perhaps I could be right by accident.
I look them both in the eye and beam, ‘Comedy is tragedy plus laughter!’
But I know the fucking thing is not going to happen.
The bright old day now dawns again; the cry runs through the land,
In England there shall be dear bread – in Ireland, sword and brand; And poverty, and ignorance, shall swell the rich and grand, So, rally round the rulers with the gentle iron hand, Of the fine old English Tory days; Hail to the coming time!
Charles Dickens, The Fine Old English Gentleman
Having travelled a wee bit, I’m convinced that Britain’s sense of humour – the sheer scope and breadth and complexity of our piss-taking – is unique. That’s what I hate about these various joke scandals. They have at their heart the idea that the public won’t be able to decode what was meant by the joke; that even if you understand, other people might not, when everyone here has a PhD in wind-ups.
People are struggling with the whole idea of comedy at the moment. I think comedy is probably a descendant of shamanism. The comic is some guy or gal covered in shit who’d live out in the desert and come roaring into the settlement every so often to tell everybody what was up with how they perceived life. Of course, this made them a pariah.
Comedy is a fictional space. Some of the things the shaman says are true, even heartfelt. Sometimes she says things she doesn’t mean; sometimes she says the opposite of what she means. And, admittedly, she isn’t always good, but nobody is. Sometimes you