secret safe,” she said. “Thank God British television is so shit nowadays. Everyone will go and see my movie now.”
That’s when my blood ran cold. That’s right, my blood ran ice cold at that very moment. She’s right, I thought. The condition of British television is beyond repair. The art form is dead. A year from today there will be just a vast pyre of useless TV sets as the British public go streaming to the cinema instead. This is a situ-fucking-ation. I left the toilet cubicle like a car bomb and went outside.
“Hey Rik Mayall, give us a smile,” said a papperatsi. Whap! Half his camera went back into his eye socket.
“Leave the fuck me alone, I’m incognito,” I howled enigmally and was gone.
The rain was lashing down and I was looking a lot like Clint. In fact, a lot of people walking past me said, “Hey bloke, you look a lot like Clint, only better.”
“Thanks complete strangers,” I said, and carried on my way muscularily.
“Excuse me sir,” said another one.
“Yes non-entity.”
“Are you going to be Rik Mayall, international light entertainment leviathan?”
“No,” I said.
“Get away.”
“Don’t talk to me like that.”
“No I meant ‘get away’ as in you are going to be Rik Mayall.”
“No, I’m not. I’m going to be The Rik Mayall and much more besides.”
“Blimey bloody crikey, can I have your autograph?”
“Not yet – I am only a partially formed foetus of a comedy legend. Give me a chance.”
“Thanks anyway.”
And that was his fifteen minutes gone. Like that ridiculous blond painter Andrew War Hole used to say. Even though they only lasted about a minute and a quarter.
On I mooded into the nearest pub. I won’t tell you the name of it because it’s important to protect the privacy of pubs. Pubs have far too much unwanted intrusion these days. Anyway, the thing is, huge genre-shifting ideas like The Young Ones don’t just come along like that. But this one did. There I was at the bar ordering a drink:
“I’ll have a pint of hang on a fucking minute – I’ve got an idea. I’ll write a situation comedy.”
Close up on the Rik doing that eye thing. Chicks gasp. Guys slit their wrists. End of shot. I’m young, I thought to myself, there’s one of me, so I’ll call the show The Young One. But no, I won’t be selfish, I am a socialist after all, I’ll put some of my great mates in it as well, and call it The Young Ones. Plural. Good.
I went straight home after another few pints and a donna kebab and I stayed up late writing the first series. I got through nine typewriters that night under the barrage of my relentless unstoppable fingering. They call me Mr Typewriter.
The cock crowed – ooer obviously* – and I got up the crack of Dawn (nice girl/ooer obviously again) and I got out of bed like a raging undetonated warhead and went straight off to the BBC.
“It’s punk rock, it’s radical, it’s anarchy, it’s four guys in a house together on a one way ticket to oblivion and there’ll be bands – good ones – playing live and it’s just a big two fingers to the establishment, and television will never be the same again. Ever.” Silence. All the television executives looked at me as they sat around the table in their pastel coloured jackets and shirts.
“I know where I’ve seen you before,” one of them said. “Weren’t you that dreadful northerner on that Kick Up the Eighties programme that no one could understand? When you were talking, you didn’t make any sense. You kept going on in that ridiculous accent like you were from Lancashire or somewhere. Who on earth let you make that? Oh it was made in Scotland wasn’t it? They’re light years behind us. They’re just a bunch of alcoholics who wear skirts. They don’t know how it’s done. Now, you mentioned something about having pop music in the show?”
“Yes I did.”
“But that’s a silly idea. Drama is drama and pop music is pop…”
“It’s called rock ‘n’ roll.”
“Well, whatever you silly people want to call it. You can’t put your music into drama programmes. It’s just not done. Now, tell me, you’re not Jewish are you?”
“So what if I am. Are you some kind of racist?”
“Oh no, no no no. It’s just we have to be very careful. Where do you hunt?”
“Oh this is ridiculous.”
“How many bedrooms do your parents have in their house?”
“What?”
“You are Jewish aren’t you?”
“Oh I’ve had enough of this. I’m going to prove this once and for all. Say hello to Mr Todge.” And out came The Behemoth. “That’s what I think of your poncey middle class attitudes,” I said in my West Midlands drawl.
“Pardon,” they said.
“Now listen up, I’m a hardcore socialist. I’m a man of the people. All the people are one and I am one and I am at war with the establishment and my first battle is to get something decent on TV.”
But the mood had changed. There was silence in the room. They all sat there slack-jawed.
“Crikey,” they said after a moment, “do you feint when you read dirty magazines?”
I saw my opening. It was now or never. “Who’s in charge here?” I brooded, my manhood still unfurled like a fire hose.
“Paul Jackson.”
“Okay, I want to see him. Now!” And I slammed my fist on the desk. Ow! Shit!
And out I strod. I didn’t even close the door. Anarchy is my middle name. Rik Anarchy Mayall or R.A.M. to my great mates. Not in a homoey way though. Not that I’ve got anything against the gay – sexual equality is my middle name and I’ve always been a rock hard feminist and homosexualist and some of my best darkies are friends.
Cut to: Paul Jackson’s office (just outside the door). SPLAM! I smashed the door open and walked into the office like a torpedo.
“Rik Anarchy Mayall here, Paul Jackson,” I said but I shouldn’t have bothered because he wasn’t there. I waited a couple of hours outside and read a magazine. I think I had a hot chocolate as well from the drinks machine. Then he came back. I think he must have been out for lunch.
“Paul Jackson, it’s Rik Mayall,” I repeated.
“Rik Mayall, oh my God! I’ve seen you countless times at The Comedy Store and you’re fabulous.”
“No, Rik Anarchy Mayall here, Paul Jackson.”
“Pardon,” said Paul Jackson.
“Anarchy is my middle name. You can call me R.A.M. because I ram everything that moves.”
“Do you mean sexually?”
“I mean anythingly. I ram everything out of the way of alternative comedy.”
“Alternative comedy? What’s that?”
“It’s something I’ve just invented.”
“Shit my pants, you’re the guy I’ve been looking for. Everything at the BBC is so slack and flaccid. We need a guy like you. This is just a sad right-wing old-fashioned upper middle class flat-minded soulless organisation of victorian leftovers that needs a shock of nuclear energy like your own unique brand of originality. So please come and work for us Rik Mayall.”
“Okay,”