Alanatomy

by Alan Carr

  When you get offered a part in a film and the name of your character is actually what you are, and followed by a number, then it’s probably not worth you clearing shelf space to make room for an Oscar. So when the role of Seagull Number One dropped on my agent’s desk it’s safe to say I wasn’t that excited. But when I heard it was for a SpongeBob SquarePants movie and I would be acting with Antonio Banderas I couldn’t help getting all unnecessary and of course I squealed (again), ‘Yes, I’ll do it!’

  I read the script, which admittedly didn’t take long, on the way to the actual recording studio and panic set in. I had quite casually assumed that it would be okay for me to just rock up; I hadn’t practised let alone researched the role, but then what could I do? Go to the seaside and eyeball holidaymakers, hang around a tip, nick some pensioner’s chips? I just had to hope that the director wasn’t going to get all Daniel Day-Lewis on my ass. Anyway, I was still cock-a-hoop that I would be meeting Antonio Banderas and sharing screen time with him. I arrived at the headquarters of Paramount all excited and was greeted by a woman at the door with a clipboard.

  ‘Of course your portrayal of Seagull Number One will just be exclusive to Great Britain as you’re not famous anywhere else in the world,’ said the woman and followed it up by telling me that, ‘Antonio obviously filmed his scenes in America. One of the joys of being a cartoon seagull is you don’t actually have to be in the same room, as you and Antonio can perform your lines anywhere.’

  ‘I sort of assumed anyway that Antonio wouldn’t be here in this basement in Soho talking to little old me,’ I lied, popping my Sharpie and Evita DVD back into my carrier.

  It was a very strange experience for me – sitting there with the script trying to fit my words into the animated beak of a seagull. And it dawned on me mid-session – I had been chosen to voice a seagull because I actually sounded like a seagull.

  People like Chris Evans and Dermot O’Leary choose to have ‘open talk back’ when they’re recording a show: that’s where you can hear the whole gallery through your earpiece – every mutter, every comment, everything that is going on in the studio transmitted straight to your ear. I choose not to have this – as I’ve said before, I have enough on my plate keeping up with the conversation I’m having with the guest let alone hearing ‘Oh, Pippa, get me a panini,’ ‘God, they’re boring,’ ‘What an awful dress!’ Sometimes they accidentally leave the ‘open talk back’ on and you can hear them slagging you off. ME! On my own show! On a few occasions I’ve heard, ‘Oh, get on with it’ or ‘Oh, please!’ if I’ve come up with a different question. Dawn French was on once and she mentioned that she went abroad to a villa to write her books. My producer commented, ‘Oooh! All right for some,’ speaking right over her so I missed her next few words. Unprofessionally, I came clean and told Dawn what the producer had just said. ‘Well, maybe he’d like to come out of the gallery and say that to me down here,’ she said. I could hear panic in my ears and a door opening and shutting quickly – somehow I didn’t think he was on his way down to speak to Dawn.

  Sometimes, though, your producer’s guidance can be invaluable – I remember interviewing the gorgeous film star Bradley Cooper, and I kept hearing my producer’s dulcet tones, ‘Ask him a question! Ask him a question!’ I’d just been there playing with my hair, spinning coquettishly on my swivel chair for five minutes, my eyes drawn lasciviously to his size 13 shoes, all dreamy thoughts of Rob Lowe evaporated.

  One thing I am a stickler for is research. I have been a chat show guest myself many a time and it does piss me off when people don’t do their research. I read all the books, I watch the films, I listen to their CDs, I sniff the perfume – I do whatever is needed as a courtesy to the guests, big or small. You have to – they have chosen your chat show so it really is the least you can do, don’t you think?

  I find it so depressing when you’re interviewed by someone and they’ve just got all their information off of Wikipedia. Nowadays Wikipedia takes itself a bit more seriously, even asking you to pay for it (yeah, right!), but back in the day, Wikipedia and in fact the internet itself was a free-for-all, it was bandit country – you could write whatever you wanted about whoever you wanted. I’ve sat down in many an interview and been asked what was it like having Lionel Blair as a dad. What? Or ‘I can’t believe you started out as the voice of Zippy on Rainbow.’ Pardon? Then the penny would drop and my eyes would spy a highlighted Wikipedia photocopy on the desk opposite – ahh, I see, they’ve gone to Wikipedia.

  Doing research is also good for avoiding any potential social faux pas – you really don’t want to be forcing a Disaronno down the throat of a recovering alcoholic or making a cheeky sexual joke to someone who just that week has been involved in a cocaine-fuelled orgy with a farmyard animal. You normally get taken aside by their agent and told not to mention certain things – sex tapes are often on the list, although I remember Colin Farrell decided to bring his own sex tape up and chat about it openly even though we had been warned not to, which I was impressed with – him being open, I mean, not the sex tape. Good for him, I thought, everyone had seen it so why not just mention it. Drug scandals and alcoholism are a no-no, which I suppose is understandable. With Ariana Grande there was a woman’s name that I couldn’t mention, I can’t really remember it but it was a really mundane name, something like Becky Tadlock. ‘Do NOT mention Becky Tadlock to Ariana’ – I didn’t even know who Becky Tadlock was/is and whether she was famous or not, I’d never heard of her. Of course, as soon as you get told not to mention something it sticks to your thoughts like chewing gum – I got myself in a right state about it and I started to panic. I was dreading her coming down the Chatty Man stairs and instead of asking if she’d like a drink I would just scream ‘Becky Tadlock!’

  I remember one occasion when a certain star graced the Chatty Man sofa and we were told in no uncertain terms by his PR not to mention or look at his hair. What? Well, as soon as he came down the stairs, I swear I could not take my eyes off it. Was it fake? It didn’t look fake. I spent the whole interview staring at his head like a nit nurse. Was it a syrup? I couldn’t tell.

  Sometimes the PR people tell us to specifically mention things, like their charity work or forthcoming tour dates, especially ones that aren’t selling, and sometimes we even get told to mention things that the interviewee doesn’t want to talk about. This happened in the Lindsay Lohan interview. We were told by her people that Lindsay wanted to come on Chatty Man and set the record straight – the drugs, the alcohol, her rumoured lesbian relationship with the DJ Sam Ronson, she wanted to get it all out in the open – the only problem being they hadn’t told Lindsay that. She thought she was coming on to talk about a people-trafficking documentary. Oblivious to this, I started to get excited. This is going to be good, I thought, this is what chat shows are made for, good old juicy titbits straight from the horse’s mouth. I really admired her for doing it; how brave of her and what a wonderful ‘up yours’ to the gossip mongers and the tabloids. We sorted out the questions beforehand and they were to the point, fair but not too harsh – we made sure there was enough scope for her to open her heart and do herself justice.

  She arrived on time and was really friendly in the make-up room, chatting to everyone and patting my red setters. The only telltale sign of her partying lifestyle was her gruff voice, which sounded the spit and dip of Marge Simpson’s chain-smoking sister Selma.

  With certain guests on the show you can feel a frisson in the audience, a buzz of anticipation running through them. This is normally reserved for the likes of Justin Timberlake or Lady Gaga but for this specific show the buzz was for Lindsay Lohan. She came down the stairs and as per I offered her a drink from the globe. She insisted on ‘just water’ and the audience tittered as that morning she had been photographed coming out of a nightclub at 4.00 a.m. with a coat over her head. I asked her about the open letter that the director of her latest film had written, criticizing her partying, but she was having none of it – s
he said she was always on time. I then asked about the partying – apparently she rarely partied. Okay, this is going well, I thought, and then I asked if she was dating.

  ‘That’s none of your business,’ she snapped.

  Fuck it, I thought. ‘Are you Arthur or are you Martha now?’

  ‘You bastard!’ she rasped. We eventually moved on to people-trafficking but the atmosphere stank. She was naturally wary of me and rightfully so, I had inadvertently gone all Paxman on her ass. I don’t want to be too harsh on her because, to be fair, she hadn’t been briefed properly and neither had I. Journalists are obsessed with her – that interview was way back in 2010 and it still gets mentioned now and they always want to know ‘What was she like?’ I feel sorry for her because people do have it in for her – they want to think the worst of her – and actually once people have an idea of you it is unbelievably hard to shake that image.

  Lindsay came back on the show in 2014 and what a transformation! She seemed ‘on it’ but in a really, really, good way. She was focused and in good spirits. Obviously people were disappointed that she wasn’t a hot mess but I was pleased. She came along to support Stand Up To Cancer too, she just turned up unannounced to help with the fundraising, which I thought was so sweet, such a lovely gesture. It’s nice to see people getting better.

  Sometimes the guests on the show aren’t even human – sometimes they are simply puppets – but they can still make an audience gasp when they hear they are on. We had Kermit from the Muppets on one series and that blew my mind as I am such a huge fan. Along with the rest of the world I grew up with the Muppets, had the books, watched the movies, I even had the Muppet Show album. I wasn’t the only one super-excited, so was my best friend, Michelle, who until a phone call on the day was probably the only person in the world who didn’t know they were puppets.

  ‘We’ve got Kermit on Chatty Man.’

  ‘Oh my God, I’ve got to come down and meet him – do you know if he’ll be in the green room after the show?’

  ‘Er, I hate to be the one to break it to you, but he’s more likely to be in a carrier bag, stuffed in a holdall, my love, but I can check …’

  I wouldn’t mind but she works in telly! I was tempted to say I was having a power lunch with Big Bird and would she like to join us just to see her reaction but I held my tongue.

  We do bend over backwards for our guests and we always give them a favourable edit. They can rest assured that the anecdote that went down like a cup of cold sick in the studio on the day will sure enough have a huge belly laugh on the end of it by the time it leaves the editing suite later that week. We will often film out of order to accommodate the stars, sometimes grabbing a guest, filming them, keeping them under wraps for weeks and then putting them out just before their blockbuster drops at your local Odeon. It’s a great way to get a good line-up on your chat show but it does have its flaws, such as continuity. Sometimes the filming is so out of sync, I’ve put on weight, my hair’s changed length or I’ve suddenly got a tan. There was one interview I did where once the poor sod had finished his chat, it looked like his interview had been so boring I’d actually grown a beard. I had two weeks’ growth! I interviewed the late great Sir Terry Wogan when he was promoting his book on Ireland, and we had filmed him earlier too so the show would coincide with the release date. We hadn’t realized that it was going to be the weekend of Remembrance Sunday, so for all my other guests I wore a remembrance poppy and then for his interview it was noticeably absent. It was like mid-show I had completely changed my moral stance on World War I and its fallen heroes. Do you know what? I don’t want to remember them after all. Oh yes, the perils of continuity.

  Everyone gets their knickers in a twist when we have a big film star on, but sometimes it’s the stars of the small screen who can provide the most entertainment. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want THE biggest names on the show but I must say it irks me a bit in the world of chat shows that an interview with an A-lister grunting one-word answers can trump a scintillating chat with someone a bit further down the pecking order. One of my favourite chat show guests has got to be Phillip Schofield, I always have the best time when he is on, and it’s not just because he brings tequila with him, oh no. Every time he comes on, we always end up getting totally smashed. However, the big difference between me and him is that he doesn’t mix his drinks, he sticks to tequila, and if you get the hundred-per-cent-agave one, allegedly there’s no hangover. I say allegedly, but I don’t have the willpower to stick to one drink; sooner or later I will drift on to red wine and that is a toboggan to hell, which goes some way to explaining why I’m found the morning after face down in a skip while Phillip is up bright and early, chipper as you like, discussing feminine dryness with Holly Willoughby. I was once so twatted on the show that not only did I forget I’d interviewed the very funny Romesh Ranganathan but I’d also mentioned his lazy eye. I don’t know what I said because I am so ashamed I can’t bring myself to watch the interview but apparently I said he had one eye on dim, one eye on dazzle. Oh the shame. However, it did not stop there. When I woke up the next day, my body refused to move on to the hangover phase and I was all a bit giggly still. Any dog owners reading this know that dogs do not care how rough you are feeling, if they need a walk, they need a walk, and they will not stop mithering you until you are in that park, anorak on, throwing sticks and poop-a-scooping. So taking advantage of having a hangover-free hangover, I ventured out with the dogs to Hyde Park.

  Everything was going well until we got to the Serpentine, the lake that curves so majestically through Hyde Park and Kensington Park Gardens. My eldest dog, Bev, had found a ball in the undergrowth and, wanting me to throw it, dropped it at my feet, whereupon it rolled into the Serpentine. I leant forward to grab it, but then it was as if all the tequila that I’d drunk the night before flooded forward to the front of my head and, becoming top heavy, I toppled in head first. Now I’ve seen news reports where animals have jumped in selflessly to save their masters from rip-roaring rivers and lakes, but no, not my two dogs; they just stood there wagging their tails, thinking it was a game. I managed to crawl out as luckily the Serpentine is not actually that deep, it’s just slimy and you can’t get a good footing. No one would be mistaking me for a swan any time soon. Seriously, it could have been a lot worse – say I’d hit my head and gone under! Can you imagine being pulled out of the Serpentine, dead with a tequila worm in my mouth – very Silence of the Lambs, don’t you think? Of course, once I’d managed to get out of the lake I had to get home across the park. I was absolutely sopping wet and it looked like I’d pissed myself. As I walked back, I actually did that thing they do in the movies, where they take off their shoe, turn it over and all the water tips out. Because of my wet clothes and quite frankly slimy appearance it was obvious that I had become ‘the man’ – mums were holding on to their kids’ hands saying ‘Come away from the man.’ And to add insult to injury, my hangover had moved on to the thumping head stage and I just wanted to get home. Most people splash a bit of water on their faces to wake themselves up after a heavy night but only I could choose a whole lake.

  It’s one thing having your own chat show and interviewing all these celebs, but it’s quite another going to award ceremonies and rubbing shoulders with all the stars at once. And when it comes to award shows you can’t beat the Brits – I just love their drunken randomness. You listen to an album all year and then you get to meet the people who sing the album and you just gush. It was there I first met Adele. It wasn’t the best of meetings – I waved at her across an after-party, then trying to look cool I did a Del Boy. Not at a bar like he did so fantastically well in Only Fools and Horses, but against a wall. I leant back on what I thought was a solid wall, but was actually a lift door that was in the process of opening. I leant backwards into the lift, getting no resistance from anything solid, until I fell flat like an ironing board on to the lift floor with such a thud that I had to check in the mirror to make sure I didn’t ha
ve ‘Otis’ stamped on the back of my skull.

  I’ve given away a total of three Brit awards and I’ll be giving my fourth one out this year. One year I was actually in the running to host the Brits but it failed to materialize. Mind you, even if the television executives had decided to go for me I think I would have turned it down – it’s such a thankless job. You go out there and you’re greeted by a wall of noise; hardly anyone is listening and the ones that are, are off their nuts. It’s better to just give an award out and then you can get on with enjoying the bevvies.

  Although it’s fun to see the performances it’s always nice to have a nose-about backstage and the great thing is that because you are part of the show you get armed with an ‘Access All Areas’ laminate. You can go anywhere and everywhere and believe me I do. So, you’ll just be there having a beer and Harry Styles will saunter past or Lady Gaga will be having a chat with a Pet Shop Boy. I was walking down the corridor one time and Rihanna was coming towards me. She stopped and pointed at me. I stopped and racked my brains, flicking manically through my cerebral Rolodex of insults, thinking, shit, have I slagged her off?!

  ‘I taught you the dutty wine!’ she squealed.

  ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘on Chatty Man.’