Ooh! What a Lovely Pair: Our Story

by Ant McPartlin

  It was called Slap Bang because it was on a Saturday night, which was supposed to be slap bang in the middle of the weekend, but we quickly discovered that wasn’t enough to hang an hour of prime-time entertainment on. The final problem, or at least the final one I’m going to go on about, was that Saturday night is a very unforgiving piece of the TV schedule. On Saturday mornings, you can mess around, dress up, do double entendres and, if things don’t work, a lot of people don’t notice. But if people are taking the time to sit down and devote an hour of their time to your show on a Saturday night, it’s got to be polished and slick – two things our new show definitely wasn’t.

  It also got us into trouble with the TV watchdogs again. We had an item on the show called Donnelly, which was a spoof of Parkinson, and every week I would interview a celebrity while Ant kept interrupting. You’re starting to work out why the show wasn’t a hit, aren’t you? One week on Donnelly, our guest was Bill Roache, who plays Ken Barlow in Coronation Street and, in the sketch, I shot him with a plastic gun. There were hundreds of complaints, divided equally between, ‘You shouldn’t shoot people on Saturday-night telly’ and ‘That Ken Barlow sketch was dreadful.’

  We knew the whole show was in trouble when, after a couple of weeks, ITV started moving it earlier and earlier in the schedule. We started off at 7.30 on a Saturday night and, by the sixth and final episode, we were on at 5.30 in the afternoon. If they’d shifted us back much further, we’d have been back on Saturday mornings.

  Not long after the series finished, our management team, Pete Powell, Paul Worsley and Darren Worsley, knocked on my door one Wednesday night just as me and Dec were about to head off for our weekly game of football. They told us that ITV had cancelled the show and that Slap Bang wouldn’t be coming back. It was the first real blip in our career at ITV. We were both, to use a technical TV term, properly gutted. Any other day we would have taken a deep breath, evaluated the decision and then gone and got very, very drunk. But, for once, we didn’t, we decided to go and do something else that left us red-faced and sweating – play football. It was the most aggressive, competitive game of our lives – we were like men possessed. Actually, Dec has been known to lose his temper on a football pitch before but, to be honest, that’s probably more due to small-man syndrome than anything else.

  Watch it, or you’ll get a smack in the mouth.

  I rest my case.

  It felt really good to go out and take some exercise and, when I say exercise, I actually mean running around trying to kick people. Although after that game, we were still, to quote Ant, ‘properly gutted’. No one likes to fail, and it felt like we had – spectacularly. Critics and audiences hadn’t liked it, and that hurts when you’ve worked so hard on something. On the way home, we stopped at a well-known Colonel-and-chicken eatery and, as we were coming out of the place, two drunk blokes walked past and said, ‘Oi, you two, that show you do on a Saturday night is absolutely shit.’

  It might not have been the most detailed audience research we’ve ever done, but it was impeccable timing and even more proof that we’d done the wrong show at the wrong time. On the plus side, they hadn’t thrown any chairs at us, but the whole thing left a bad taste in our mouths. The incident with the blokes, that is, not the chicken, which was delicious. Slap Bang was the first new thing we’d done as part of our exclusive ITV deal, and it had bombed.

  We did the only thing we could – we went back to Saturday mornings, played general-knowledge quizzes with kids, dressed up as cartoon characters and did sketches about farting.

  After all, we still had our dignity.

  Chapter 24

  After the gun-toting nightmare of Slap Bang, going back to Saturday mornings was like slipping on a comfy pair of old shoes. sm:tv and cd:uk were familiar by now, plus they had an audience who not only knew who we were, but were also on the same intellectual level.

  That’s not fair.

  You’re right – some of those kids were much brighter than you, as Challenge Ant proved on a regular basis. By now, we were getting some pretty amazing music guests on cd:uk. It seemed like we had a different musical idol of ours on every week. There was the band we’d seen at the Newcastle Riverside all those years ago, Jamiroquai, one Saturday; we had REM another Saturday; and then one week there was a little band that Ant in particular got very excited about – Blur.

  They’re my favourite band of all time, and Dec let me interview them on my own. I can still remember the first three questions I asked Blur: ‘What was the inspiration for your new single?’; ‘Can I have your autograph?’; and ‘Why do I have to stop cuddling you?’ Graham Coxon said he loved the show, which was a massive buzz.

  We even had Paul McCartney on. You might not know this, because you haven’t worked in the music industry like us two but, before his solo success, he was in a band called The Beatles. When we met him, we were both so starstruck, so worried about saying something stupid to him, that we hardly uttered a word. Fortunately, Conor broke the silence by asking if Macca knew where to get any decent jam.

  Then you had some American singers, who would make ridiculous demands – asking for fourteen dressing rooms and Evian water at room temperature. Frankly, it was absurd, we were the hosts of the show and we didn’t even behave like that.

  Too right – we only had ten dressing rooms each and didn’t even mind if our water was a bit cold.

  One of my favourite guests ever has to be the American singer Jessica Simpson. I don’t like her music; she was just part of something very funny that happened off camera. As was always the case on a show day, we had loads of kids milling around on the studio floor – some from the audience and some of them the children of guests or people who worked on the show. During an ad break, Jessica was standing on the studio floor, when I spotted a little boy about five feet away from her. He was looking at her and jumping up and down on the spot, clearly very nervous and excited. It was pretty obvious he was a big fan. I pointed him out to Cat, and, being good with kids, she went over to the little boy, took him by the hand, walked him over to Jessica and introduced him to the American pop princess.

  ‘Hello,’ said Jessica. The kid took one look at her and wet himself on the spot. Literally. Jessica’s feet were soaking. We later found out that the boy didn’t give a toss about Jessica; he’d been jumping up and down on the spot because he was desperate for the toilet. I don’t think Jessica ever came back.

  There was one other set of guests who nearly caused people to wet themselves – U2. They’re a band we’ve both loved for decades, and we couldn’t believe they’d agreed to come on cd:uk – they even asked us to pop into their dressing room and say hello.

  As you can imagine, we were just the tiniest bit nervous when we knocked on their door. When we walked in, the first thing they said, after, ‘You two look much bigger on the telly’ was ‘Thanks for having us on the show.’ That’s right: U2, the biggest band in the world, thanked us for having them on our little old Saturday-morning programme. They said we were introducing them to a new generation, and that they were actually fans of the show. I was expecting Jeremy Beadle to jump out of The Edge’s guitar case at any moment.

  They were so lovely that it seemed to prove that old rhyming showbiz theory, ‘The bigger the star, the nicer they are.’ They did a special session of four songs that would go out over the following few weeks, and it was recorded after cd:uk had come off air. We just got a couple of beers in, stood at the back of the studio and took it all in. It was amazing. A year earlier, U2 had released ‘Beautiful Day’, which was also being used on ITV’s coverage of the Premiership football. Their music was everywhere, and it felt like they were really on top form.

  A week later, we ran a U2 competition on cd:uk, and the prize was tickets to one of their gigs at Slane Castle, with flights to Dublin and accommodation at their hotel, the Clarence, included and, for a laugh, I added, ‘And isn’t it nice, Bono’s said we can go too.’

  And I said, ‘Is that right?
He’s a lovely fella that Bono, isn’t he?’ Obviously, we were just messing about, we never imagined Bono would be watching. He rang up after the show, called us a couple of cheeky buggers and told us he supposed he’d have to invite us to the gig now. It was weird to think that, just because we’d said something on telly, Bono had to do it (we started the following week’s show by saying, ‘Hello, welcome to cd:uk, Bono said he’d buy us some cars made of gold,’ but he didn’t fall for it twice). He paid for me, Ant, Clare, Lisa, Cat, Phil Mount and his girlfriend to fly over, go to the gig and then attend the after-show party at the Clarence.

  It came to the weekend of the gig, and it was unbelievable. We flew over to Dublin in time to watch the Republic of Ireland beat Holland in a pub, then saw England’s 5–1 demolition of Germany, and then sat next to Bob Geldof in the backstage area of Slane Castle. Bob Geldof gave me some good advice: ‘Never drop names,’ he said – or was that Bono? Or Prince Charles? I can never remember…

  You won’t be surprised to hear that, by the end of the gig, me, Dec, Cat, Phil, Lisa and Clare were all in ‘good spirits’, mainly because we’d spent most of the day drinking good spirits. By the time we arrived at the after-show party, we were plastered. When Bono came over to say hello, we just stood there, in a drunken haze, starstruck all over again and thinking, ‘It’s Bono, it’s Bono, and he’s talking to us.’ Phil, our producer, was particularly dumbstruck; he’s the world’s biggest U2 fan. He finally managed to open his mouth and say to Bono, ‘I can’t thank you enough for inviting us – the football was amazing, the gig was incredible and, all in all, it’s been, it’s been…’

  We all looked at him expectantly, waiting for the end of this sentence. Finally, after what seemed like an age, Phil, clearly overcome with emotion, looked at Bono and said, ‘It’s been a beautiful day.’

  He went silent. Bono looked at him. Phil looked at us. We looked at Bono, then Bono smiled and walked away. We all turned to Phil and asked the same thing, ‘What did you say that for? You can’t say, “It’s been a beautiful day,” to Bono. “Beautiful Day” is one of U2’s most famous songs!’ Phil was gutted, he hadn’t meant it and had just got tongue-tied. I still can’t believe that, of all the things he could’ve said, he went for that. He may as well have gone up to Bono and said ‘I’m dying for a pee and I don’t know where the toilet is. “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For”, but I’m going “With or Without You”.’

  We haven’t seen Bono since. Thanks, Phil.

  Chapter 25

  We were loving Saturday mornings but, now that we had an exclusive deal with ITV, we still had ambitions to host a show in prime time. Slap Bang hadn’t worked, so we needed to find something that did. We went to a meeting with the same ITV big cheeses who’d wooed us at the Hempel Hotel, David Liddiment and Claudia Rosencrantz.

  Even though the meeting turned out to be a bit of a milestone, we almost didn’t get into their offices that day. We arrived at ITV Network Centre with Paul, and Dec and I sat in reception while he went up to the receptionist, gave her his name and told her that he was there with Ant and Dec. When our visitor passes were ready, there were only two of them – one for Paul and one that said ‘Anton Dec’. I know people sometimes say we’re joined at the hip, but we definitely are two different people. After some confusion and explanation, they made us up separate passes and let us in. As we headed for the lift, though, I could’ve sworn I heard the woman on reception say, ‘It’s the third floor, Anton.’

  We finally got into the meeting, and David and Claudia kicked off by reminding us of a show called Popstars, which had been broadcast to great success on the channel. On the show, people from all over the country auditioned to be – you’ve guessed it – pop stars, and a panel of judges chose the five best singers to be part of a band, which was called Hearsay. They told us they had a new twist on the format which, incidentally, is a phrase you hear a lot in telly. Normally, ‘a new twist on the format’ means ‘We’re going to make a rubbish version of something that’s already a hit,’ but not this time – this was a genuinely fresh and new idea. They wanted to find a solo artist rather than a band, and the big twist was the public would decide who that was. The show was called Pop Idol, and they wanted to know if we were interested in hosting it.

  Normally, in a meeting like that, we’d listen to everything the big cheeses had to say, then go away and talk it over with each other and our management but, on this occasion, we took one look at each other, and said, ‘We’ll do it.’ We’d been huge fans of Popstars, and this sounded like a great opportunity for us. Unlike Slap Bang, this was a format, which meant we were part of the show, rather than the whole show, so it would introduce us to the prime-time family audience more gradually. By now, we’d learnt not to rush our relationship with viewers – we just hoped they’d take us into their hearts and their front rooms when they were good and ready.

  With Pop Idol, we’d found what we called our ‘bridge’ show, not because it stopped us getting into deep water – which it also did – but because it would be a bridge between Saturday mornings and prime time. We were also genuinely intrigued by it – could it actually find a genuine pop star? Who would the public choose? And what kind of clothing budget were we going to get? We’d had a music career ourselves, and we knew how tough it could be, so we were fascinated to see how the selection process would play out in the public eye. The whole thing would be an emotional rollercoaster that would require sensitivity from everyone involved. I think our exact words were, ‘This should be a right laugh – hope there’s plenty of crap singers.’

  It’s hard to imagine telly without phone votes, evictions or winners and losers now but, back then, things were really quite different. I know I sound like an old man, but I also know I’m right – I’ve checked. Big Brother was still brand-new, and there weren’t really any other shows on TV where the viewers controlled what happened. Pop Idol was certainly the first talent show to let the public choose the winner by phone voting, and that was a very bold idea.

  The first thing we did was go to the auditions, where we met the judges – Pete Waterman, Nicki Chapman, Neil ‘Dr Fox’ Fox and a bloke called Simon Cowell. We had met Simon once before, in the early days of sm:tv, and we liked him. He was honest, straightforward and very cutting, by which I mean very horrible about various pop groups. If there’s one thing you can rely on Simon for, it’s having an opinion – and, nine times out of ten, it’s an opinion that’s horrible and entertaining. Having known Simon for ten years now, I can honestly say that fame hasn’t changed him one bit.

  That’s absolutely right – he’s always been arrogant, conceited and self-centred, whether there’s a camera there or not.

  Generally, the judges were lovely, apart from Simon, who was arrogant, conceited and self-centred – did we mention that already? Nicki was very sympathetic towards the acts, Pete was like a mad uncle, and Foxy (as we’ll call Dr Fox from now on) was always searching for a funny one-liner about the contestants. After people had auditioned, he’d say things like, ‘I wanted a Ferrari, and you gave me a Mini.’ And as you can tell from that sentence, he never did find those funny one-liners…

  It was never our intention to go to all the auditions. Nigel Lythgoe, who was the executive producer (and had also been a judge on Popstars, where he was christened ‘Nasty Nigel’), said, as hosts, we should come down and, frankly, we couldn’t believe what we saw – so many of the singers were talentless, tone deaf and deluded. It was brilliant. We sat in the audition room and had to hide our faces behind sheets of paper because we were laughing so much.

  As well as giving us a good laugh, hanging round the auditions also helped us work out what the hell our role on the show was. Yes, we were the hosts, but we wanted to be as involved as possible and, short of getting lunch for the judges, we didn’t know what to do, so we did what we’ve always done and made it up as we went along. We spent a few hours sitting in the audition rooms, watching the contestants, and then
, in the afternoon, we took a big decision, a decision that instigated a drastic shift in our role on the show – we went and stood outside the audition rooms. That meant we could talk to the contestants when they came out. They would hug us when they were upset, or hug us if they were ecstatic – it was basically wall-to-wall hugs. These days, it’s an established convention of telly, the post-audition hug, but then it was something that just developed organically – it wasn’t as if we had a director standing behind us shouting, ‘And cue the hug.’ We wanted to hug these people because we knew what most of the contestants were going through – we’d had a music career and, as actors, we’d been to auditions, so we felt qualified to help them through the terror that is singing in front of the Prince of Darkness himself, Simon Cowell.

  The auditions tour went all over the country, which was all you could ask of it really – it wouldn’t have been much of a tour if it had just stayed in one place – and a real team spirit developed between everyone who worked on the show. The whole crew wore Pop Idol T-shirts, (except us – that would have looked weird), and there were so many different things to enjoy about travelling around the country. It was full of variety and every day was different. For instance, sometimes we’d drink wine in the hotel bar, sometimes we’d drink beer, and when we were in Scotland, we drank whisky. It was also great to work outside of London. Because the TV industry is based in London, a lot of TV professionals often lose touch with real people and real life. In fact, we were saying that to our chauffeurs and butlers only the other day.