THE ADAM BUXTON PODCAST - EP.6 - GARTH JENNINGS

Episode Date: October 21, 2015

Adam Buxton talks to director Garth Jennings about how his new animated feature is going, in-law stress, how he started himself on the road to his dream career, and the joy of Toy Story. Adam's Blog: adam-buxton.co.uk Adam on Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/adam-buxton 'When She Loved Me' sung by Sarah McLachlan (from 'Toy Story 2' 1999) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ElhbTsKsros 'The Deadly Seven' by Garth Jennings, reviewed by readers: http://www.lovereading4kids.co.uk/book/10669/The-Deadly-Seven-by-Garth-Jennings.html Podcast music/jingles by Adam Buxton except outro music bed from 'Wario’s Woods' game (Dr Buckles remix. Music composed by Shinobu Amayake, Soyo Oka, 1994) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week's podcast does contain swearing, almost immediately in fact, so I would switch off if that's going to be a problem. And it may be that the rest of the podcast doesn't actually contain swearing, it's all just in this bit about the swearing. Because last week I said, oh, there's no swearing in the podcast apart from one use of the S-word. And then it was correctly pointed out to me by several people on Twitter that I had overlooked some fucking and that's not cool you know if I was on the radio if I was on BBC six music still that would lead to more than a stern chat after the show it would probably result in the castle crumbling even further into the ground, in fact. But luckily, this is a podcast, and I can do what the fuck I want. Here we go.

I added one more podcast to the giant podcast bin. Now you have plucked that podcast out and started listening. I took my microphone and found some human folk. Then I recorded all the noises while we spoke. My name is Adam Buxton here. Welcome to podcast number six, which features several conversations with an old friend, Garth Jennings. Now, if you used to listen to the BBC Six music show with myself and Joe, then you'll already know Garth, probably. He used to fill in for Joe every now and again when Joe was off doing his film things. And Garth was also a guest on my big mixtape show. He's one of those people a bit like Louis that I'm very lucky to have as a friend and helps me out whenever he can with this kind

of stuff and it's always nice to see him and good to talk to him. For those of you not familiar with Garth let me tell you that he is a film director. When I first met him back in 1999, what a year that was, the explosion on the moon sent it out of earth's orbit and it went spinning off with martin landau and barbara bain but elsewhere myself and joe were preparing to make another series of the adam and joe show for channel 4 and we met up with garth we were hooked up with garth by our then producer fenton bailey up with Garth by our then producer Fenton Bailey and Garth was then working on music videos with his company Hammer and Tongs himself and his producer Nick Goldsmith and friend Dominic Leung and they made some amazing music videos one of the first ones I saw of theirs was the one for

Coffee and TV by Blur you know the one with the little milk carton. And since that, which I believe is now in the Museum of Modern Art in New York, they have a an exhibit there about the art of music video and Garth's video for coffee and TV is included therein. That's how good it is. And that's just the tip of the music video iceberg for Garth, he's done loads. He's done loads of really, really good ones. That's my considered critique. But he now works more or less exclusively in the world of feature films. Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

was his first foray into features in 2005, and he followed that up with a very different, much more personal and authored film, Son of Rambo, in 2007 2007 which i was in playing an angry teacher i was brilliant after son of rambo garth kind of wandered in the creative wilderness for a while trying to figure out what his next move was going to be i don't think he would resent me saying that but for the last well nearly five, he's been working on a very big studio project, which he talks a little bit more about in our conversation.

He's also written a book, a children's book called The Deadly Seven, which we don't actually speak about, but it's really good. If you've got young children, I would say some, you know, aged between about six and eleven or something, they would really enjoy it. I highly recommend it i'm going to do an audio book of it actually that's one of the things that i'm trying to do at the moment in my nutty room but anyway over the weekend garth and his family came to stay and we found some time to record a couple of conversations for the podcast we talked about how things were progressing with

his film an animated film that he is making and we chatted about some of our favorite moments from other animated films well mainly toy story and its sequels we also had a couple of conversations on the way to the pub one about the danger of getting together with other people's families including an anecdote about a run-in that garth once had with his father-in-law very enjoyable and another conversation which actually might be useful for someone about how to get into an exciting industry that you have no connections to. A lot of people approach Garth asking for advice for how to get started in films. People even ask me for advice sometimes and I always find it hard to know what to say.

Often it just comes down to a question of attitude, so Garth and myself talk about that. Anyway, here we go. It's quite a long podcast this week. In fact, it might even be the longest one so far, so perhaps you can enjoy it in several sittings. As I so often say to Santa, why don't we have a jingle? Ramble Chat Hi. Hey, man. How are you? I'm pretty great, actually. I've got a nice glass of wine here. You've got your beer. Sure.

Very cosy. There's something nice about being in a room that's soundproofed as well. It does make it even cosier, doesn't it? It does, doesn't it? It's all safe and cosy. So you're here for the weekend. Yeah. We've been coming to stay with you for probably, what, ten years?

I guess. On and off. At least twice a year. Right. We do a little Buxton retreat. Because you live in the countryside. And for us townies, this is as good as it gets. And now you're not even an English townie anymore.

No. I'm a French townie. I live in Paris right now. We moved there two and a half years ago. Because I am writing and directing a film for Universal Studios. It's an animated film with a company, Illumination, who made things like Despicable Me and The Minions. Oh, they've been doing well for themselves.

They're doing okay, aren't they? And yeah, so the team that made that asked me to write a film for them about... We met four years ago. I met the head of the company just for a cup of tea, literally just a cup of tea and talk about ideas. And after that, I said, oh, we had this chat about a certain subject. And I was like, let me write you a little sort of synopsis, an outline, see if there's any mileage in it. Very informal.

So I wrote a few pages up for an idea and we sort of shared it and giggled about it. And then I said, all right, do you want me to write a script? And he says, yeah, let's write a script. So I wrote a script and then I said all right do you want me to write a script and he says yeah let's write a script so I wrote a script and then I did another draft and by the time I got to the second draft he said uh would you be up for moving uh to Paris where the animation studios are and you know take your family with you and and come and direct the film and uh my wife had said to me before that meeting because she has an ESP thing, she said, if he asks you to make this, just say yes, and we'll just do it and see what happens.

So I said yes, right there on the spot, and then phoned Wazza after the meeting, and he asked us to move to Paris. We could actually do this. Wazza is your wife? Wazza is my wife, my lady wife. Louise. Louise, yeah. Everyone knows her as Wazza. It's a long story why that name is there but anyway was I said do it and then he asked me to do it so I said yes and and then a few months later we were we moved and it's it's been two and a half years now since we've been living

there that's an upheaval though how many children have you got I've lost I've got I've got four sons. Four boys. Yes. And they, at the time you left, were aged between about two and twelve or something? Yeah, one was two. Actually, we moved on the two-year-old's birthday. So he was three the day we moved. On the day we moved.

And because now they're twelve, ten, eight and five. It was a massive amount of naivety in terms of you know we just thought oh this will be great yeah no problem you know they're young and we'll you know we'll learn to speak french and all that stuff and you don't realize till you do something as big as that just how much you take for granted in your own life just knowing where them to get milk from or what time things are open or when something needs fixing which it does when you move into a new place with no furniture yeah how much you need to work out and starting new schools i just didn't realize i didn't take into consideration just what a big upheaval that was

also then your children going wait so you've taken me away from all my lovely friends to a place where i don't know anyone or what anyone's saying. So there was a lot of stress. And didn't you think there was a good chance that they might actually deal quite badly with it and get a little bit depressed and antisocial? Yeah. Again, I didn't really think about that. Wazza as well was very, very pro the whole thing. Let's just do it. Let's have an adventure. She'd gone out, worked it all out because I was too busy just trying to make the thing work the story work so yeah we turned up in

paris and this lovely place lovely part of paris and uh it's just around the corner from the studios the animation studios themselves are right around the corner from the eiffel tower you know you literally come out the building turn left and there's the eiffel tower so this is an american company right yeah they're an American studio. Illumination is based in Santa Monica in California, Los Angeles. But all the animation, every bit of it is done in Paris. Why is that? Because they're just using French animators as sweatshop guys.

There's no sweatshop aspect to it. I think there's a couple of things, probably a few things, and I'm sure the boss could answer this better than me, but he wanted to set up his own animation studio and he knew trying to set one up in Los Angeles would be very difficult because you've already got Disney and you've got Pixar up the road and DreamWorks and all these people already have covered it. So it's very hard to find a new team when everyone else's,

all these other studios have absorbed pretty much all the talent in the area. Right. In the country. So he was looking outside of America to find somewhere and met with companies in England, I think, and met with companies in France

and just connected with this chap that ran a company called McGuff. And they didn't have many people there and they tried to make a feature film, or maybe they had done, I don't really know the specifics, but they just clicked so they put put a sort of scrambled together a team of about 90 people to make Despicable Me. So that's all French animated, isn't it?

The whole thing. All of the films are all done there. And they brought in an American director called Chris Renaud to work with Pierre Coffin, who's a French director. And the two of them sort of worked together to make that film and then and then the team assembled around them it's predominantly french but there are a few american um people you know a part of that team but it's mainly french folk it's now the team there now is 720 it's huge i mean and again not all working on your film no no but I've got about... I mean, it's over 100 now.

I don't actually know. I actually have to take Polaroids of everyone that I'm working with and get them to write their name. And I have a whole wall in my office that is just the people I'm working with. So I can try and memorise their names between meetings. I can just look at this wall and try and go, that's Pierre, that's Guillaume, that's Zeb, that's Pef. They all have weird names as well.

They all have... They're abbreviating their name, they're Zebe. I just try and memorise everybody. It's almost impossible. And how long then does it take from starting work on an animated feature? This is going to be like a big tentpole animated feature. It is. It is going to be a big one christmas 2016 yeah it's due for release now the release dates can change sometimes but it's technically that's the worst what you're working towards yeah it's christmas 2016 21st of december i think and um yeah it's

a big one you can't really say too much about the plot or who's in it and stuff like that because you're in you know early stages of production still i suppose well it's a big one and you can't really say too much about the plot or who's in it and stuff like that because you're in you know early stages of production still i suppose well it's not early actually it's quite we're quite far in uh-huh you know we'll be done on in animation by the spring next year and we'll have delivered the film by the end of september i think next or the beginning of september next year yeah um and we've recorded almost all the voices quite a lot of the music and we're flying through

the animation right now it's looking amazing but I can't talk to you about the specifics yet until it's officially announced which could be any day now

right it's weird I mean this is four years now since I met for that cup of tea and to still be working on something where I can't talk to anyone about I mean, this is four years now since I met for that cup of tea. And to still be working on something where I can't talk to anyone outside of the company about what I'm doing is quite odd.

But you've got sort of A-list Hollywood talent in there. It's ridiculous. It's really silly. And they're brilliant. They're amazing. And how have you found it? I've got you in there as well. I'm allowed to say that, aren't I? Yeah.

You're in there. Of course, I've got to be in there. Dr. Buckles. I've been in all your films, haven't I? Yeah, I think pretty much. Yeah, no, because there's only been two so far. So that wasn't difficult. I wangled my way in there.

Yeah, but you're in this one. I've told my story before of the dreadful audition I did for Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy you know i still have a soft i still love you even more for doing that you went for it who never heard me um telling that story that the short version of it was that i when i found out that garth was going to direct after years of being a wonderful music video director with uh the company hammer and tongs garth then started working on these features and the first one was an adaptation of hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy and i i got this was one of the first people i knew who was doing a big

mainstream feature i was pretty impressed slash envious because i had it in my head then that oh i should be in films yeah dr buckle should be in films that's what i should be doing oh yeah that's right i should yeah well garth's a really good friend of mine so maybe maybe i should be in that film and i sort of i sort of would say it and i was thinking i don't want to be i don't want to be too cocky about i don't want't want to put pressure on Garth, because that's not cool, because we're friends. On the other hand, I do want to make sure that I'm in the film. So I would tease you almost every time that I saw you.

Pretty much. It did get to that point where I was like, all right, all right, all right, mate. There was one time, I remember your reaction. It was the most tired laugh that I've ever heard. After one of my jokes, it was like, yeah. Withering. Yeah.

Yeah, whatever. Okay, we've done that one. Yeah. And you're not going to be in the film. But then you lined, and I really didn't expect it, you lined me up with an audition. Yeah. Find myself in front of Susie Figgis,

one of the most powerful casting agents around. Yeah. And decided that the best thing to do... She's quite a handful as well. She's no shrinking violet. No, she's intimidating. Yeah. And I turned up with a towel and a bathrobe,

dressing gown. Yeah, you were in a dressing gown. Because I was auditioning for the part of Arthur Dent, which I really was not expecting or wanting because I thought, well, obviously I'm not going to play the lead. All I wanted was like a few lines. And I just thought, damn it, this is Garth's way of ensuring that I definitely don't get this thing.

Absolutely the opposite. I was like, right, come on, have a crack. Have a crack at this. Because most auditions, when you think about it, loads of people audition for things and they don't get this absolutely the opposite i was like right come on have a crack have a crack at this because most auditions when you think about it loads of people audition for things and they don't get them but they make an impression right and suzy's if you're going to make an impression with anyone suzy figgis was the one to do it with well i did you certainly did i did because she said all right should we have a go really You know, you go in, you sit down. And as I say, I've told this story before,

but you go and you sit down and have a little chit chat for a little bit. Yeah. And then she goes, okay, well, let's have a go at this scene. So I'm like, okay, just give me one second. Reach into my rucksack and pull out a bathrobe and put it on. And as I'm doing it, I'm sort of aware that it's not cool and that it's from Susie. Yeah. She's mainly looking at me like, what are you what are you doing?

You know, I just said, let's start reading the lines. And now you're reaching into your rucksack and putting on a bathrobe um and as i was doing i was thinking this is weird isn't it oh i shouldn't be doing this but then i thought come on be confident follow through follow through follow through and um so i put on the bathrobe i i do the audition to the to the best of my abilities i i thought, well, I won't be getting this. But, you know, I gave it a crack. And she said, I think she said something like, well, that was a little bit better than I expected. Or something like that.

A sort of like a poisoned compliment. And then I said, I think maybe slightly encouraged by that. I said um it's probably a bit weird me uh having the bathrobe and the towel i suppose and then she said put it this way if you'd done that in la you wouldn't work again i don't agree with that. And then Martin Freeman got it, and I thought, okay, fair enough. I was in Son of Rambo as a... You were in Hitchhikers, though. You were one of the workers at the end,

restoring Earth, too, to its proper state. I pushed down a plunger to make some mushrooms pop out of the ground. Yeah, which feels right. Sure. And then... I was like, which just feels right. Sure. And then... I was like, just give him something. Christ.

Give him something so he stops making those jokes. Give him that plunger. Do something like a plunger. Can somebody just help? But then you were nice enough to put me in Son of Rambo as a...

Now that was a proper part. A shouty science teacher. That was perfect. One day, no waiting around, went in there, had great fun. I could do the scene. You know, all it required was some shouting, which I can do. You are, I don't know anyone better at shouting than you. You're the shouter.

Yeah, I love to shout. I'm an angry, gnomey little man. And that's what the part required. It was a lot of fun, though, and it was great because you had to, at one point, have some scissors. It had to look as if you'd stuck some nail scissors or some hair clippers up your nose. Yeah. Because of the accent. And you were very funny with that. Because you gave us loads of different takes. I had to pull them out. Exactly, you had to pull them out.

Now, of course, they weren't really up your nose. We had to put CG tips in. You know, computer-generated tips. It's my favourite kind of tea. That's what they drink in host houses, isn't it? they weren't really up your nose we had to put cg tips in you know computer generated my favorite kind of tea that's what they drink in post houses isn't it i can't believe i set you up for that cg tips now uh you pull these out these half half pair of scissors and then we had to put the you know the tops on um but you did you gave me such a load of different reactions you gave me horrified to a level i've never seen before like i can do

horrified absolutely appalled and then the my favorite one which you didn't use because it was too much but it was so funny was that so appalled that you were going to throw up and you were doing that face that one somebody does just before they actually that sort of yeah which i think i probably just copied off jim carrey and yeah but it was brilliant. So we had a... I know, I gave you everything. I gave you my three faces. And shouting. The three faces of Buckleys.

Buckleys, give me your three faces and some shouting. Go, action! Wow, that was like having Toast of London inside my nutty room. Have you watched Toast of London? Matt Berry. Matt Berry. He's basically if I've had an argument with

Wazza, which isn't that often to be honest, or if there's a bit of tension I'll go to that Matt Berry voice and start talking to her like that. Just that. And that for some reason just unlocks all anxiety. Yeah, within seconds you are

He did that thing where he was doing like a nature, he was doing voiceover on UK rowing. Did you see that one? No. Oh, he just did a voiceover for something like an old piece of footage of men, you know, like the Oxford-Cambridge boat race. That was it.

And he would talk about it and he would say, and this changed the face of UK rowing. And that that for some reason made waza just fall about laughing so all i used to say to him you know we should be cleaning her teeth or something and i just go hey was um you know it's uh later we should probably watch some uk rowing and that would just get her get her in fits he's got one of the great voices the best voice ever hello i'm douglas rennan and i'm not a scientist but i do have a better understanding of what space is than any scientist

living today So we're walking to the pub, our local pub for lunch. And we've got all our children there up ahead. My brother is squadron leader. I have to say, your brother's been essential really, hasn't he? Yeah, it's essential to have a brother who is mature, sensible and single. Yeah. So it's a very specific set of skills that my brother has to, like, be good at his job and be a nice person and be popular with the children. But not such a well-rounded person that he'll attract a partner.

Well, maybe this is a good chance to set Dave up. You know, if anyone's looking for love out there and Yeah. And loves, I think he looks quite like you. So, you know, they've got a rough idea of what he looks like already. Yes, he's younger than I am. Well, he's about four or five years younger than I am. Yeah. And he's like a bigger, taller version of me. Yeah.

But he's an IT guy. Yeah. So there are some quite big chunks missing personality-wise. Are you allowed to say that? He's only three feet ahead of us. He can't hear. He's surrounded by bracken. Okay, that's true.

It insulates him from insults. A lot of people like that, though. They can fill in those gaps. I wonder if actually dates should be more like, less about impressing people with what you can and can't you know what you can do and more like look here's what i need this is what i need i'm missing here's what's missing right how do you feel about plugging that yeah and they could go actually i've got loads of that so that'd be useful because i i've got loads of that to spare like you're right that's

exactly what it should be and instead everyone focuses on what they have in common. Yeah. And, oh, what kind of music do you like? Oh, no, that's slightly different to the music that I like. Yeah, no, no, no, it's all going the wrong way. Like, I'm not going to be able to bear you. Yeah, yeah, yeah. If you're playing all that stuff. And what kind of movies?

Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. And actually, you're right, you should be going for someone totally opposite that you can actually stand to be with and explore in every conceivable way for however long you're together. Yeah. Are you quite similar to your partner, to Louise? To Louise. Like she doesn't get too stressed out, this is how it seems from the outside. That's absolutely how it is, the truth.

And she's on a very even keel yes and you are too but no every now and again you've seen me pop i've seen the top hat go on victorian dad get to your rooms i've had it yeah yeah no she's uh remarkably laid back now that can be infuriating at times, the whole thing about people's strengths often being their weaknesses as well. Orza will be so laid back that time doesn't really matter. Right. So she does no problem, you know,

being late for a plane or you know. Oh, she doesn't get anxiety about that? No, no problem at all. Whereas I I'm very anxious when it comes to time. I don't know why. How early are you going to get to an airport then? This is my dad. You're supposed to check in two hours before an international flight, right?

Yeah. That's still the standard. Yeah, but I've been three hours before. Three? I know. It's pathetic. And I get it from my dad, who has actually got worse. He would admit, as he's got older, he will have packed a week before he's going anywhere he will leave he'll say oh i've got a if he's got a 12 o'clock

flight or a train to catch he'll be there at something like 9 or probably 8 30 just to be on the safe side and it'll always be like well you know there's going to be traffic that time of the day he'll say or uh you know there's been a strike in some country and that could affect things. And I want to be prepared. And he likes to be there with his book and his cup of coffee. He likes to be there early, just sitting there waiting for it. I'm a bit more like that. But Woz is so laid back.

She's the opposite. And actually, it's the perfect thing. If you want to have a big family, you've got to roll with it. And be better at sort of, you know, just sort of going with the flow a bit more. Right, you can't control every single aspect. And you've got four children,

four male children. Four males, yeah. So that is mental. It's ridiculous, yeah. In a way, you're killing the world. We are part of the reason why it's the reason. You're draining the world's resources. However, in your favour, I would say that you're both

nice people and you'll probably raise good members of society rather than deranged killers. Yeah, I definitely think we've knocked all the killing off my head. I think that's been extinguished any chance of that but no they're a good bunch but it's been a real wake up for me because i come

from a tiny family christmas for me was about six people and that was enough it didn't feel like we were missing out so it's just you and your sister it was me and my sister and then grandma and grandpa would come around yeah and that was it um and then i go to waz's house and christmas day was 22 people around the table what and prior to that there'd been about 30 i'm not exaggerating about 30 just cousins just they're everywhere yeah because waz is the youngest of five so she's used to sort of a big noisy mess and people coming and going at different times and i'm more used to i'm used to sort of things being on time and being nice and tidy and as a film director you're always trying to make everything work in the most economical way possible so my day is spent sort of fussing over

moments and of course family is the opposite of that you come home and it's just a free-for-all so christmas time is coming so christmas time is coming and we will actually go to my wife's parents for christmas this year it's a sort of tends to be an on and off thing yeah and it's weird because i was one of those kids that you could like you could i would always chat to your mum and dad yeah do you know what i mean i was brought up to be uh you know you say hello to the mum and dad yeah do you know what i mean i was brought up to be uh you know say hello to the mum and dad so confident a confident little chap well not so much confident but just like i was a precocious little prick an annoying little bastard yeah uh no it was much it wasn't like hello you know it wasn't that it was just you know i would say hello and how are you and all that

sort of and and mum's okay wasn't he nice yeah so why can't he be a bit more like that you know uh it's all superficial really but it was uh it was just that i was just told and taught to be that way so i've never had a problem meeting other people's mums and dads and in fact most of the time i quite like it like i'm going to chat to your dad this afternoon it'll be great yeah but the only the one part the one mum and dad I struggled with was my wife's mum and dad whose her dad is quite he's a lovely chap I should start by saying he's a very very nice man when I first met him though just as we were walking down the path to their front door so what's your dad's name and was my wife goes oh it's

it's a Caligula he's Michael or or michael whatever yeah so i go um hello mike and he shakes my hand he looks furious you went for mike oh it's well no because everyone calls him mike oh okay everyone his wife the milkman everyone calls him mike not me apparently i'm not allowed to call him mike he went into the next room and according to was a sibling said he just called me mike and i had to call him mr pring for six years six years and it's so hard so how did that um filter back to you then via was uh i think it was this that's a really good question i can't remember because it's it is 19 years ago yeah but i think it was his, was his mum. So you're... Who said, I think it would be better if you called him Mr. Pring.

Right. And was was wonderful... Michael's totally cool, but, but he was wondering if maybe you could drop the mic. Yeah. Well,

after six years though... Wreck the mic, don't check the mic. After six years, I remember being there for a birthday of his and he came into the kitchen and he said, all right, well, seeing as I'm, whatever, let's say he was 70 or something.

See, 70 now. You don't have to call me Mr. Pring anymore. You can call me Michael, but not Mike. Did he say it with a twinkle in his eye? Nope. None twinkle? Nope, no twinkle. And it was all funny because the trouble is you can't call someone

Mr Pring in a normal conversation. You wouldn't say, oh, Mr Pring, could you pass the salt? Right. It just is ridiculous. Yes.

You just avoid the name altogether. So it was a little bit tricky and it's the only person I've ever had a, I'd say, proper lose my nut with,

you know. Things came to to boiling point. Yeah, and there was this one holiday, we'd all gone away, and he can be, he can be a little bit heavy-handed, and what I noticed was that when I'd go back to their house for these Christmases,

it didn't matter how old my wife's siblings were, or how professional they were you know there's doctors and surgeons and you know guy guy that runs a string of pubs I mean they're all really bright professional people but you get them back around the table and it's like everyone goes back to being ten years old again in terms of how they're seen around the table do you know what I mean yes those relationships are forged pretty early on, and it's very hard to change the way you're perceived within your family.

Oh, God. Do you know what I mean? Completely. You don't get any respect. No. And... You could go to the moon. Your mum would still...

Someone in your family would still think you're an idiot. Definitely. And that's fair enough. But it used to drive me mad, because I come from a family where people... You know, where we'd stand up for ourselves if there was a bit of a fight or something not a fight but if somebody challenged you you challenge the hell back so and i noticed her dad would say things and no one would you know quite spiky things but he sort of would say things like well that's a stupid idea or something to one of his children and i think

whoa that was quite that was a bit below the belt. And they would just quietly absorb that. Yeah. And so I don't know where I have this. It's the only time I get riled in that sort of situation. I remember being on holiday, and he made my wife cry, because he said, he kept saying, well, I think your children's haircuts is ridiculous.

They look like girls. They look like girls and uh something else and and at one point she said something in return and she'd use some word that provoked this response that's a big word for you louise oh so she cries at that point i have a dr david banner snap yeah and i can't stand for this i go no and then. And I go, no, no, no, no, no. And I actually genuinely don't remember what I said. But I do remember leaning across the table with my finger pointing right at his face. You unsheathed the finger. I totally unsheathed it.

Like fully out. Finger out, into face, pointing and waggling. Mate. And I don't remember what I said. But I remember I was so angry and shouting and shouting and saying,ling. Mate. And I don't remember what I said, but I remember I was so angry and shouting and shouting and saying, that's it. But I do remember the aftermath,

which was, I finished saying whatever it was I wanted to say, yeah? I was like, and that's enough. But I didn't want the dinner to go on for it all to be normal again. Do you know what I mean? I didn't want, oh, well, gas to spit. And I said, and that's the end of dinner too.

And the lemon tart had only just come out. Literally, it just arrived on the table. My poor brother-in-law, he'd just got it up to his face and I just cleared the table I just cleared everybody's plates took them out of their hands put all the lemon tart back onto one big plate and walked back out that's the end of dinner

that's it, no one's allowed to go back to it being nice after this, after what you did your children are not at the table at this point. No, they were young at the time. So how many adults are sat around? Six, and one of my wife is crying now. She's crying, and is she crying? Are you getting the sense that she's crying with joy?

Well, no, there's no joy. Because she's so proud? No, she's not proud at this point. We're all thinking, we're all thinking, oh no. Oh, Jennings is just... This isn't you know it wasn't nice what mr pring said yeah but right now jennings has just blown it what he took it too personally i took it as an attack on my lovely wife who's amazing and she didn't deserve that

so i went for him and cleared the plate so no one else was allowed to have a nice time no lemon tart no tarto citron for you and uh what you should have done is you should have taken all the lemon tart and then eaten it in front of them this by the way this is delicious yum yum yum yum yeah yeah yum yum yeah but yeah i wish i'd done that you never do the right thing in the moment you never even make it put an eloquent sentence together i don't you you are shaking at this point shaking with fury you know got that breathing going on like you've been crying but you haven't been crying you've just been so furious yeah your voice is all wobbly and then you go out to the kitchen you put all the plates down. What is Dr. Pringles doing about this?

Silent get up from the table. By the time I came back in, everyone had gone. Yeah, everyone had gone to their rooms. So that wasn't great. And here's the weirdest thing. Immediately afterwards, as I'm sure you can imagine,

I'm regretting it like mad. Even though I think, damn you for saying those cruel things. Yeah. And being a bit of a bully. Well, man, that was some righteous indignation on your part. Well, you don't make your daughter cry and just, you know, anyway. So I'm getting a bit upset.

But at the same time, I think, oh, it's only two days into an eight-day holiday. No. That's not great timing. Where were you again? Oh, it's Portugal. Portugal. There's no escape. It's not like we could pop home you know everyone's in their

respective rooms either cleaning their teeth or whatever talking to their partners and you can just feel the blimey that what an idiot he blew up there

didn't he what about the tart what happened to the lemon tart you know all this sort of stuff yeah it was delicious but the most amazing thing happened to Zoe obviously Woz was upset

and she was upset about what he said but also saying oh I wish you hadn't said that and i completely understood and i'm saying i am sorry the first thing i'm going to do in the morning is apologize to everyone so i was up at some ridiculous hour because i couldn't sleep i felt terrible about having uh reacted the way i did at the same time still like oh but he deserved it yeah no roughy that night no no no no roughy no chance of that no so i'm waiting there for everyone to come down and first of all was a sister comes down

the next morning it's about six o'clock or something we all got babies at this time so rachel her sister comes down i go rachel i'm so sorry about last night and i could tell she was a bit like you know oh yeah it's all right which meant yeah you overdid it right it was her way of saying yeah you went too far with the whole clearing of the lemon tart but let's just pretend that didn't happen you know that may not be what she was thinking but that was the impression then her husband came in i said listen john so sorry about losing it last night and he's like and he's chuckling going oh shame i was getting into that lemon tart there and he's irish that was why i did that voice that was accurate that was not bad was That was why I did that voice. That was accurate. That was not bad, was it?

That was good. You were straight back to Ireland. I felt like I was in Ireland. So John's come in. Yeah. And he's sort of funny. And he's on my side. He's very sweet and everything.

And then Maureen comes downstairs. Maureen's my mother-in-law. And I'm thinking, this is the one. This is the person I'm afraid of. Because she's, you know. She's the matriarch she runs the show yep so down comes Maureen and I and as I'm saying I literally meet her at the bottom of the staircase go Maureen I am just about last night I'm so before I can finish my sentence she puts

her hand on my arm and says quietly I only wish more people would stand up against Mike and walked off I was like wow that I did not see coming and she walks off to the kitchen like that's and that's all i'm going to say about that you know and then mike comes down yeah and he is my best friend in the world shut up he is hello good morning i'm and i'm staggered i'm like good morning Michael I'm sorry about last night oh laughs that one off and then can't say enough about how how funny the children are

and avoiding all mention of their ludicrous haircuts he was right their haircuts were ridiculous they looked like sort of they looked great they looked like they just stepped out

of Vice magazine yeah but they were only like two or three years old that's ideal for Vice magazine but yeah so it worked out it It did work out. I was pleased afterwards. But yeah, it's amazing how you can suddenly find yourself from nowhere on a holiday with a lemon tart sitting in front of you, suddenly waggling your finger

and screaming at somebody. Two days ago, I was sent a really short email from a guy that lives across the street from me. So I hardly know this guy, but he sent me an email saying, my wife's secretary's daughter would like to do work experience at your company and these are the two weeks she wants to do it in, just in the run-up to Christmas. Just laying out his terms. Just that. That was it.

No, not even a deer or hello or anything as if he typed it with his thumb in the middle of doing something else and because i get these things all the time and i am more than willing to help the enthusiast or the people trying to do their stuff i will always help if i can but you've got to at least show a bit of willing so i wrote back and said uh if if willing yes show a bit of willing one of the others just show a bit of willing no i wrote back and said um just ask your wife's secretary's daughter to write a letter don't expect things to just be handed to you yeah that's the worst work experience you could give anyone and do you mean the job itself might be fine but you will have learned nothing about how to get it yes

because that's half the struggle isn't it yeah what's your policy on reading people's scripts i bet a lot of people send their scripts yeah they do and again most people are again they're just trying to get started they don't know how to get going a brother or something of somebody that worked once at our company is no's no longer there, had said, oh, I have this connection to you via someone who used to work at the company you're at. Would you be up for reading some of my scripts? And I wrote back and said, look, I'll do my best, but I'm not the best at giving story advice.

I tend to write for myself, and if I give notes, it ends up becoming something I'd do rather than you would do. I'm not the best at that. But I can always be enthusiastic, and if I give notes it ends up becoming something I'd do rather than you would do you know I'm not the best at that but but I can always be enthusiastic and if I you know if there's anything I can help with I will do my best and they sent me five scripts oh so I did write back to this person who's very nice and I said look it's quite a lot being a script reader and giving notes that's a full-time job that people are employed to do, right? Yeah, and I don't take the note-giving bit lightly. I think that's quite important that if you're going to give somebody advice or notes or whatever, and especially if you don't know them, you better get it right. Because you don't want to steer them in the wrong direction.

Anyway, so it's quite a tricky one. But do you, presumably these days as well, it's quite dangerous in the film world to read people's scripts because people are so litigious that's probably a really good point i probably shouldn't read them anyway yeah because they come out uh a few years down the line and they'll say hey you see i sent you my script you stole my idea yeah i should probably be more sensible you know what from this moment on i'm gonna start a new policy well at least that's an excuse you can give them it's true i could say look i don't take unsolicited scripts if you want me to read them send them via i know my agent or something we're

coming up with a good plan here this is good yeah yeah so what is the best way though how did you um break in did you ever do that did you get a leg up from someone you knew we had not i grew up in um in effing in essex and there's no showbiz in my family i mean it's a it's a great family but my dad works in a bank though the closest we got to being in anything you know connected to anything theatrical was the fact my mum used to do design the windows at dickens and jones which used to be on regent street but that was it my school i think we were the first GCSE year and it seemed that along with that we got this thing called work experience which up until then no one had really heard of so roughly what what date was this 87 88 somebody came into the school and said right we're going to do this thing called work experience

and you all had to fill out a questionnaire, which basically involved ticking boxes, things you liked, things you were doing okay at school, and that was given to a computer, apparently. Well, I can't imagine what kind of computer it was, but apparently it went into this giant computer, and the computer went, this is what you can expect to do for the rest of your life. You've got this sort of printout.

You did on, like, Telex paper. Yeah. Of careers. In ingested into the zx spectrum exactly the spectrum spat out your future and it was in the form of a gray list of jobs and i remember getting this list and everyone was excited because you got the goal the computer's given us a list of things that we could do with our lives and it came back and it was the most depressing list of my life only because nothing that I wanted to do was on that list yeah not even close it wasn't even like oh well that could lead to a good thing it was rubbish anyway so you had to take that

list to the careers advisor teacher what person I don't know who she was a Korean advice teacher she was Korean and yeah she said all right well we looked at your thing here and as you like drawing so much what about the town council planning office where they do a lot of drawing hey and you could help with the photocopies that they do there and drawing in the town council planning office exactly it was like a good time well you know it's very hard I mean there was a new system and also what do you do with your own kids?

I mean that's perfectly yeah decent job but maybe not the most exciting. No so I went home that night and I was all cheesed off and my dad came home from work and he's sitting at the table and goes what's up with you? Ah I've got careers advice thing I'm gonna work in the Town Council offices for three weeks if they can get me a job there you know if they can get me a job there he's like oh what do you want to do and I said well I'd like to be a rock star I genuinely said that I'd like

to be in a band or something were you not embarrassed to say that? No I was like well that's what I'd like to do and he goes he sort of laughs and goes yeah well you can't do that but you could. Good for you for saying it but he did go he goes but maybe we could write to one of those

recording studios you know where they actually record the songs maybe you could do some work there and the whole time I'm thinking nah

it's never going to happen good for your dad so my dad goes come on let's write a letter and he made me write this letter out three or four times because my spelling was always quite bad

and my handwriting was wonky as hell so he made me write this thing over and over again until it was really nice and we sent out 50 copies and you were excited though you were up for this plan i was really up for it because dad has an infectious enthusiasm once he's got the you know bit between his teeth you're off it's happening and back come 50 rejection letters

so that was a great first lesson are you bummed out at that point yes yeah of course i was thinking oh that's that that's that done and dad goes no there's one here that was quite nice they said no but they've also given you a list of other places you you can consider that's the weak one hit them again so we write another letter again i'm sort of rushing it a bit and he makes me rewrite the thing and um and again a rejection comes back uh at this point i do give up and feel really just cheesed off and uh apparently what my dad did then was at his lunch break he rang up the head of the personnel department at this recording

studio and said look he is a dog's body Just take him on for a couple of days. If it's a problem, send him home. But otherwise, you've got free labour for three weeks. He'll be great. That's it. And the woman just gave in to him and said, all right, all right, OK, send him up. So dad comes home and goes,

you're starting work at CBS Recording Studios next week. I'd better get you a travel card. So I was delighted. And cbs was this is before it was bought by sony and it was on i think great titchfield street i might be wrong about that but it was a spectacular recording studio it wasn't any just any old recording studio and you had bands like uh what do we have coming in well george michael would come in and do a remix of one of his tracks i remember remember Junior, Pepsi and Shirley. Junior?

Junior. A mama used to say. Yeah, he was so nice. Pepsi and Shirley came in and I really liked them. They were in Wham, weren't they? They were the backing singers in Wham. Right. Yeah, they were the girls with the top knots.

But when you're 15, and up to that point, you just assume that the entire entertainment industry, the thing you're most obsessed with, is just done by other people. Not people like you. It's just other people that do that. And then suddenly you're in it. Even at a super low coffee-making level, you realise that everyone there is just a regular person.

And they just got into it, A, because they loved it, and B, they just sort of kept on banging on the door. And so you had a good positive attitude yeah I was the sparky guy you weren't like sitting around and no sighing whenever they asked you to go out and buy some tea bags no I honestly felt uh like it was a gift to be there like I was almost in fact I was almost probably a bit too cautious i would stay out of everyone's way and make the coffee and then quickly leave the room yeah you know like i just felt like ah the whole time i really shouldn't be here i remember this one guy who's probably a booking agent or some

somebody worked in one of the offices upstairs and he saw me go past he goes oi oi come here listen to this and it was the new smith song i can't remember which one it was but i know it was the smiths he goes listen to this and he presses play on a tape recorder and he plays a smith song full blast then he goes they're the best band in the world aren't they and i go i don't really know the smiths he goes what do you mean you don't know the smiths you've got to know the smiths even old people like the smiths i remember him saying that and it was just amazing to go home thinking that's what these people do all day long people that absolutely loved what they were doing yeah and um so i didn't end up going into the music business but it did make me think you should definitely have a shot at doing the thing you

like doing yes and not necessarily take that piece of paper you got given um too seriously you know that was quite a downer getting that bit of paper yeah and i think it's probably the same for a lot of people getting the bit of paper that said yeah here's the jobs right aim low you know don't get your hopes up if you're lucky it's the town council planning office for you i always find on sets i mean i'm not i'm not on uh film and tv sets very often at all but the times that i have been i'm always impressed by the the sparky ad or the runner who's just totally on it you know yeah it's so easy to stand out yeah in those situations oh my god but you know and that doesn't mean to say that you can't screw up every now and again quite massively. But if you've got an attitude... No one cares if you've got the right attitude.

Yeah. Yeah. If you're just like, if you're clearly on it and want to do a good job, that is so valuable. And yet there are always people on these, you know, you're in Pinewood or something, and there's some runner who's, like, everything's a drag. Yeah. And, oh, do I have to? And it's like, oh, my God.

You're like, man, there's so many other people that would love that i think those people tend to be the ones that got there too easily right like you say i mean we had someone once give us a cv that was a it was like a color swatch that you would get from a paint shop you know when you're choosing your wall colors and it was various shades of brown starting starting with very, very light, through to deep dark brown. And next to it had the names like, had names like, weak, weak, builders, it was basically different types of tea, and basically the CV was on the back, you know, what this guy had done, and just, by the way, I make great tea, so just tick the color you like and i'll make sure your tea comes to you that color every you know that that strength every time oh and on films

film sets kind of run on tea yeah and even though it was just a bit of a bit of a laugh it was such a sweet clever little thing to do the effort that had been made meant that that guy just got went straight to the top of the pile yeah um and it's amazing to me now how many people that were runners or assistants on our sets to begin with and now not only you know the top of their game but producing big movies now and you know really really very successful in their field yeah yeah it's lovely it's great when the good guys win. You're the first guest on the podcast to actually be in my sound booth. It's really nice being in here.

And I have to say, I think the podcast is a smash. And I'm not just saying that because I'm sitting in front of you I think quite a lot of our friendship has been you know backing each other up when things are down or like encouraging each other when we're getting started on something and definitely as your pal now I would say keep going you know don't take any criticism too much because I know you know where you know there's a lot of you get a lot of feedback whatever you hear me um ranting about the guy that sent me a message the other day? Yeah, yeah. And automatically I want to run to your rescue and go, don't worry about it. It's fine.

Ignore it. Were you thinking, don't talk about that? Not don't talk about it. Because I know, I think it's funny that you talked about it. And John was very funny on that subject as well. But I'm terribly protective of you. If you get, if you, because I know you'll read that feedback. My squirmy mind.

You'll go there, you know, and it's one of the good things that you do is you take on board what people are saying and you try and adapt or like take it on board. But sometimes I just, I want to just bowl in and say, stop reading it,

don't listen to them, keep going. And what are you like then on the criticism front? I mean, obviously the first film I did, Hitchhiker's Guide guide to the galaxy i had the rough with the smooth there because we had lots of people that loved it and still send messages and things and and other people the one guy wrote like a 10 000 word essay i'm not exaggerating apparently a 10 000 word essay on why it was so bad and um so that was actually it was brilliant to start with that in many ways, because that sort of taught you everything you need to know about how to handle opinions and which ones matter and which ones don't.

So I feel pretty robust because, you know, the next thing we do is going to be launched in quite a big way and I'll be judged, you know, in accordingly. be judged you know in a accordingly but i feel very happy about it all but uh and and the nice thing about animation is you really do or there's millions of things that are nice about it but but one of my favorite things is the fact that you get to press every button one of the things i loved about films like toy story or finding nemo was the fact that you could have something really funny really inventive moving and everything it could be it could really be everything man I remember the first time I saw Toy Story me and Joe went to see it and it was one of those moments when I was talking to Leanne in the um I love that podcast and we were talking about Prince and and I was saying to her that one

of one of those moments that I had where you just think, oh, this is a thing. I'm witnessing something special and revolutionary was when I saw the video for Alphabet Street. Yeah, I remember that. For the first time. And I was like, oh, my God, this is special. And then when me and Joe went to see Toy Story, I remember having that feeling as well. It's like, OK, everything's... That's it.

Something's changed. I was with you. When you were talking about Prince with Leon La Havas, I was reminded of the fact that I was such a huge Prince fan. I was part of the Prince fan club. So much so that I know for a fact that if you freeze frame some of that Alphabet Street video, you can see a little message from Prince that says, don't buy the Black album, I'm sorry. Shut up. Is that true? That's absolutely true, yeah.

That's how deep I was into Prince. I went to his gigs, I caught his towel, and I've still got it, and it's got brown foundation make-up. It looks disgusting, because obviously it looks like he's wiped his bottom. But I kept it all the same. But it's actually just like a... Have you still got that there?

Yeah, yeah. Not around. You know what? You know I stored a load of stuff in your barns? Yeah. It's in one of those boxes in your barns. I'm going to rifle through. You should have a rifle through.

But make sure it's the Prince towel and not the other towels. Wow, that's good. You should have that under a glass jar. You know, Mark Maron has the cup that President Obama drank from. Oh, I'd do the same. When he was on the podcast, the WTF podcast, he's now got Obama's cup under a glass jar. Oh, I would do the same thing.

I really would. If it was Prince. Not many other people I would do that for well you see if i uh do this podcast long enough and get enough respect yeah i'm gonna get david cameron in because that's yeah everyone everyone will be so excited yeah so will he yay buckles has got david cameron i'm so happy for him it's so funny when you think about the English equivalent of what Mark Maron's done. He gets Obama in, Obama walks in and he's all

fabulous. Could you imagine Cameron coming in here? Cameron comes in, we have a light, silly chat, then he sticks a private part of his anatomy in a coffee cup and I keep that under a glass jar for the rest of my life showing it off to people

so your children are going to be excited seeing your movie yeah it's funny isn't it they're going to grow up thinking that this is a normal job whereas I grew up thinking this was an extraordinary job to have

you know you didn't think you know someone working in the movie business was an ordinary thing but yeah they're even going to play little working in the movie business was an ordinary thing. But yeah, they're even going to play little parts in the film. They're little voice parts. Not big ones, but loud ones. That's great.

Yeah. What were their favourite animated films when they were little? Well, when they were smaller, definitely Toy Stories. All the Toy Story movies. I remember taking Oscar and the kids to see Toy Story 3 and Oscar just sobbing through the end Toy Story 3

and I think I have again spoken about this before but Toy Story 3 has that scene where they all believe that they're going to die yes and

they're sat there and they're going towards a furnace aren't they yeah the flames of hell they're going to be engulfed by the flames of hell and they they going to be engulfed by the flames of hell. And they hold hands and they look at each other and in that moment it is understood that this is it.

And they've come to the end of their lives. It's amazing. And it's really extraordinary. It's like just being punched in the chest. Well, what's lovely... To see it in a children's film, eh? And also to really have that kind of terror and then a sort of peaceful acceptance.

Well, it was the fact that Woody's scrambling. He's desperately trying to sort of find a way out still. But when he looks up at the others, he sees them all looking at him with these sort of solemn expression on their faces, like, woody just stop and he looks at them like no no no you can't give up now and then they take his hand and then they all hold hands together and that they even have like the sort of bell ringing don't they in the score isn't it going like dong dong and then they're holding each other's hands and closing their eyes embracing themselves

for for the end of their lives and it's the most unbelievable thing in the world and if ultimately you're leading up to one of the best reveals ever which is that the claw comes back right and it's operated by those three little guys that were saved by the claw or two little guys the claw i mean what that's just so brilliant that is next level brilliance and you know and the fact that my lot my all my children respond to that and I respond to that in the same way makes me so happy it's so lovely to be able to share a moment now of course they receive all those signals on a slightly different level they haven't lived you know they're not 43 years old and as i've seen as much as i have but still they just feel it it resonates in a way that's so lovely to share with your children and then in toy story 2 as well you've got that song oh that kills me jesse's song

i mean when she loved me yeah i can't actually speak about it no because it's one of the things that actually just always makes me cry yeah it it does and it's weird i don't know if you find this but the more the older i get the harder it is to stop myself if i watched it now i would start crying yeah and i think it's part it's it works on so many levels it's like so it's um it's this Jessie doll and she used to belong to a little girl and the little girl has discarded her for another toy. Same sort of thing as in Toy Story 1. But she stings this song and it works as a kind of lesbian love song as well. Well, I never thought of it in that way but but the fact that it's so from the heart and so yeah but it works in every way but i think you can you can read it as a straightforward

gay song about having your heart broken yeah and um it works completely on that level well that's randy newman's genius as well because even though the idea and that point in the story is a great beat of the story, it's a fantastic beat to have. But he I may be reading too much. No, no, no. Well, you may have done. But the fact is that it's it's so I mean, so eloquent. And then what's her name? This singer called Sarah something. Anyway, it's you know, when somebody loved me, everything was beautiful was beautiful you know and you're going to have that all taken away by the end of it and that this this little toy is now phobic is now is suffering from anxiety based on that separation she's still traumatized by that and that's massive amazing and

it works it works though as as a song of heartbreak from the point of view of a child and its parent. Yeah. And also the other way around, a parent losing touch with its child. Yeah. And what it's like to be a parent and not always be able to have your children close to you or, God forbid, lose them altogether, you know. Yeah, them not need you anymore. Yeah. The idea of, you know, she's just kind of let go of not thrown away in

an angry way it's just left by the side of the road yes and she's going to live her life and it's inevitable it's not like a shocking surprise how terrible it's like no that's what happens and um that's that's profound on so many levels you almost don't know what's going on with your brain when you're watching that for the first time you're like help this is an advert for squarespace. and pics and I don't want to stop. And I'd like to access your members area and spend in your shop. These are the kinds of comments people will say about your website if you build it with Squarespace. Just visit squarespace.com slash buxton for a free trial

and when you're ready to launch, because you will want to launch, use the offer code BUXTON to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. So put the smile of success on your face with Squarespace. Yes. With Squarespace with the podcast at the moment. I am spending a lot of time on it and I do have other professional and personal commitments that I should probably spend a little bit more time on than I have been. Maybe. I mean, this podcast is now hosted on the ACAST platform currently. And one of the reasons I went and joined ACAST was to see if they might give me a bit more organizational support, maybe further down the line find me a sponsor, and then I could afford to pay a producer and just tighten up the efficiency of the whole podcast operation. Get some different guests, a wider variety of guests,

that kind of thing. So that would be good, wouldn't it? In the meantime, I'm chungling along on my own. Chungling? What's chungling? Maybe Alexa Chung chungles, but I'm not going to start chungling. I'm just carrying on on my own. And you can find out more about this podcast, a little bit more. I do a blog post about it every week, which sometimes contains links to some of the things I've been talking about with my guests. I've got a blog, I've got a blog, rooty rooty, spooty rooty, blog, blog, blog, I've got a blog. It's the address, it's the address, it's adam-bugston.co.uk, so check it out. There you go. And the blog is a good place to leave comments about the podcast or anything else, if you wish.

You can also leave comments on my SoundCloud page or get in touch with me on Twitter. At Adam Buxton is my handle. Just looking at my blog now, in fact, approving a few comments. Here's one that's just come in. This is real. Naturally, like your website, but you have to take a look at the spelling on several of your posts. Several of them are rife with spelling issues. And I, in finding it very bothersome to inform you the reality, then again, I will definitely come again again.

I think maybe that's spam. But still, nice comment. So what else can I tell you before I wrap up this week's podcast? There won't be a contrived comedy bit at the end of the podcast this week. But by way of apology for that, here's a little insight into my exciting professional life. Yesterday, I got an email from my agent about an advert, and I've been approached to be in on screen in an advert. Like, you know, I do the occasional voiceover for adverts, as I was

saying to Rob Brydon last week, but I very seldom appear on screen in them. I always feel like that's more of a commitment. You're you as you endorsing a product rather than just being an actor providing a voiceover for an ad. That's the way I think about it anyway. So you have to consider those things a lot more carefully. The money's a lot bigger when that's the situation. So that's obviously tempting. But here is the key line in the email that made up my mind for me. And it says, we've done these commercials in several different countries now,

and most of the time we've gone for someone quite young and good looking. So, as much as I like Adam and his enormous beard, it will be a slightly different approach we take if we were to use him. Smiley emoticon. That's nice that he had the smiley emoticon there at the end. But who knows, maybe in six months you'll be watching TV and the ads will come on and one of them will have an old, ugly guy with a giant beard on it and you'll know that Bles has bought himself a gold

swimming pool please take care i love you bye