The Bananaphone is Back: Ant’s Been Texting Bill Nighy & Dec Needs a Hobby

6:31Declan Donnelly:You need to get on my motorbike. Oh, don't get on you, you thug.

6:35Ant McPartlin:I did a couple of roles. I did Motorcycle Thug 2 in Harry, which was a Northeast-based drama thing with Michael Elphick, who played a hard-nosed cop called Harry. Yeah. and I played Peter the stable boy in Catherine Cookson's The Cinder Path

6:51Declan Donnelly:The stable boy

6:52Ant McPartlin:where I had two lines go on one was what's going on Mr. Charlie that's good and another one oh my god I think I heard one line

7:04Declan Donnelly:did you have a line as motorcycle thug in Harry yeah I did but I can't remember that right I did say something I was also in which you've seen I was in Why Don't You the kids TV show and they used to do different gangs every year. Like you'd have like the Liverpool gang, the Cardiff gang. And one and only year they'd done a Newcastle gang. And that was my first ever job in telly, was why don't you? And it was fun. Got paid nothing. I got a free Johnny Hits jazz CD and a jacket. That was my payment for do. I swear to God, that was it. They give every cast member a CD and you were allowed to wear the clothes that you wore for filming.

7:41Declan Donnelly:You're allowed to keep the clothes. Was it a shell suit or? No, it was like a ski jacket. Oh, like a Capri. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was like that.

7:49Ant McPartlin:Still got it?

7:50Declan Donnelly:No, I don't have it. No, your memorabilia box? No, I give it to Deck, it fits in.

7:56Ant McPartlin:Okay, let's move straight to the end. Oh yeah, we've already had one voice note. Come on, let's have another voice note. Let's have another voice note. Hi Ant and Deck, it's Maddy from Essex. Hi Maddy from Essex. So last year, I realised that I had no hobbies aside from working, lol. So I started to play paddle just like every other person on planet Earth. And I was wondering, do you guys have any hobbies that you do away from work? Thanks, Maddy. Thanks, Maddy. I like the style of Maddy. I do.

8:22Declan Donnelly:Lol. Lol. Lol. Yeah, we do. We like golf. We've said it before on this podcast. We love golf. We love everything about it. We've got a little society that we play golf with and have been playing golf with for 20 years, like 22 years. And we golf in Portugal. We've golfed in Dubai. We've golfed in Vegas. You name it. We've golfed it. Not quite. Do you do anything I don't know about?

8:50Ant McPartlin:Don't think so.

8:51Declan Donnelly:Do I have any other hobbies? Do you play paddle? No, I'd love to play paddle. I've just never gotten round to it. No, I've tried it. It is fun. Have you tried it? No. You've never been on the court? No. Pickleball? Hmm? What do you call me?

9:04Ant McPartlin:Pickleball?

9:05Declan Donnelly:That's another thing, isn't it? Yeah. It's very American pickleball, isn't it? I think so. Is that not the same as paddle? Now, pickleball is a smaller ball with holes in. I think it's like tennis, but slower. Pickleball. Am I right? It's like tennis for babies, I think. Tennis for babies or for older people. So you'd be great. Yeah, I don't want to.

9:26Ant McPartlin:I don't quite know which category you're putting me in there.

9:29Declan Donnelly:What?

9:30Ant McPartlin:Babies or older people. I straddle both.

9:35Declan Donnelly:Oh, God, blimey, Governor.

9:43Declan Donnelly:Oh, God. We need a holiday. We need a holiday.

9:47Ant McPartlin:Is there any other hobbies? I don't think I do have. I'm trying to change this subject.

9:55Ant McPartlin:Any other hobbies? I like the odd jigsaw. Oh, God.

10:05Declan Donnelly:Let's get this on with.

10:07Ant McPartlin:Any other hobbies? Any other hobbies? No, none to report. No, I did rock climbing for a while.

10:12Declan Donnelly:Did you? Yeah, I was into it. Really into it. Indoor rock climbing? Indoor rock climbing. Yeah, not outdoor. I even got quite good at it. I got me on rock climbing shoes.

10:21Ant McPartlin:Did you?

10:21Declan Donnelly:It's not like you took to buy all of the equipment. And then after that, I fell out of love with it. Yeah, funny that. Yeah. No, I haven't done that. We need to get you out more. I like a jigsaw. Any suggestions for hobbies that you think Depp would like, then please send them in. Hanging out at beltabox.com.

10:37Ant McPartlin:Let's have another voicemail. Okay. absolutely love the podcast my question is do you ever wonder what you're going to do like when you get old as in old old do you think you'll still be like going like you are now and be kind of bruce forsyth style where you know you're literally still on tv till you're almost dead or do you think like you kind of know when to enough is enough and so what do you plan on doing with retirement.

11:07Declan Donnelly:Well, you're either eating a sweet, eating a sweet whilst recording that, or unfolding a large bit of paper.

11:14Ant McPartlin:I don't see myself still doing what we're doing when I'm like 80. You don't? No, in, what is that now, in 50 years' time? 30 years' time. Yeah, go on. No, I don't, I don't. Don't you retire by then? Oh, I think so.

11:30Declan Donnelly:With the grandkids?

11:31Ant McPartlin:Playing golf. Playing golf. In the sun. Do you think she would like us to stop? That's the vibe I got. Yeah, that's the vibe I got. She's a bit annoyed that we're still doing it. It was almost like, hi guys, how much longer is this going on for? It was. Yeah. Yeah, it was that. So for that, I'm going to continue to I'm 93. Do you know the lovely thing for us is that kind of our career has just taken twists and turns all the way. So you never know what's going to come next.

11:56Declan Donnelly:I never thought we'd be doing a podcast.

11:58Ant McPartlin:No. Did you? No, absolutely not. That just came out of the blue. Yeah, so we never quite know what we're going to do next, never mind what we're going to be doing in 10, 20...

12:09Declan Donnelly:30 years. So...

12:12Ant McPartlin:Watch this space.

12:13Declan Donnelly:Maureen. What's your call, Maureen? Sounds like a Maureen. Katie. Katie. Watch this space, Katie. It's already losing his memory. All right, here's the next one.

12:23Ant McPartlin:Hello, Anne and Doug. This is Jane from Austin, Texas. I have a question for you. I see there's a show coming on, Celebrity Get Me Out Here in Africa. So my question is, which one of you is the fastest runner from those animals? Ooh, Jane, in Austin, Texas. She's our reach. We've reached Austin, Texas. Austin, Texas. Who's the fastest runner from the animals in Amos Celebrity South Africa? Well, Jane, thankfully for us, we have a very fancy hotel where we don't need to run from the animals. No, we don't, thank goodness. We're pretty good. We stay in like a nature reserve out there. Yeah, we do.

12:58Ant McPartlin:It's beautiful. The first time we went to South Africa to film the show, they put us in our lodges to, you know, settle in and unpack. They said, so, you know, these are your patio doors. You've got a little swimming pool out there. Make sure you keep your patio doors closed because the baboons will come round and let themselves in if you leave your doors unlocked.

13:15Declan Donnelly:Let themselves in.

13:16Ant McPartlin:And they said, there is a walking trail. You can go walking or go for a jog, but make sure you're back before dusk because if you're out there, the leopard will think you're, it's dinner. So I was like, I stayed in. No walking, no jogging, no running. I went for one swim in my pool. It was a little plunge pool outside. I went for one swim and I heard something rustling in the trees. Out, dry, in. Closed door, lock. Curves closed.

13:44Declan Donnelly:Lights off. When I went out there for the first time, I was like, oh my God, this is beautiful. Opened the doors, walked out and I heard, warthog. Really, really wonderful. So I forget your question.

13:56Ant McPartlin:Who's the fastest runner from the animals? So as in us two. Yeah. Who would run the fastest? Well, I think you look more meaty, so they would go for you. Meaty? I don't look meaty. Well, you know what I mean? You've got, you know.

14:08Declan Donnelly:What do you think? Why they just leave you behind?

14:10Ant McPartlin:Yeah, I think I look a bit unsatisfying.

14:13Declan Donnelly:On a larger bite, am I?

14:15Ant McPartlin:They'll go, go for the big one. And that gives me a clear run. I see. We've done Australia so many times now that we're kind of used to the wildlife.

14:22Declan Donnelly:Yeah, we are used to the wildlife. Used to the snakes, used to the spiders. In South Africa, it's a different story. We're not used to all of that. When you film the show, down where the trials are, the baboons are wild, aren't they? Oh, they're crazy. They're crazy. They just make a little noise. And it sounds like people shouting. It's like, oh, ah, ah, oh, ah, ah. The first time you hear it, you're like. What is it again? Oh, ah, oh, ah, ah, oh, ah. So it's really scary. You think it's people having an argument, but it's the baboons. And we were doing a trial the first time we did South Africa.

14:54Declan Donnelly:and it was, we had a load of rotten fruit and veg which was part of the trial. That must smell amazing to the baboons. Yeah. And they got closer and closer, this family of baboons, to the trial when we were filming it and they all sat on the rocks just like watching, licking their lips. So we're like, let's get this trial and get out of here and leave them with the peelings.

15:13Ant McPartlin:I don't know if it was the rotten fruit and veg or Paul Burrell does look like me. He looks tasty. He looks tasty. Yeah, he looks tasty. To a baboon.

15:19Declan Donnelly:He's a tasty morsel. Oh, that's like a suckling pig.

15:25Ant McPartlin:Let's have another voice note. Hi, Ant and Dec. Amy here. Hi, Amy. Thanks to Spotify. They've been recommending some Ant and Dec music from back in the day. Sorry. I'm a 94 baby, so I was probably a bit too young to remember all the music. You were, baby. I do remember We're On The Ball, the legendary football song you released. I'd love to know how that came about. Did you get any input in writing the song and making the video? and did you see yourselves being up there with the likes of the Lightning Seeds and Baddiel and Skinner? I obviously remember Ant dressing up as Svengore and Ericsson on SMTV quite a few times.

16:05Ant McPartlin:Lots of love. Bye.

16:07Declan Donnelly:Oh, thank you. Thanks, Amy. Good question. Yes, we did hope that we would be the next Baddiel and Skinner, but we didn't really... Didn't quite reach those. Hasn't really hung around as long as it's coming home.

16:20Ant McPartlin:I'll tell you how it came about we got a phone call from Sony Records back in 2001 2002 and they said we need to do a World Cup record for the Japan or 2 Japan or 2 2002 the World Cup in 2002 we've got the record we know what the song is it's going to be we're on the ball will you guys record it I'm like yeah okay that could be a laugh and they're like we'll get you some free tickets to the World Cup which we still never got no we didn't we never went No, we never. So we thought, oh, the song's already done. That's easy. We'll just do that. And then we turn up and they went, oh, actually, yeah, there are no lyrics to the song.

16:57Ant McPartlin:All we've got is we're on the ball. We're on the ball. So you need to write the verses. We took a morning, didn't we, round at my house? You did. And put the song on and just wrote the two verses and the bits. So we wrote the verses.

17:09Declan Donnelly:So the verses were like, from Neville to Hesky, Hesky to Scolzi. And then we kind of just went through the players who were in the squad at the time. but by the time the record came out a few of the players weren't in the squad anymore and they didn't make the World Cup did they? No I don't think they did. So that was a shame and it's not really a song that's repeatable because it's very of that time which we should have thought about.

17:31Ant McPartlin:We should update it for the World Cup this summer. Do you think? Yeah do you think we should do that?

17:35Declan Donnelly:Put new lyrics in there put new players in there.

17:37Ant McPartlin:New players in there. Just Newcastle players. Could do. Yeah. Plenty of them in the squad. Yeah there is. Yeah let's maybe we'll update that. Let me tell you about the video shoot. Go on. Right. They said, we're taking you up to Leeds because England are playing a friendly up in Leeds and all the squad are there. So you've got to make the video and you've got all the squad.

17:56Declan Donnelly:So you'll be able to mess about with the squad. They'll get involved. They'll definitely want to be involved in the video. So come on, we'll shoot it. So we went up and saw the squad from about 300 metres away.

18:07Ant McPartlin:Never met any of them. Yeah. Didn't get time with any of them. Not one of them wanted to be in the video. So the idea was that we were going to kidnap Sven-Goran Eriksson and his assistant Todd Grip and take their place to infiltrate the team so we could go to the World Cup in Japan. So we do a scene in there where we're doing tactics to the team and it was supposed to be the team, but we couldn't get any of the team. So we had to dress up as the team. So I ended up dressing as David Beckham. I was Seaman. David Seaman with a long ponytail.

18:36Declan Donnelly:Yeah, I like that. That's good. We dressed up as members of the...

18:39Ant McPartlin:And we would just do this on the hoof. for like, we haven't got any players in this video. We're going to have to dress up with them. That's quite fun though, dressing up. It's quite stressable too.

18:46Declan Donnelly:Yeah. And also not what we hoped. We hoped we'd meet the players and have a laugh with the players, but they didn't want to play a ball. Miserable.

18:54Ant McPartlin:Well, they did want to play a ball. That's all they wanted to do, was play a ball. Not play with us. Yeah. But look, that's another thing.

19:02Declan Donnelly:Talking about our career, who would have thought we would ever have released an official World Cup song? I know. You know?

19:08Ant McPartlin:That just, again, came out of the blue. You never quite know what's going to happen. And because we did the World Cup song, we got invited to the Beckhams World Cup party.

19:18Declan Donnelly:Japanese-themed World Cup party. David was there with Victoria shaking your hands and Elton John was there. Yes. Wasn't he? On the entrance, went through, shook our hands. And it was massive, like a massive hall of, you know, three-course dinner. And David got up and, as he was the captain at the time, so he got up and spoke to everybody.

19:35Ant McPartlin:We were on a table with Boy George. Yes. And his friend, a guy called Philip Salon. Philip Salon, that was it. Who had the funniest haircut ever. Well, it wasn't a haircut. It wasn't a haircut. He was completely bald, but on his head, in his little bag, so they were dressed really flamboyantly, in his bag, he had a can of shaving foam and he did a big Mr Whippy on his head. No. He did? That was his hairdo? That was his hairdo. So then we'd have like, we were sitting there having starter and you could see it starting kind of slide and then depress a bit. So after every course, we went to the toilet and redid it and came back for another course.

20:11Ant McPartlin:Brilliant, eh? That is commitment. But it was brilliant.

20:14Declan Donnelly:He looked fantastic, I have to say. I'm going to try that one day. Maybe next week. I can't believe I'll do my hair.

20:23Ant McPartlin:And then I'll have to grow a beard because my shaving form will have gone. Let's have one more, come on. Time for one more. Here we go, last one.

20:30Declan Donnelly:Hello. I would like to ask a question for both Ant and Dec. Do either of them remember who their first school crush was on

20:41Ant McPartlin:and how old were they at the time. Thank you for your question. Thank you. Who was that?

20:47Declan Donnelly:Mr. Frank.

20:48Ant McPartlin:Hello, Mr. Frank. Thank you, Mr. Frank. First school crush and who was it on?

20:53Declan Donnelly:Well, I'm not going to name names because it's unfair to the person, but I was in primary school, remember it, and there was a girl who I had a real crush on. so I must have been before we went to Vixco I must have been like nine eight, nine and I remember I had a little red skateboard like Bart Simpson Cowabunga! I remember skateboarding from my house to show off I found out no, no I just found out where she lived so I skateboarded all the way from my house all the way she lived near the school and I lived a little bit away from my primary school so I skateboarded all the way along as a nine year old skateboard there was a slight gradient to the hill so my legs were burning by the time I got there and hand delivered Valentine's Day card

21:42Ant McPartlin:I know how did she respond?

21:45Declan Donnelly:she loved it and then she came around to mind to play with my science kit the following week that's cute eh? that's cute

21:54Ant McPartlin:that's very cute my first school crush I think was on a teacher was it? yes what was he called? Mr Frank No, it was on my primary school teacher. And she had big, blonde, curly hair right up my street. Even as a six-year-old, five, six, seven-year-old. And she was lovely and kind and lovely. And I was like, oh, I had a bit of a crush. I had a real soft spot for mine.

22:21Declan Donnelly:Did you ever write in your book, like, I heart?

22:24Ant McPartlin:No.

22:24Declan Donnelly:Her name? No, I didn't. No? Did she ever notice you crushing on her? I think so, yeah. Yeah?

22:29Ant McPartlin:Yeah. I was a bit of a teacher's pet.

22:31Declan Donnelly:Were you? He still is, isn't he? Isn't he? He is. He is.

22:36Ant McPartlin:Why are you nodding that? I smashed your face in in a minute. What about celeb crushes when you were younger?

22:43Declan Donnelly:Zoe Ball. Hello. I'll tell you who I had a big crush on in Adventures in Babysitting. And Karate Kid. Elizabeth Shue. Yes. Oh. And there's a movie called Weird Science, which was out when we were growing up. and Kelly LeBrock was the pin-up in it. She was also stunning. They were my two childhood crushes. Yours?

23:07Ant McPartlin:Apart from Teachers? Glynnis Barber in Dempsey and Makepeace. Oh yeah, that's a good one. Do you remember a band called Transvision Vamp? Yes. Wendy James.

23:16Declan Donnelly:Yes. Hello. Hello. We should do it for all of them, actually. We've got Elizabeth Shue. Hello. Kelly LeBrock. Hello.

23:29Ant McPartlin:Mr. Frank. Hello. Mr. Frank, what are you doing here?

23:32Declan Donnelly:What are you doing here, Mr. Frank? Get out of my thoughts, Mr. Frank.

23:39Ant McPartlin:They've all gone.

23:40Declan Donnelly:Oh, that's good.

23:42Ant McPartlin:Bye. Thanks for all your voice notes. Keep them coming in for our next voice notes special. Hanging out at beltnerbox.com. Love that. I always like that, yeah. I love the voice notes. It's good.

23:52Declan Donnelly:We don't do a lot. We're just listening to you guys. I love it. We'll be back on Thursday. Follow me and Pod. See you then. respect guys see you later turn off turn off your lights bye lobster