John Bishop - ‘I’ve always wanted someone to say: you’re good enough’

0:28Hello, lovely How to Fail listeners and viewers. Hello and welcome to How To Fail. This is the podcast where every week I speak to a new guest about three times they failed in their life and what, if anything, they've learnt along the way. You're like the man I met. She said, what happened to you? I said, I married you. But at the time, I'd have done anything not to have gone through. My kids are the kids I used to throw stones at. You know what I mean?

0:57The new Popeyes and Hot Ones menu is fire flavour. Trust me, because I'm about to eat it. Woo! That hits right away. Attempt the Popeye's Hot Ones menu in stores. Love that chicken from Popeye's. Limited time in participating US restaurants. My guest today is a hugely successful stand-up comedian, a man who has spent a quarter of a century in comedy, playing to sell-out crowds across the world, as well as fronting a number of entertainment TV shows, writing best-selling books, and raising millions for charity. Not for nothing then has John Bishop been hailed by the Daily Mirror as Britain's top comic.

1:36But it could all have been very different. As a child growing up on a council estate in Runcorn, Bishop had dreams of becoming a professional footballer. Instead, he found himself working as a sales rep for a pharmaceutical company, earning a decent living with a pension plan, private health insurance and gold cards for two airlines. But a nagging dissatisfaction led to marital separation and then a career pivot One night, Bishop wandered into the Frog and Bucket Comedy Club in Manchester and took to the microphone, cracking the only joke he could think of about French farmers That moment changed his life forever Within three years, he was a household name and was back with his wife, Melanie the mother of his three sons Now 25 years on, Bishop is taking his 10th stand-up tour across the UK and Ireland, and to mark this special anniversary, every ticket at every show will be just£25.

2:38You're only ever four words away from joy or the fear that nobody will laugh, Bishop says. You're always only four words away from success or failure. That's a brilliant tightrope to walk. John Bishop, welcome to How to Fail. Well, thank you. Thanks for the introduction. Thank you for being here. Tell me about those four words. I said that in relation to the joy of stand-up, because the thing with stand-up is that it's all about the reveal. You set the joke up and then you're four words away and then the punchline is said. And in English, the punchline is invariably the last word that's said. and so the last word of that sentence is you stop and people laugh and i was speaking to someone about it the other day and i said the difficulty is if they don't laugh you can't go back and do it again i said it's like being a stripper you're like you you go boom you get your boobs out and if nobody's impressed you don't go oh that was an accident and then put them back in and get them out again and you you the the the joke is the last word and so you're only ever as you're saying it as a comedian you're only ever building up to that last word and then if you don't laugh you've got to pick them up again and if you do laugh you ride on it so you're only ever four words away from judgment i think do you enjoy that adrenaline i i enjoy the tightrope of it i enjoy the the immediacy of it and i've always said like stand-up comedy is the most immediate form of communications the most instant form of communication no one goes home and thinks about laughing they laugh or they don't laugh laugh is an instinctive reaction to what's going on and if they don't laugh you have to carry on you can't just go that sorry that was my joke i've got to go off now you've got to carry on and you can't like in music if you go to a music gig you can ride through the energy can pull people through but with stand-up it is it is bricks in a wall and one of those bricks just may not fit and if it doesn't the wall might fall down so your whole act can fall to pieces do you remember that joke about french farmers oh 100 % i do because it's the only joke i had in fact i'd been on the phone to my mate jimmy before i went into the club and this this is 25 years ago so not everyone will remember this but there was a um a protest going on with French farmers about petrol prices and something to do with petrol prices or gas or something, but I think it was all petrol prices.

5:17And what they were doing to protest is that they were blocking the borders with tractors, getting bales of hay and setting them on fire. And so English lorry drivers couldn't get back. And so on the news that night, there was all these lorry drivers going, I can't get home, I can't get home. And obviously they had perishables on the trucks, but also they couldn't get back home. And that was the news that the French farmers were blocking the borders. So the joke that I said is, if you've seen them French farmers blocking the borders, wouldn't it have been handy if they'd have done that in 1939?

5:52That was their gag. And then that was it. That was the end of the gags. You're going back to the frog and bucket, where it all started as part of this tour, aren't you? Yeah, yeah. I read somewhere that you sometimes feel as if you've nicked someone else's life oh yeah listen I was a month off being 34 I had a very good job I was a sales and marketing director for a pharmaceutical company that specialized in immunosuppressants so we worked in the field of transplantation so people who had organ transplants we um our drug prevented rejection for them so it was a very specialized area very interesting and it was a good life in many respects in terms of what what aspirations i had in life and i never had aspirations to be in show business or did i maybe i did but they were so far suppressed because it just wasn't a world that was open to you and so it does always feel sometimes you know i'd be standing on a stage and I think there's a comedian somewhere doing a sales presentation putting a graph up thinking how did this happen because it feels it doesn't now because it's 25 years since that night but it feels always feels that there's a process and I'm sure you've been through it yourself of imposter syndrome where you think was this really meant for me Were you a good sales rep?

7:29I was great what's the secret to selling it's the same secret to being an interviewer it's the same secret to being a comedian I think you just gotta make people like you and if they like you then they'll listen to what you've got to say and I don't mean that in an insipid kind of way what I mean is you just got to be friendly with people and I think that's the key to all things in life

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9:07EBCLIS can be used with or without topical corticosteroids. Don't use if you're allergic to EBCLIS. Allergic reactions can occur that can be severe. Eye problems can occur. Tell your doctor if you have new or worsening eye problems. You should not receive a live vaccine when treated with EBCLIS. Before starting EBCLIS, tell your doctor if you have a parasitic infection. Searching for real relief? Ask your doctor about ebglis and visit ebglis.lily.com or call 1-800-Lily-RX or 1-800-545-5979. This idea of tight ropes and lives unlived brings us onto your first failure, which is your failure to become a footballer.

9:39And it's a specific failure. It's the under 15 Cheshire boys schools trial. Tell us what happened. I was a good footballer. I was captain of the school team. I was captain of every team that I played for. It was kind of drummed into me that that's your way out, that's going to be your passports off the estate and football was just the thing that I was in my head destined to do and it was also a connection with my dad and my brother and it was a thing that we could talk about I was definitely destined for that avenue and I remember my games teacher Mr Hilton took a couple of us to the trials but all the way was saying to me listen all you've got to do is just just keep it steady you'll be fine and we turned up and it was at king's school in chester and i'll be honest i didn't even know there was such a difference between the schools i didn't know there was i don't think i really understood about private schools or anything like that and a king's school was the private school in chester and we turned up because they had more pitches than anywhere else there's all these lads playing some that I recognised from some of the schools we played against.

10:55And they had one game going on first and then another game starting a little bit later. And we were in the second game, it was freezing. So we watched a bit of the first game. And I noticed that a lot of the lads seemed to know each other's names. And as it transpired, the kids from King's School, seven were on one team, nine were on the other team. And like all the other schools had brought three or four kids. and it was the teacher from King's School who was picking the squad. So anyway, they had their game. The second game began. I started playing in the second game and I thought, this just doesn't look right.

11:33It ended up one side had 12 players on. That's how much the guys who were meant to be coaching, meant to be inspecting the players were watching. They hadn't even noticed that one side had too many players on. I remember scoring a great goal. in my head it was a fantastic goal it was a good goal, I remember playing well I remember one of my mates was getting a lift back off his dad and he said I'll give you a lift to Mr Hilton saying look go with them, you'll be fine he said I'll stay and I'll phone you up later, I remember him phoning me up and it was the first significant disappointment that I felt in my life and I'd had a lot of things happen in my life even up to that point and but I remember getting a phone call and saying I can't believe it he didn't pick you he said I went mad at the teacher he said I've put an official complaint in the way it was done he said but he's he's tended to pick all the people from his school he said it's disgusting and I remember going upstairs going to the bathroom and I'm going you're alright and I'm going no no no I'm going into the bathroom and crying because I suddenly felt all those dreams were gone because the pathway at that time was you played for the school team, you played for the county, scouts were picking up for the county and then you'd get an apprenticeship and all of a sudden that full stop had happened.

13:00And it must happen to a lot of kids, obviously in sports or in performance or something like that, where somebody says you're not up to it. And it was just the injustice of it because probably, as I've got old and I have played with a lot of players who made it I remember getting into the under 18 side later on, the Cheshire under 18s and I was still pissed off about it then because some of the lads had played in the under 15s and I remember we played the game against the Ellsbury Port and it was the first time ever I'd played a football match against somebody who was my own age and it was this lad playing for Ellsbury, of course, who someone said went on to play for Everton or someone signed for Everton.

13:48He was just miles better than me. But that was the first time someone my age was miles better than me. You think, oh, that's my limitation. But not at 15. Not on that day. On that day, when we talk about how to fail, what failed was the system. I was so angry with the injustice of it. so angry with the fact that I know I should have been picked. And if it had been picked, as I say, I might have run out of track at some point. I would have reached the point of someone saying, you're not good enough. But it wasn't for them to say on that day. And you deserve the opportunity. Yeah. And it's like you were playing one game and there was a whole other game being played that was rigged against you.

14:34Exactly. That injustice, how did you deal with it at, how old were you? Were you 15? 15. how did you process it then maybe you didn't maybe you locked it away and only look at it you know what i hadn't really thought about it very much until i got asked to do this show and i was thinking what are the points in your life where there's been a failure where you've not achieved what you thought you're going to achieve and that have stood out and that immediately immediately came out so that's been buried deep inside for a long time how aware did you then become of class and the injustice around class in this country oh I was always aware of class I think because we lived on a council estate first of all and when we left Liverpool went to a place called Winsford I remember you know some lads lived on the private estate and they just had more toys than me and my dad went to prison when i was six only for for a year but if there was ever a moment in my life that i knew how the world saw us it was that because i remember going to see him and i i will never I'll never forget just the way you were looked at the way the guards looked at you Was it dehumanising?

16:06Oh it was horrible Each door you went through was locked behind you as you went through as the families all went through and it just felt like you were cattle it felt like you were it felt like you were judged and nobody's interested in the truth or the reality you were just one of them all of that got reconfirmed by that one moment the story which i noticed you're not telling which i think is interesting because maybe you feel like well i don't have to justify it but i'm going to tell a story about the reason your dad was in jail is because he was defending his wife your mother in a with from men who attacked her and he couldn't afford a good defense and he was sort of stitched up yeah yeah yeah so that's a very difficult thing for a family to deal with oh yeah it is it's it's hard it's it's funny because i've just got my dad staying with me now he's gonna be um 84 uh this week my dad uh and he's got a twin brother one of the stupid ideas in their defense was to say it wasn't him which one of these twins did it and i went really that's that's you clearly didn't have a good defense if somebody was suggesting that but yeah it was it was that that's what happened yeah and i'm glad that you you know the story but basically there'd been an instance an altercation at some point and then uh And my mum was getting chips.

17:43I had a chip and my dad was in the car and these two fellas started having a go and shoved it around and that was it. Have you forgiven the system that did that? No, never will. Because one of the things that came across loud and clear when I was doing research for this interview was how much you give back to charity. So£96 ,000 to the Hillsborough victims' families, millions of pounds raised through sport relief. Is that part of your purpose, do you think, that kind of giving back to people who need it because you didn't get that? Yeah, yeah. And quietly, I mean, the money that I gave to the Hillsborough family support group was anonymous, but they asked if they could make it public.

18:44I'd rather do it anonymously when I can. And part of it is because, you know, some of the things that I've been able to support are in themselves, you know, small charities that make a big difference. and they're the things that, you know, it's nice. The sport relief thing was all good and it's nice to be able to do stuff that raises money. But I'm also very, very fortunate that I make a good living out of doing something that I love. And so I don't have to raise money. I just have to keep less of it. I love that. Yeah. This idea of working for a living and how necessary that was given where you came from.

19:33I imagine that made it particularly difficult to walk away from your secure job as a sales rep and to take this punt. It did and it didn't because me and Melanie got back together. It was a joint decision. You said in the introduction three years. In reality, it was I didn't leave my job until six years later. I'd overlapped so many times with the job that I did. And I told my boss, I'd go to the Edinburgh Festival. I'd rent a flat in Edinburgh. I'd have one week's holiday. And the other times I was there, I'd be going to see the transplant unit in Edinburgh. I'd be flying down to London in the day, back to do a gig of a night.

20:16I was doing all of these things to run them parallel. and then it just came to a point I thought, you know, the people around me who've been on the circuit with me, like Alan Carr, Jason Manford, Michael McIntyre, Jimmy Carr, they'd all gone on and I'd reached the point of recognising that if you didn't make this step, then that's where you're going to be then. You're going to be a really good circuit comic and you might be able to generate an audience locally, but that's your limit. And so I just sat down with Melanie and said, look, I'd started doing these sportsman's dinners and sportsman's dinners were getting done in the middle of the week.

21:01So you're doing gigs of a weekend and you're getting whatever you're getting for the gig. You do a sportsman's dinner and you might get 700 quid. I'm like, well, if I could do that, self-employed, change it. And then I could do a little bit of consultancy. The company that I was working for didn't want me to leave so they offered me a consultancy so I could tick that so there was a lot of things suggesting you know you you could be okay and I spoke to Melanie I said look I I promise I'll make the same amount of money because when we got back together because the kids had missed out so much we kind of agreed she was doing the job she didn't like I said well you don't have to work if I can do this and then and then the kids will get the the time that we never never really had with them and and so I said look I just promised her I'll make the same amount of money and she said she said I think you will and for the first three years obviously I didn't everything went down and we added to the mortgage all of those things but the bottom line is I remember looking at me kids who at that time would have been i guess about 12 12 10 8 something like that and i thought the main reason for me not doing this is because we've got a nice house usually going to a nice school and i've got kids and what's going to happen if i don't do this that would be the main thing that will bug me forever is that I didn't do it because I had you and that's a coward's way of living I'm going to blame you for me not doing it and I and I could sense that because everyone was going well what you know you're taking a chance and I just thought back yourself and what's the worst that can happen because when you talk about the work ethic for me I knew it was impossible for me to go back to where I'd started from.

23:00It was impossible. That would never happen. So anything beyond that was success.

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23:51Whether you prefer talking in person, on the phone or using the award winning app, it's nice knowing you have help finding coverage that best fits your needs. Like a good neighbour, State Farm is there. Just tell us the story quickly about you and Melanie. I know you've told it before. Basically, the story is we split up. I ended up doing stand up comedy in a way that we didn't expect it. And then what happened after being apart for almost two years, about 20 months, she came to a gig. Well, no, she came to a comedy club, not knowing I did stand-up comedy. I didn't tell anyone at this time. I didn't tell any of my mates.

24:33She's in this comedy club with people who don't know me in this new job on someone's birthday, I think it was. And their ex-husband gets announced on the stage, walks on the stage. and at the time I used to tell this terrible joke about saying, you know, I'm really selling at the moment, I split up with my wife and the audience would go, oh, it's not that bad we're not divorced or anything, I've just killed her, but I've kept her head in the fridge terrible joke, and not something I would say now, and certainly not something I would say after that night, because I looked to the left and the head that was meant to be in the fridge was in the audience, and I thought and I tell you where we were at, we were at the decree nice-sized stage of the divorce Wow, so it was really advanced.

25:16Yeah. So we were just haggling over money and kids and stuff like that. And I remember seeing the head thing, oh my God, that joke's going to cost me another 20 grand. And then she came over at the end and she was laughing. And I'll never forget the line she said, and it sounds like a gag, but it was actually true. She just said, look, it was just great to see you doing that. She said, you've got that bounce in your step, that glint in your eyes. She said, you're like the man I met. She said, what happened to you? I said, I married you. And then she said, well, can we do something? And then we ended up, and actually, on reflection, we ended up going to counselling because we couldn't, she wouldn't sign the papers and we couldn't finalise it.

26:06So we went to counselling not to get back together or to see what was wrong, to try and source out the final details about lawyers. And I remember sitting in the room, and we were sat in the room, and she was talking for 20 minutes, and I was talking for 20 minutes, and it was going a little bit backwards. And this councillor went, what are you two doing here? And she said, I can see, why don't you just go for a coffee? I can see what you probably can't see. Just go and have a coffee. And then that was it. And do you consider it a full-on second marriage, just with the same person. Oh, listen, I think that story's a lovely story.

26:42And I think the biggest story is the fact, like, at the end of this month, it'll be 32 years since we got married. That'll be our, well, on and off, obviously. But it'll be 32 years. And so getting back together when you've got young kids after two years apart, you can say, oh, that's all right. But then to get on a roller coaster that our lifespan where your life has completely changed and and and your your one of you has become a public commodity in some respects and everything that was normal has been thrown out the window and to to still be there then i think that's that's a bigger achievement because what what we've had to go through as a family has been not something that we could have prepared for and where we're at now is not somewhere I imagine we'd ever get to.

27:42Congratulations. Oh, honestly, as you get older, you reflect on things in a different way and what's important in a relationship changes. And, you know, we met, I was 21 when I met her. It's funny, somebody asked me recently about touring and are you looking forward to going home? And I have a beautiful house. and all of those bits. And I just suddenly realised that she's home. But that's true. That's so lovely. I have a million questions I want to ask, but we need to get on to your second failure. Before I do, your top tip for a relationship lasting? Go on tour for six months of the year.

28:31You know what? I honestly don't know. You've got to grow together. And listen, anyone who says, oh, we're wonderful, that's bollocks. I mean, Jesus Christ. The other thing about being connected with somebody in the same way that we are is no one can make me feel like she does. And so she can make me feel shit as well. So if Melanie's annoyed with me, it ruins my day. I couldn't give a shit what anyone else thinks. Someone's annoyed with me. I'm not bothered. but she has a place in my psyche that no one else does. And in the same way, she can lift me. She's funny, and I won't be unique in this.

29:20Everybody who does this kind of joke, you take your jokes to the world. You know what I mean? I give my jokes to strangers. I give my tears to her because, well, I'm down and I'm done. no one else sees it we're going back in time for your second failure which is your English A level yes yes so I understand so you're at this school and you were the first in your family to do O levels yeah I remember that yeah no I was O levels and I remember me dad saying to me your mum says you're doing O levels I said yeah he went good that was it that was the biggest because me brother and me sister sisters done GCSEs and no CSEs as it was then and so and I've been pulling these groups to do all levels and I went back to sixth form to the school that I was in we had 2000 kids in the form and it was brilliant I got a name I got a letter literally two days ago that had been scanned in by my agent it went to my agent but it's from my old um English teacher Julia Withers Miss Withers who was also the head of the sixth form in this school this school had a sixth form it was starting at sixth form we had 2 ,000 kids in the school we had six people in the sixth form in the first year of the sixth form and I was one of them in fact I made it up to seven and then what happened I turned up on the first day in jeans and he said no the sixth form means you've got to wear trousers and I went I'm not going back and asking me mum for trousers there's no chance these are new jeans because no one had a job in your house at that time did they so you were worried about asking for money for trousers yeah I wasn't going to do that and I do it my brother and sisters were on a scheme my dad was in and out of work and my mum was working in a kitchen cleaning pans and I left and I started looking for a scheme and then I ended up getting a job at ICI.

31:34A job that wouldn't exist these days, a male lad. I knew if I couldn't get off, if football wasn't going to be the way out, and it wasn't, listen, the estate wasn't, it was a really nice estate, but, you know, get onto that next stage in life. Whatever, if I couldn't do it through football, I tried through education. So I tried to do A-levels at night school whilst I was doing the job. And I was trying to do a law A-level, ironically, and an English A-level because I was good at English. I was always told I was good at English. And I was doing them at night school one night a week. And it got to Christmas and I went to see some mates in the sixth form.

32:20and I was in my work clothes big metal boots and all that stuff the clothes that you wear in a chemical factory and the English teacher Mr Logan Jeff Logan saw me I don't know why I know all my teachers first names I know I knew that and he said what are you doing I said well I'm trying to do I'm trying to do my A levels and stuff but I'm working and he said well why don't you come back I said well I've missed a term and I'm not going to start again and he went and him and mr devage dave devage who's the history guy so look we can help you catch up and i said i can't do it for the money okay there's no way i can i can drop the money and so miss phillips the headmistress i'll never forget this actually i remember they took me into her office and we negotiated that the school would allow me to go and sign on and come back and do A-levels without disrupting anyone else and telling anyone else that I was doing it so that I could get the£18.50.

33:28Wow, they really cared. Oh, yeah. It was, yeah, it made a massive difference there. And then I went home, told me when my dad was going to leave because I was going to do A-levels. And again, they were going, why? You've got a job. I went, because I want something more. And my dad was going, but what is that? like you've got a job at a factory where no one leaves you'd be getting your pension there but that's not what I want and I'll never forget it the best advice anyone's ever given me we sat there, we were so glad to get up at 6 to get the bus to work and I remember my dad saying to me it was nearly midnight and I remember him saying look, listen I can't talk it out of it he said if it's what you want to do he said you've got to do it because if you don't try it you'll never know what would have happened and I took that advice onto just about everything so when it came to leaving my job to do comedy I thought I took that again we don't try it I'll never know you did try it and you worked really hard you and you didn't get the a that you were predicted no so what happened i sat my english a level i always had a problem with spelling you know at the time dyslexia wasn't as as well understood what it is i can't spell in my head and so recently i've been learning sign language oh god deaf people love to spell for your son your elder son yeah he doesn't need it or do it i'm doing it now for myself but that's how that was the connection because he he he's okay with hearing aids and he wants to live in the hearing world continuous as much as he can before but anyway i'm still learning i still do some sign language but with sign language the hard thing for me is like when people are telling you the new sign and you're ready to spell it to your bros dispelling it it's doesn't make it's not making any difference to me unless i can write down what to spell and i just can't spell in my head so it always been this thing and there's a joke that i always say in stand up when i talk about being dyslexic where they phoned home and said look we think you're john's dyslexic and that's where living in the northwest was so good because we were only an hour from wales so my dad drove me to wales got out pointed at the first road sign said there you go son you're not the only one and there was an element where we were on holiday in wales and my dad was saying does that make any sense to you and anyway so i'd i'd been fine with it and and the i'd applied i'd applied to go and do english and history a degree at newcastle poly and and the the estimated marks were really good and everything my mock exam had been good my history was good i did well in the history A level.

36:28I'd got a low A level in one year when I was, because I carried on with the night school when I went back to normal school. So I was very confident and I went into this exam, this English exam, and I don't know what happened, something happened. In the end, they came back ungraded and a U. I didn't even know what U meant and they went just ungraded and the school went we just don't know what to do so the school paid to get it remarked because my whole life was hanging on this and it and it came back and he sent the paper back and he gave it to me as well the school and I wish I'd have kept it and he just went you just had a meltdown the sentences just made no sense and and words were written backwards and some words were written like almost upside down and it was just my brain had just gone berserk and so I remember serving the teacher going how did that happen you've obviously gone in that nervous and that anxious that it's overloaded your brain and and I took so much from that because I remember thinking I I remember walking in feeling the weight of the importance of it and uh and i've never felt like that ever again it's so interesting because one of the things i understand about how you perform comedy is that you leave it quite free and you don't write anything down so you don't over prepare do you think that's a legacy of this a little bit yeah and i also a lot of people always said to me about comedy do you get nervous and now and again you get nervous but i always think none of it matters this doesn't matter when something really mattered i cared that much i ruined it so don't don't worry about it because it's like um i remember somebody asking me once how would you define confidence and i said to me confidence is about consequence you can be confident if you're not bothered what the consequences are that is so good it's it's like what's the worst thing that could happen The worst thing that can happen might be a bit embarrassing for 10 minutes.

38:47So the consequences aren't that great. How does it feel now being the father of three sons who have a more privileged life than you did? Oh, listen, again, I used to say my kids are the kids I used to throw stones at. You know what I mean?

39:09It's difficult, but I think it's a generational thing. I think we are the first parents, my generation of parents, are the first parents to parents in a world we never lived in. And we didn't understand. We were the first, you know, the internet, social media, all of these pressures of expectation. You've got to go, it's not your fault that you've grown up in a nice house and it's not your fault that you don't know what I know. Yeah. And I also don't want you to know it. Yeah. I remember talking to a friend of mine once from a similar background to myself, and we were talking about having kids who maybe don't know, maybe, you know, don't know what you do.

40:06And they said, well, someone's got to win. you know if you can't take them back to the estate why would you want to someone's got to gain from it what you want is is you hope that they take the right values from it before we get onto your final failure you've spoken so movingly about some of your childhood and the things that you went through and i suppose it's quite a cliche question but i'll ask it anyway do you think your comedy has to be rooted in that darkness when you say movingly what what made you use that word i because i felt moved i feel i suppose it's just an intangible thing where i feel that i feel your emotion so you talking about your sons not knowing your darkness i find very moving because also part of your role as a parent is protection yeah but i think i don't want people to feel that i had an unhappy childhood i had a childhood that was reflective of the circumstances i was living in but i don't talk about it as as in depth as this and sometimes you know even during this conversation i've found myself catching myself because as i've got older i've been more open about some of the things that i've kept as a bloke down and i've and i've kind of become more comfortable with that so maybe it feels more emotional than I realised myself.

41:37And I think it's also, you use the word darkness, there's not darkness, there's things that have shaped me as a person that I'm grateful for, but at the time I'd have done anything not to have gone through it. At Sierra, discover great deals on top-brand workout gear, like high-quality walking shoes, which might lead to another discovery. 40 ,000 steps, baby. Who's on top now, Karen? You've taken the office step challenge a step too far. Don't worry, though. Sierra also has yoga gear. It might be a good place to find your zen. Discover top brands at unexpectedly low prices. Sierra, let's get moving.

42:20Your final failure is your failure to follow your gut when your in-conversation TV show came to an end. So I remember the show. It ran for four series. Yeah. It was an interview show. You interviewed everyone from Cuba Gooding Jr. to Jeremy Corbyn. So tell me about that and why it came to an end and why you categorise it as a failure. I'll tell you. So what happened is UK TV, which was one of the arms of Sky, had a channel, W, and he said, you know, and I wanted to do this. I wanted to do a one-on-one interview. And he said, how is it going to work? I said well this you know I'll sit with somebody and talk with them and it'll be an hour of one-on-one interview and we're talking like 2017 this was happening and they said have you ever done it before I said well see what we're doing now this is it that's all the magic that there is I'll say something you say something we'll put cameras on it and so they said okay let's give it a go and we ended up doing 41 episodes of this over in 2017 and 2018.