Lee Mack

0:00Gather ye rosebuds while ye may. There's a new guest waiting, with quite a lot to say. so I'm going to shut up and say welcome to another episode of Rosebud we do indeed have a very special guest for you cue the music, they're ready

0:36I like to laugh, and I really like people who make me laugh. And my guest today is somebody who makes me laugh. He makes me laugh when I see him on television. I've seen him in something called The 1 % Club on ITV Saturday nights. I've seen him in a sitcom, his own creation, called Not Going Out. He makes me laugh there. And if you haven't seen this sitcom, I think all 106 episodes are available on BBC iPlayer. and I've seen him on Would I Lie to You because I love that show and I've been on that show a couple of times and he doesn't just make me laugh when I'm watching him. When I'm with him, I think he makes me laugh more than any other, risky thing to say because I know quite a lot of comedians, he makes me laugh more than anyone else.

1:26He's so quick, he's so clever, he's so funny, he's Lee Mack, yeah, yeah, yeah. On Rosebud, real name Lee McKillop, born 4th of August 1968, Southport. Parents, they were publicans, party animals. I think he grew up above pubs. We're going to hear about that, of course. And how his background, surrounded by jokes, by banter, led him to become my kind of comedian. I hope he's your kind of comedian, whether he is or whether he isn't. His story is intriguing and entertaining. Yes, this is Rosebud with Lee Mack. Cue the music.

2:17Lee, we always begin with the same question on this podcast and it's simply this. What is your, Lee Mack, your very first memory? Well, I am going to tell you my first memory, and then I'm going to tell you why it might not be my first memory. So I'll start by telling you, which is when I was in a pram, and I don't know if we're talking a baby in a pram, or like a two-year-old in a pushchair type thing, but I remember seeing the newspaper rack, which your younger listeners won't really know what that is. But back in the day when all we had was newspapers, and we didn't have any phones, you'd buy a rack, wouldn't you?

2:59And you'd have it in your living room and it was full of newspapers and magazines. And it was behind the telly and it was on fire. And it turns out my brother had set fire to it. And that is something that definitely happened. The newspaper rack was set on fire. When I told my mum I remembered this, she said, gosh, you were so young. I can't remember what she said now, but it might have even been like one or something or two she says there's no way you remember that i said no i do i do remember i can picture it now the orange wallpaper and blah blah blah but then years later like probably in my 40s i was listening to the radio and it was a story about it was about memory the the show and it was a story about a woman who was taken out as a baby by the nanny being pushed around the park and somebody tried to steal the baby then a nanny fought off the attackers, came home, and the family was so grateful that she'd saved the baby from being kidnapped.

3:59And the daughter grew up remembering it. She said, I remember it. I remember exactly the actions this woman did. And then cut to, I don't know, 50 years later, 60 years later, the mother of the baby was a very old woman, and she received a letter from the nanny saying, I am close to death. I haven't seen you for 50, 60 years or whatever, and I'm trying to put things right and one of the things I want to put right is that that story I told you never happened I made it up for attention I was an attention-seeking 20 year old girl and I thought wonder how much of my memories aren't true then maybe I'd heard that story about the fire and somehow I didn't so much remember the thing as remembered the story and it'd gone in my brain but did your mum know that the fire rack had ever been on oh it definitely was on fire that's That's a definite.

4:53So that definitely happened. It definitely happened, but it might have been that when I was four or five, she said, oh, by the way, never set fire to the newspaper rack. Your brother did it once. And I looked at the newspaper rack and then that became, the story became the memory. You know that thing about, I'm sure you've talked about it on this show before, about how we remember things. Of course. About we don't really remember things. We only remember the last time we remember them. Yes. So by the thousandth times you've remembered them, it's... And you build the story up. You build the story up.

5:22I mean, that's why all of our anecdotes probably aren't true. But it's a likely thing that you might remember it, because it's a traumatic moment. It is traumatic. Well, I don't remember. My memory of it is that it wasn't traumatic. My memory. I was so young that my memory of it is that I didn't know it was dangerous. I just thought, that isn't what it normally looks like, is my memory of it. But it's seared on your memory. It's definitely seared on my memory. Because everyday things you don't remember. You know, it's like you don't remember every normal meal. but the day you ate, you know, shark you probably do remember well you would if they'd left the teeth alright, so let's assume that is your first memory I'm a vegetarian, so I'm not sure that shark would be high up on my list of things that's why it would be so memorable because you broke being a vegetarian suddenly you thought it feels like you've gone from one extreme to the other if you do that are you a vegetarian?

6:13well I was, but today I think I'll have shark it's like, wow, that's a big swing isn't it? Yeah. Okay. I'm going to take that as your first memory. So you're going to tell me who your brother is. Is he older than you? Then who your mum is. So my brother was sadly no longer with us, but my brother was two years older than me. He was born in 1966. I was born in 1968. And my mother was born Delia Christine McKillop. But in the way that seemed to happen in the old days a lot, people often adopted their middle names as their first names. I noticed that's a generational thing isn't it where you'll often meet people who will say oh it's not my first name it's actually my middle name but they're called that for some reason so my mother from virtually the get-go was known as christine christine so not delia and her surname it's confusing because she was delia christine kingsley when she was born but everyone called her christine but then she married my dad so she became a mckillop which is my real name then she remarried and then she was a grant so she's gone through a few different versions of that name tell us what she was like what sort of person was she?

7:16Like my father, they were both party animals, is the only way I can describe them. I grew up in a pub, in two different pubs. And so the sort of party boozy environment was a big part of our lives growing up. And before we moved to the pub, they worked in pubs. And they were publican and landlord and landlady, were they? Correct. So what was the first pub you remember? So we lived in two pubs. The first pub was called the Dog and Partridge in Rochdale. So I was brought up in Southport, but at about the age of seven or eight, my dad got his first, well, my mum and dad, but I think my dad was the name above the door.

7:53You had to be the licensee. They got their first pub. Management, they didn't own it, but they managed it. So we all moved to Rochdale. And we lived above the dog and partridge. And you had a flat? Yeah, it was sort of over two floors, I think. I think it was two floors, but it was big. I remember it being very big. thinking it was a flat but yet somehow seemed to be bigger than my previous house or i was probably morphing the pub into it as well because there wasn't so much division what i do remember about it is going into the attic and my uncle visiting from southport and there was sunbathing my mom dad my uncle some others friends whatever and we were on the top floor doing a uh a seance me and my brother and friends or whatever were up there trying to contact the dead, as you do, you know.

8:43Did you get in touch with anyone interesting? Well, no, but as we were talking, it was one of these grand attics where it had its own staircase going up into the attic, not like a stepladder, an actual staircase. It's a Victorian pub, I take it. I guess so, yeah, I guess so. And suddenly, up the stairs, flew a roll of wallpaper. There was brand new wallpaper, maybe that hadn't been used, there was an over you know too much wallpaper they just stored at the bottom of the stairs and one of them flew up the stairs and slid across the floor during the seance so we obviously were very nervous uh and we we ran downstairs and everybody swore blind that nobody had been up there nobody had done anything and they maintained that for quite some time until it was sort of forgotten about so they never ever said to me we did that and yet to this day i don't believe for one minute that it was the dead i think it probably was my uncle who had a done it or b done it and genuinely forgotten he'd done it because he was a bit drunk he was capable of it he was that sort of more than capable so this is a party family full of larks and games there wouldn't have been a part of my family that go is that right to do that to scare the living bejesus out of them and then not tell them that it's even funnier and was he the uncle the brother of your mother or your father brother of my my father so just finish with your mum we've got she's a party animal is she pretty is she tall short fat thin she is uh she was pretty actually yeah she i've got a lovely photograph of her winning miss she miss she was a beauty contest at butlins and she's got a big sash that says miss she and it was big news as in the magazine she that's a good question there was a magazine the reason i went oh is i used to contribute to a woman's magazine called She, which was a big selling magazine.

10:27I've always wondered why it was called Miss She. And I think they would have done promotions with Butlins in all the camps. That would make sense. And they would have had a Miss She competition, and you'd have featured in the magazine. And they'd have provided the prize. Because I always thought it was quite a strange name, Miss She. Because if it was a male one, you wouldn't call it Mr Him, would you? No, it was a large format magazine. Yes. Glossy magazine, a fun magazine. Well done her. Yes, she was Miss She. And you got a free holiday? Yeah. Or did you? did you get to go to the next round and then you had to pay for the holiday anyway it was the whole thing a scam I can't remember we went back and clearly you say she was a party was she funny was she fun what what makes you think that the whole atmosphere when I was growing up was just just party and fun it was it was endless um jokes that's all I can remember it really was like my dad was as close to you you can get as being a comedian without being paid for it he was behind the bar showing off you are the center of attention it's like a little stage being behind a bar and people would certainly in the old days sit at the bar that was your that was the prime seat the bar people had their regular stools you know you don't sit in someone else's bar stool you know and they would all line up my dad was you know drinking with them as well um and there was it was in the days of when pubs weren't allowed to open between the hours of i think three and six in the afternoon.

11:51Unless you were letting the local police in. Exactly. The lock-ins. The lock-ins were a big thing in pubs. Were they, were they? Yeah, and it was a big thing in our pub where the doors got shut, the regulars were allowed to stay, and the lock-in started. And I think, technically speaking, if you're not charging them money, I don't think you commit any criminal act. No, you're entertaining your friends. Yeah. I suspect my dad probably was charging them money, but who am I to grass up my dad? But my dad is no longer with us, so I'm probably allowed to do that now. And did he actually look like Bobby Ball?

12:19Because I think in your sitcom, Bobby Ball played him. And I used to know Bobby Ball because we shared an agent with a man called Laurie Mansfield. You know, Laurie? Anyway, he looked after Bobby Ball. And Bobby Ball is not, to me, you paint a very attractive picture of your mother. Yes. Bobby Ball, he looked like Bobby Ball, didn't he? How diplomatic of you. You're trying to suggest that looking like Bobby Ball doesn't win you Mr. He. what did they see in each other? If you'd be the first to say, he's not what you call the traditional front page male model look. But my dad had, it was more to do with his personality.

13:00But he also did have a permanent moustache like Bobby. Because in the 1980s, it was a criminal offence to live in the North and not have a permanent moustache. And what drew them to each other? They were funny together? You're talking about my dad and mum or my dad and Bobby? No. no they never actually they did meet it turns out so bobby ended up playing my dad and we got chatting one afternoon in rehearsals and i told him i grew up in a pub and he said well around that era before we became famous we did all the pubs in rochdale so we might have played it and i mentioned this to my uncle because my dad was no longer alive and my uncle said no he did i remember cannon and ball coming because they were just breaking through so i like the fact that my fictional dad and my real dad probably did meet yeah so my dad was very much like bobby ball in in personality and the moustache and perm but he was six foot that's where they are yeah yeah so what do you think when it was going well because i know it ends sadly when it was going well what did your parents give each other and then what did they give you i suppose they gave me the don't take life too seriously attitude i can't remember any serious conversations as a child i can't remember anything where we sat down and said look there's something you know we have to tell you this is serious this is it was all everything was brushed under the carpet and come on let's just have fun even when they split up i don't remember a big chat about it it wasn't uh an event so they gave you your relaxed approach to life because that approach seemed to be relaxed jokey very jokey and there's lots of pictures of my mom after my mom died i i went through the photos and there's there's far too many were in the photograph she's taken her false teeth out to get the laugh for the photograph or my dad's got the cigarette up his nose there's a lot of ones with my dad with a cigarette up his nose because it's a funnier image isn't it well and her this pretty lady miss she oh yeah uh oh yeah but this was this was i think what she did um was she had buck teeth and she went to the dentist and said take them out and give me false teeth she did that when she was like before she had me before i 18 so she was miss she with false teeth.

15:12And was the problem between them, because I know they part when you're about 11. Correct. You've done your research, haven't you? Unless you were involved in why they split up. I did hear rumours of another man. I have a big Lancashire connection. Have you? I know Rochdale well. I know Southport even better. Do you? Yeah. Have you thought about why they parted? Thinking about them this morning, and them being this happy-go-lucky publican pair, is it because their relationship is based on the banter and then when the banter after the years there's nothing more than the banter? No, I think what happened was I think my dad was 21 when he got married and I'm pretty sure my mum was pregnant when she married my dad with my older brother and it was just that generational thing where in the 60s if a woman got pregnant you married the woman.

16:08it was the given thing that you did and he just went along with it that's what i think i think he went along with what he was supposed to do and maybe she did as well maybe she thought well i don't particularly want to marry this person but but i'm i'm pregnant that's not an option i must now get married and who knows i mean maybe they were madly in love with each other i don't know because again we didn't have serious conversation we never brought it up and they seemed happy enough they seem very happy they they were party animals they were they were always in bars drinking and lots of people round and lots of you know i don't remember many memories of them being happy together just the two of them there was always lots of other people they didn't allow themselves to be alone when you grow up run a pub that you're never alone you you you open up the pub at well you my dad was down there eight in the morning cleaning out the pipes and doing what you restock and do what you do the bar opens at whatever midday opens till three you might have a little kip in the afternoon if you're lucky and you start it all again at whatever six o 'clock at night that's seven days a week it never ends it is relentless and it's stressful this is why i could not think of anything worse why was it stressful it's there's a lot of alcohol involved so you're not living healthily lots of cigarettes oh my gosh they i don't think you're allowed in unless you smoked you know when they say you know nowadays you're not allowed to smoke unless it's outside i don't think you're allowed to smoke outside you have to smoke inside that was the rules so what were you like as a little boy in the 70s what what were your you played with your brother do you like your brother yeah we got on great um we we my mum and dad split up when we were 11 and he went to live with my dad and i stayed with my mom so why was that well because he started off with my mum.

17:55It was me and my brother and my mum. He had some issues, my brother. He was... My mum found it hard to look after him, and so he went to live with my dad, probably when he was about... I mean, don't forget, we were in a pub in Blackburn. That's when they split up. Were you conscious that they were about to split up? No, it was... I mean, I can laugh about it now, but it's quite a... It's both a hilarious and traumatic story at the same time, in that But we went back in the day when Pontins and Butlins were the big holidays in Britain. They were the big British holidays. They decided Pontins to try abroad, a sort of foreign version of Pontins.

18:39And not many people remember this, but you can Google it. They called it Pontinental. And it was Pontins in Spain. And we went to Pontinental because we were big. You know, my mum was Miss She. She went to, you know, Pontins and Butlin. We went to both, you know. And suddenly we're in Spain on a continental holiday. Now, looking back, it had reached a real crisis point in terms of the marriage probably wasn't going as well. But as importantly, my dad was just struggling running this pub. He was a heavy drinker. He was trying to run the pub. He was a heavy drinker in the respect that so many people in that era, especially people who were in pubs all day, everyone was a heavy drinker, you know, around him.

19:20And so suddenly he snapped. He just could not run the pub anymore. and one morning on the day we were supposed to fly back my dad wasn't and they'd had a huge row the night before we were in the room next door in the hotel they'd had a huge row but they used to row quite a lot they were feisty as they with the party atmosphere comes fun and rowing it was chaotic and it was just another row and he'd slammed the door and walked off and my mum went to bed woke up the next morning and very calmly and casually said go by the pool and see if your dad's asleep on one of the deck chairs we've got to leave for the plane in a few hours so we went down we couldn't find my dad anywhere near the pool turned out he just couldn't face going back and he just went he left um and started hitchhiking just just started hitchhiking he was drunk because he knew vaguely knew somebody i think in spain thought i'll go to that place don't forget we're talking pre any maps on phones he had no he just had a vague town name in his head and off he went started hitchhiking.

20:21He told me years later that in the middle of the night the guys that picked him up stopped on a lay-by, pulled him over and he genuinely thought he was going to get killed. But they were trying to say in pidgin English, can we have a little bit of money towards the petrol? Because we need a bit of cash. They were just asking nicely but he thought he was about to get attacked. And after his breakdown and their break-up, did he recover? Did he... Was the rest of his life a bit better? It's interesting because I'd never really thought of it as a breakdown. I probably was now by today's standards of we talk a bit a lot more openly about mental health but he he just said no i've had enough i can't do this anymore and off he went he was overwhelmed by the drink the drink by having having young kids and probably financial problems too running a pub yeah he ends meet etc even though he's working for somebody else we did all right financially i think i often will were the northern working class thing on on my sleeve you know i grew up on a council estate The reality was we grew up in the pub on the council estate.

21:16So I saw a lot of poverty. It was the 1970s and quite a tough estate in Blackburn. But we lived in the pub. So we were going on holidays to Spain and we went skiing and things, but still being brought up in a working class environment. On the day your dad disappeared hitchhiking in Spain, what did you think? Did you think anything? The chaos of our lives and the way they lived their lives, it wasn't as traumatic as it sounds. As far as I was concerned, we'd see him at the airport. And when he wasn't at the airport, he'd be in the pub. He'd have somehow got back before us. It's just part of the chaotic nature of being brought up in that environment.

21:58But when he didn't... When he didn't. When he didn't. Dornier, did you and your brother talk about it before your brother moved away from living with you and your mum? We'd never talked about it. My dad was quite... I wrote an autobiography, and I described it as being... It was like having another older brother rather than a dad sometimes. He wasn't dad material. He was a really nice guy. He really was. He was funny. He was nice. He was a good person. He just didn't know how to be a dad. He said years later to me when he was much older, not long before he died, He just said, I don't think I was loved properly by my mum, and I found it hard to do that for you.

22:44Which is both reasonable and a bit of a cop-out, I think. You know, I think it's... We could have an endless cycle then if we do that, aren't we? Did he find another wife? Oh, yes, he married four times in the end. Oh, my goodness. So he was clearly likeable at first. The fact that I had to say, I think, shows you how many... He married so many times that I was... I travelled around Australia once, phoned him randomly just to say hello. I mean, we'd only speak a few times a year. We weren't close, but we weren't not close because of any trauma or any abuse or anything like that. He just was separate from us.

23:21That's the only way to describe it. And I phoned him from Australia when I was travelling. I backpacked round for a year, and I just said, I just wanted to say hello. And he said, well, that's really good of you to ring me today, of all days, so thank you. And I said, what do you mean, of all days? He goes, well, that's why I assumed you're ringing me. I'm getting married in three hours. And I said, well, you didn't tell me. I didn't tell anybody. He goes, oh, well, I just didn't think. You know, to him getting married is like pancake Tuesday. You know, it's not a big thing. It's just another marriage.

23:47Did you meet any of his other wives? Yeah, I met the second wife. She was part of my upbringing, but the next two, not at all. No, no, I didn't. They were very quick, I think, those marriages. I didn't. And was he happy as the years went by? Did he get on top of the drink problem? No, he never got on top of it. He was a committed drinker. He said it from day one. He said, I will smoke and drink to the day I die. It wasn't even a question about whether he stopped drinking. That was not part of the deal. What's your best memory of him? What's the best funny thing you did with him? Well, as I say, he was largely out of my life on a sort of day-to-day basis after about the age of 11 or 12.

24:24But I don't know. I suppose it's bringing kids round to my house. Because we lived in a pub, people wanted to come round. It was a big building. And because the pub closed between three and five, we had a very long pub and we used to have games of football inside the pub. We used to set up two little goals either side of this sort of long bit next to the bar. Use a tennis ball and play three or four a side. And it was brilliant. But it got to the point where loads of kids were coming round to the pub and my mum and dad said, you're going to have to police this. We can't have more than, say, four mates in every day in the afternoon.

25:02it's too noisy it's too chaotic you know which i thought was rich coming from them it was a popular place to be both for the drinkers and my mates and when they met my dad or my mom they would always say god they're so cool and funny and they're not like my parents they were they were they were not strict my parents were not strict people at all so for example talking about the seances that this is a weird thing because apart from the seance thing that i just told you there was another thing where it was a regular lock-in thing between in the afternoon and that's probably where we got the idea actually from seeing them do it but they would do these seances and ouija boards in between the three and five lock-in periods it was a thing that a regular thing and we were allowed to join in but yeah come on come and try and contact the dead with us they didn't they were very relaxed about what a you know as a parent now the kind of thing that I think I've probably gone the other way a little bit too much.

25:56If a film says 15, my kids are not watching it till they're 15. And even then, my kids are not doing a Ouija board at the age of 12. Give me a happy moment with your mum then. I remember when she had the occasional night off from the pub, she would give herself one night off. So she stayed in. And when I say stayed in, she stayed above. So you could still hear the noise from downstairs. And we'd watch Corrie. we'd watch coronation street together i remember thinking i don't see a lot of my mum because she's downstairs a lot so it's nice when she's up here you know because it's a very weird thing at owning a pub in that your mum and dad are always there but they're sort of never there it's a busy hard life especially if you're drinking too much did you find yourself falling into the role of looking after when you were alone with her once your brother had gone to live with your dad did you feel that you were stepping into the shoes of being a little bit unfortunately the drinking carried on for both my mum and my dad they they carried on drinking i mean to be fair my mum my dad was the heavy drinker i don't remember my mum being drunk ever until they split up i remember the day the i suppose like the area manager of the i think it was whip bread was the chain and they came around to basically say you you can't run the pub anymore on your own it's just impossible and she knew that but I remember going into the bar and seeing her in tears and she she was drunk and she was smoking I'd never seen her smoking before and it obviously hit her more than it hit him I think them splitting up and unfortunately she just didn't really recover from that I don't think and she carried on drinking after that day I don't remember any long periods of her not drinking till the day till the day she died after that you know Did you hug her on that day?

27:41I remember looking through a door into the pub. I wasn't with her. I remember her being over in the corner with the area manager. But no, I'd like to pretend I ran over there and gave her a big hug. But the truth is... But she found Mr Grant. She did. So she remarried when... Not that... I was still a child. Was I 13? Was he OK? Again, he wasn't really dad material, stepdad material. No, not really. so what was happening in your head with these present but absent parents well you don't it's only now that i'm a parent that i think it was chaos i look back and think my childhood was utter chaos and if the things i went through my kids went through and someone said to me i think your children possibly will be affected by this i'd find it hard to disagree with them but it's the only life you have and you you assume i don't know you assume it's a sort of norm how do you think you're happy don't forget i was i was i remember a lot of you know with with poverty come social issues you know and and on that estate there was a lot of single parents a lot you know we'd come from a town southport which was was more affluent at the time and and suddenly we were on a council estate uh with all the social problems that came with that in the 1970s you know lots of single parents and I remember saying to my mum you you and my dad would never split would you and she said oh god no no that because that seemed like seemed like an alien world and they split up and the first thing we did was leave the pub and go and live on the estate so it was my mum me and my brother living in what we considered a problem area you know there was no getting around it in a council house or flat in account we've got a council house so suddenly we we were now in the council house looking at the the castle as it were the pub that was the center of attention of the of the estate you know and then we tried moving to as i tried meaning my bro like me my brother or my mom applied to swap council houses so she could go and live in southport which is her hometown and which was where i was brought up you know my brother so we moved back to southport and i think that was part of the problem for my brother that it wasn't just the divorce.

29:57He wanted to be back with his mates in Blackburn. He wanted to be back there. I don't think I had the same affection for it because maybe it's just because I was younger. I think I was only in the first year at secondary school, whereas he was in the third year. So he wanted to go back. So he did. He went back and lived with my dad and went back to his old school, whereas I started a new school in Southport. And how were you at school? What sort of boy were you at school? Well, I dug out my school reports probably about 10 years ago in the attic. and it is literally like a declining graph of academic achievement.

30:28It starts off, I'm your textbook swotty kid, top marks, always sitting at the front so I can listen to the teacher. And then it slowly just goes downhill to the point where, by the time I leave, I just scrape through two O levels. And obviously, you know, if you look at where it goes downhill, it's around the split up. It coincides. Of course it does. but it also coincides with the time I left a school and went to start another school so I often wonder if they'd have split up but I'd have stayed in Blackburn and stayed at the school would I have stayed a high academic achiever it's the moving of the schools as well I think had an effect because I didn't know anybody I became the class clown I was you know you all start on day one at a secondary school together not knowing anybody or you might know the kids from junior school but when you start in the second year and you literally don't know one person you find ways to try and get to know people and i chose to be the clown of course clowning is in your blood in that your parents were party people they were fun they were lucky but also you had a great grandfather who actually was an entertainer we were always brought up i was brought up to believe that he was a variety hall comedian but my what's his name billy mack billy mack and he was your father's grandfather correct yeah yeah and i it was never really spoken about when i very first started doing stand-up on the london circuit unpaid open spots i mentioned this to my gran who was still alive and she said oh like your great granddad um and i couldn't believe this that i had a great granddad that i'd never heard much about that turns out was a variety hall comedian and call himself mac as well i'd called himself mac yeah well yeah although oh actually yes no that's right he he had the c m-a-c mine's m-a-c-k yeah i remember now because my granddad when i first called myself lee mac the comedian he was not happy because he said he shouldn't have a k on it do you remember the moment you make somebody laugh for the first time i mean why did you become the class yeah my first memory of it is standing on the those what we used to call the mobiles they were classrooms that were in the playground i know the little portable buildings over spills i think they were and standing on one of them doing a bobby ball impression to about 20 people cheering me on it was a very high stage as you can imagine a proper audience little little little crowd gathered that's in my memory it might have been three people looking indifferent but in my head they they they looked up and i was doing a performance but i i can't say to you for one minute oh my gosh I love this this that was my moment of going I want to perform I'm I didn't have that for a long time but you liked it I like the fact it was a way of making mates is what I like and did you have good mates I mean did you yeah yeah we did your best friend at school well at that secondary school my probably my two closest friends who are still close mates now uh John Clegg and Neil Blundell they were my schoolmate friends that carried on being my friends all the way through to now and what did you give me which is very rare for me by the way I don't tend to hang on a lot to necessarily the past.

33:36You know, if someone's a good friend of mine from a certain period, but that period is over and I haven't seen them for a few years, I have no massive desire to go back to that period. But those two have always sort of been there as my mates, you know. But my group was the, in that old-fashioned, awful way of grading kids at school, we had A1. A1 was the top class. a4 was the bottom class in the a band then we had the b band b1 to b4 they were labeling you very early on and if you were in b4 they were literally saying you are the word i mean it was subject so you'd be in b4 at maths but you might be in b1 at something else but the a banders and the b banders kept separate and within that the a1s for english or a1 for maths were the real swatty kids and I was more your sort of A2, A3.

34:27Not quite the top. Not bad. But in the sort of top 20%, shall we say, in terms of the grading of it. That didn't correlate with the results. I should have been B4 because I got two O levels. In fact, I think the Bs weren't allowed to do O levels. It's awful. I mean, it's an awful way of telling people. It comes from that 11 plus era of, we're telling you at 11 what you are. And were you disappointed at the time when you got the... Oh, no, I couldn't give a monkey's. I barely turned up at school towards the end.

35:02Did you have a girlfriend at this time, in your teens? In my teens. Who's the first girl that you fancied? Well, do you know, I remember the first girl I probably, I was so little, I mean, gosh, I must have been five or six, but there was a girl sat behind me called Karen, who used to have pigtails. and I remember liking her and I think I used to pull the pigtails to get the attention off her, which I think in a lot of ways has never changed. I'm still the kind of person that, if I like some, I don't even mean fancy them, just if I think, oh, they're a good person, I want to get to know them, I'll prod them a bit.

35:36Yeah. You know, nothing's changed. I'm just warning you, don't go around pulling pigtails anymore or prodding people. No. We don't want you cancelled. No, absolutely. I will not do that. I thought you were going to say, don't pull my pigtails. But who was the first girl who took your eye and who reciprocated? Well, my first, I suppose, proper girlfriend was a girl called Debbie, who very strangely, that you should mention this, I've never seen since. It was a very brief little school thing, relationship. And then about a year and a half ago, I was in a play called The Unfriend in the West End, and my mate Neil, who I just told you about, came to see me, my old schoolmate.

36:13He looked a bit shocked when he came into my dressing room. He said, you're not going to believe who's outside that dressing room door. It's Debbie from school. your first girlfriend. And it was quite nerve-wracking, you know, to see something you haven't seen for, I was probably 14 or something. But it was nice. It was a nice little brief moment of hello. And she said something, actually, it was quite interesting, because as she walked away, she said, do you remember the last thing you ever said to me at school? I said, no. And I can't believe it was the last thing, because I still went to school with her after that.

36:40She said, I'd said to her, the next time you see me, I'll be on the television. And I hate the fact that she said that, because that makes me sound like an insufferable human being. And I wonder if I did really say that or... Well, it's one of her memories. One of her memories of... That she's... Because of what maybe happened to you. That perhaps I actually said, I'd like to work on telly one day and she'd give it a bit of VAT, that story. And were you wanting to work on telly? Absolutely not. No. I wanted to make my mates laugh. That's all I wanted to do. And then you leave school. Well, until about the age of about 13 or 14.

37:12But then when I was about 14, 15, something like that, the young ones started. the alternative comedy revolution started it was now the early 80s and I found my passion in the sense that alternative comedy for people my age that was our punk to watch the young ones that the next generation didn't like although my parents of course of course they loved it went along with everything oh they loved it my mum's favourite programme was Bottom Until the Day She Died she loved anarchy you know but I got well into watching Friday Night Live seeing comedy that you know really spoke to me i loved it you know and at the time i thought god wouldn't that be great to be one of those people but that was like saying i wanted to be an astronaut that it's all good saying it would be great but not even feasible to someone like me because because you left school with two i've left school with two i did what do you then do how do you end your living and i left school at 15 i hadn't even turned 16 because i turned 16 in the summer august the 4th as you know um so like a dickensian chimney sweep i left school at 15 and all my mates who'd succeeded in their results neil and john who i told you about they went off to do their a-levels it was one of these schools we get to leave to go somewhere else college yeah so they went to sixth form college and i got a job doing what i went home that afternoon i put on the television thinking what am i now going to do with the rest of my life and horse racing was on.

38:39And I thought, well, I'll become a jockey. What about that? That looks like the kind of sport you can start at 16, having had no experience. So I rang up my local stable, who just happened to be the trainer of Red Rum. I rang up Ginger McCain. His wife answered. And I said, I'd like to be a jockey. And did you know Ginger McCain at this stage? Oh, no, no. You just found the number in the phone book? Oh, yeah, just rang up. I don't know. I think I rang up, what was the old way of doing it? 192, was it? Direct inquiries. I just said, but bearing in mind, and I've lived my life like this ever since, from turning the television on to deciding I was now going to become a jockey to ringing up and trying to get a job, that all happened in about 90 seconds.

39:21That's how much thought I used to give, and still do. I'm very like, yeah, I'll do that. Let's do it now. Well, that's why you're here today. I guess. I don't know. And so I rang up and just said, I'd like to be a jockey. And they said, what experience have you got? I said, absolutely none. but I'm, I think I said, I'm eight stone. I thought that'd be handy to be very light. I wasn't eight stone. I was a lot heavier than eight stone but still very skinny. I definitely wasn't 10 stone, put it that way. But you were a bit tall. Well, first of all, it was national hunt so you can be taller and heavier as a national hunt jockey.

39:50So if you're going over the fences, it's a different sport altogether. And had you ever been on a horse before? I'd been on a donkey at Blackpool, that was it. Never been on a horse in my life. But I just thought, how hard can it be? So you thought, I'll go to a Red Rums trainer and maybe he can see me right. And did they meet you? Did they say, come along? They said, come along. I think they said, come along on Monday. I'll have a look at you. And they looked at me and the first thing she said was, you are not eight stone, are you? But she said, okay, well, look, we'll give you a try. And we'll give you a try means you work for free, for nothing, for a few weeks.

40:24But you get work experience. What a fantastic opportunity. What other sport? Imagine turning up at Man United and saying, yeah, I'll give it a bash. And I'm going, all right, you're in for three weeks training with the lads. What a fantastic opportunity. I was certainly working with Irish jockeys, professionals, working with racehorses that were entered into the Grand National. Red Rum was still there. You met Red Rum? Yeah, he was there the whole year I was there. What did happen to Red Rum, by the way? He died of old age. He died of, I'm going to say, 30. I think he lived till he was 30, buried on the finishing line at Aintree.

41:00Oh, good. Why do I think he disappeared for a while? That's Shergar Oh thank you very much I'm not very good at this There's another one called Arkel Arkel yes He wasn't kidnapped He just died as well Only really Shergar It's Shergar But it's a completely different sport Flat racing Is where all the Arga Khans And the The reason they kidnapped Shergar Was because he was worth a lot of money Because they're stud horses National hunt horses over the fences Tend to not have their Testicles That's what you mean They've gone they're basically a lot of the time they're even they can clear the fences well i think there is a bit of clearing the fence but more to do with uh temperament as well you don't want a horse and they're off shooting off at the fastest possible speed because you've got four miles to do so you have to calm those horses down and they are geldings okay so i've taught you something you've taught me a great deal yes you're in fact never to book me again well that we booked the wrong person because you're only here because i thought we're going to hear about the disappearance of red rum where he'd ended up with the irish connection yeah it turns out it's sugar completely different horse totally different person oh i see so when you said what happened to him you were hoping i'd say well you know the famous story yeah and then i just died of old age completely wrong horse i'm afraid so you have a few weeks alongside red rum i have a whole year so after a few weeks i said is there any chance now i can i've proved myself now at this point all i'm doing is shoveling poo.

42:26And one of the lads in the yard said, you've never ridden a horse yet, have you? I went, no. They went, come on, we'll put you on a horse. And they put me on a horse just to walk up and down the yard. And that horse was Red Rum. So the first horse I ever rode was Red Rum. Which to most people is a really impressive thing, but given that you don't even know that he wasn't kidnapped, you know, I'm not sure you have the same affection. I've heard of Red Rum and I now know you as having had your first ride on red rum. I mean, had I known that you'd have thought that was the one that was kidnapped, I could have elaborated a story about how I got on that horse and then suddenly a hood went over my head and I was tied to a radiator for four months.

43:03I should have said that story. You should have. But I didn't. Next time. That's not what happened. No, but we want the truth. We like the truth. Why did it all come to an end? Why didn't you stick with that one? So I sat on the horse, led up and down, didn't feel comfortable, I have to be honest. And now it was time to properly learn to ride. now Red Room was famously he's the only horse to win the Grand National three times despite the fact that he didn't have there was no gallops so he was trained behind well originally a second hand car lot so Ginger was a taxi driver and got into horse training and had no facilities really that's what makes the story even more romantic he just had these stables behind this car lot very small stables and the horse was trained on the beach so they would all ride down the high street to the beach and off they would go galloping.

43:54And Red Run was bought for a relatively small amount of money and wasn't a particularly successful horse. In fact, he was a flat horse to begin with. Lester Piggott rode him. You won't care about that because you perhaps don't know that it was a different sport. No, no. He was in a completely different sport of flat racing. Lester Piggott rode him. I know who Lester Piggott is. Yeah, but he didn't do particularly well. And the story goes that he kept having problems with his foot, his spot or his leg or something. And when he was on the beach at Southport, he would go in the sea and something magical happened with Southport seawater and it cured his leg and he became a fantastic racehorse is what I've heard but anyway no gallops so where do you train a lad who's never ridden before well what they decided was they'll let me walk around the streets with him so I sat on the back of a horse we're talking double-decker buses going past we're talking cars going past horses 100 % sense fear and if they feel that you're scared they get scared and this horse knew i had no idea what i was doing and he ran off down the road with me on his back uh so i was galloping down the road and of course i thought stay calm i get into the jockey position i stood up so now the horse he thinks he's in a race because i'm now stood up so off he belts around the corner hey god and i'm terrified i'm absolutely terrified and i'm getting they're running he's running on concrete as well and we get to a very sharp left-hand turn on a fairly quiet suburban street and this horse is properly galloping and he sort of turned and I can only describe it as, you know, in Scooby-Doo when they sort of get to a sort of corner and they sort of run on the spot for a second.

45:34Does that make sense? Or when they run off... Absolutely, going round and round to run off the edge of the cliff. Run off the edge of the cliff. And they still run. And they run back onto the cliff. Onto the safety of the cliff. That's what it felt like. the horse was sort of skidding like at any minute he now might fall to the side and i'm going to be crushed underneath him and he sort of went right on the concrete and then he got his feet and then he sprints again down there and he gets to a hedge that's a field and i'm like this is a horse that has been trained to jump and i'm i've never been on a horse and now now i think he's expecting me to go over the hedge with him is he and he sort of when a horse jumps he sort of slightly crouches slightly sort of gets ready and there's a sort of i wouldn't say a pause but a horse sort of gets ready to jump just before it jumps and he did that getting ready to jump thing he sort of went and then i think he assessed the situation and thought i've got a right herbert on my back no way am i jumping and he stopped i was off that horse like a shot holding on to its reins and i thought i don't want to do this i don't want to be a jockey it is terrifying and after that I was just my job was just to you know what I used to do I used to take red rum for a walk because like a dog on a lead because he needed a walk but he wasn't training anymore he was he just lived in the yard he was a retired race so I took I remember taking him to my grandmother's house knocking on the door and she said get that horse off my lawn I said that's not any horse that's red rum and she said I don't care who it is get it off my lawn I used to go door to door selling horse manure.

47:08Yeah, the gardens to help the rhubarb. 50p a bag. And now I tell you, now I'm into my garden and if someone knocked at my door and said, I've got a bag of horse poo for 50p, I would be biting their hands off. Well, I wouldn't, obviously. Not the hands. Not literally, I wouldn't go anywhere near their hands with my teeth. Exactly. But I used to say 50p for a bag of horse manure and they'd say, no, you're all right, thanks. It's just cold calling, basically. But then I used to say, it's not any horse manure. Red rum's horse manure. It wasn't. Well, it might have been. Some of it will have been. Some of it was.

47:35A lot of it probably wasn't. And occasionally they go, really? I go, yeah, you know what? Red rum's trained around here. I did. This is pure red rum poo, this. And they go, stay there. Go and get me 50p. Well done. That's what I used to do. How did you end up? You gave that up eventually. Well, I fell off a hay wagon and broke my arm. And I had to have some time off. There's only one thing left to do when you decide you can't be a jockey. And that is try and become a professional darts player. We all know that. So I locked myself in the bedroom. spent a year determined to be a professional darts player because I thought I was good enough.

48:09Well, it's interesting because you look... I was deluded. You do look more like a professional darts player than a jockey. Right, I'm leaving. That's a compliment. Is it? Have you ever heard in any beauty contest anybody say, and there's Mr Portugal there coming down the stairs? And I would describe that as quintessentially darts player look. it's not a look we often think of as as good looking but i think you're getting i think you're going by the college shirt and i'm going by the attitude as well yeah exactly so what went wrong there i was good enough i was deluded i've always been deluded i've always i couldn't be a darts player anymore that i could have been a jockey but i just go it's the only sport that i probably excelled at i was i was a better darts player than average for my age because i grew up in a pub I played all the time my dad was town champion my dad's love of it came down to me I got into it I played a lot but it's like I do soccer aid now you know on ITV I do that every year surrounded by celebrities that could have made it they think but the professionals have a quiet word and they go they're so far off and that's the same with me I was so far off what a professional darts player is but because I was better than my mates and because I was regularly hitting 180s in my bedroom.

49:27It doesn't translate to being in a pub in a competition and doing it.

49:38So how do you get from there to here, in a nutshell? When is the moment of transition that comes from this... Being a professional comedian. Yeah. Well, as I say, from about the age of 15, I said in my head I want to be a comedian, but I didn't know what that meant. because you also wanted to be a jockey and then a dance player well i did but that's because i i wanted to be a comedian but that was never going to happen so i might as well be a jockey or a dance player was the with the philosophy you know if you know if i said i want to be an astronaut you go yeah well don't be deluded what are you really going to do all right i'll settle for jockey or dance player that's sort of in my head but it was always there it was always the thing i did with my mates i would make my mates laugh i would and and they would make me laugh you know i was it was the thing that bonded both my family as an upbringing and also bond the people i would look out for were the people that had a shared sense of humour you know I've often thought of it as being like a way of forming a gang you know you I would go to a party and start doing my thing and trying to make people laugh and the best thing that could happen was some girl I fancied laughed at me but the second best thing that could happen is the girl I fancied thought I was a right numpty and moved away from me because it saved so much time.

50:50The third result is not, it's a bit like now when I test out jokes. If I test out jokes, the best result is that they laugh. But the second best result is that it gets nothing. Because then you draw a line through it, you never have to think of that joke again. It's that sort of middle third thing where they laugh a bit and then you put so much effort into trying to get it to work again, but it doesn't ever quite work. You've wasted your time. That's why no laughs is almost as good as laughs. It cuts through things very quickly. and I was a bit like that with people you know I'd go brilliant you're on my like you are on my level totally we're now going to be mates for the night and who knows maybe in the future in 1990 I went to the comedy store yeah and it was a sort of life-changing moment I thought finally I found that this is where you do it as a member of the audience oh yeah yeah as a member of the audience Eddie Izzard I didn't I'd never heard of any of these people at the time but Eddie Izzard was the the compa Steve Coogan was the headliner and it was just the best night ever and I thought I would love to do this but I can't do it because these people are different to me is what I thought I just remember thinking wow you you people are amazing you are so you cannot get on that stage unless you are emotionally sorted completely sure of yourself and worldly wise that's what I remember thinking I'm none of those things I'm not worldly wise I'm not so confident in myself that I could stand there in front of people but these people are they're different to me I need to become like them.

52:12I know I'll travel the world. If I travel the world, I'll come back all worldly wise and I'll be older and I'll be like those people. That's when you went to Australia? Part of it, yeah. I just thought I'll travel the world and just become like them. Now, I've now know thousands of comedians, but I didn't know any at the time. And if I'd have known then what I know now, I'd have got up that night because they're no more secure or worldly wise than the man in the street they're just putting on a very good front is what they're doing but at the time I thought they were different and special you know and when I realized they were just as messed up as the rest of us I just thought why have I wasted the last few years traveling the world so they just got up so what is the moment of transition is it happening in Australia yeah I remember watching uh Ben Elton again actually because Ben Elton was on Friday Night Live of course I used to watch the kid he was doing some telly show and I was watching it and I had this plan that one day I was going to leave Australia I was going to go to Japan then I was going to go to India and I was watching him on the screen and I just thought I've got I've just got to get on with this like if I want to do what he's doing I've got to just get on with it but of course even then I managed to find a way of delaying it I decided I was going to go back to university because I'd left school at 15 with two O levels but I thought if I go to university I will be surrounded by like-minded people especially if I do a drama or film course which is what I ended up doing i'll be surrounded by people like on the tv show fame remember fame where you'd be in the canteen and somebody would just get up and sing a song and someone else would join and then end up dancing on taxis outside if i'm surrounded by them sort of people i'll tell a funny joke in the canteen they'll go hey lee's a funny guy let's sit around and watch him do a show it's the deluded version of what i had in my head but is this where you met tara well yes so that i met tara in freshers week and and you saw across the crowded room had you had lots of girlfriends between doing those ramshackle years?

54:07Yes, I'd had a few girlfriends. I'd had, but I was, yeah, I'd had some serious relationships, but nothing, there was no wedding bells or anything like that. And then I met Tara and we were mates, just mates. And we moved into our accommodation together as flatmates. So there was me, Tara, and a girl called Becky. We had a three bedroom house. And for me, wanting to be a comedian was such a deep, dark secret. I hadn't told anybody because I just thought, I didn't know anybody wanted to be a comedian. It was an odd thing to say. And I remember sitting down with Tara and telling her, like it was a big thing, you know.

54:44I just want you to know that I want to be a comedian. Thinking she would just either say, don't be ridiculous, or you've got to go for it. She just said it like I'd said, I'm thinking of having rhubarb pie or something. She said, just do that then, it's fine. I said, oh yeah, it's not a big deal, is it? So I think that's what bonded me to her. And we ended up getting together whilst the other girl wasn't there. so now suddenly the girls come back and now me and her are a couple and you move into her room or she moves into yours well the actual story was there was a tiny room a middle room and a massive room we drew straws, I got the tiny room Tara got the middle room Becky got the massive room and I remember saying to her when she came back Tara said you deal with it, I'm going off, you can tell her so she came back and the exact conversation was me saying look, you know that I'm in the tiny room and Tara's in the middle room and you're in the big room she'd been gone for like a week and I said yeah I said well just so you know I'm now in the middle room and she went what Tara's agreed to swap with you and I said no we're both in the middle room and she still didn't get it she said you're going to share the middle room and then the penny dropped wow but it was fantastic we got on really well all of us and you're still with Tara still with Tara and that was when I decided that there was no amount of travelling the world or going to university or any of this nonsense that was going to solve the problem of becoming this worldly wise, better person who was confident enough to go on a stay.

56:13I just had to do it with all these insecurities. So Tara is the solution? I think so. Tara was the... Why have you stuck with Tara, given your parents' example? Oh, you've met my wife, have you? Why have you stuck with Tara, do you think? Why has she stuck with me? I think our relationship has always, again, like my family we the comedy is without that it wouldn't have a chance but right from the get go we have the same things make us laugh I don't know we've now been together for gosh 32 years it's a long time and we've been married for we got married after about 10 I think and you've got children haven't you we've got three kids yeah my son is actually turning 21 next week which is the age that I think my dad was when he was when he got involved in a shotgun on wedding to my mum.

57:03So can you remember the first joke you were paid for telling? Can you remember the moment? I remember the first gig. I wasn't paid for it, obviously. You don't get paid for a long time when you're doing the circuit. The first gig. I remember the first gig. And can you remember some of the material? I'll never forget the first gig. I've forgotten a lot of gigs. I'll never forget the first one because you've got to remember that I left school at 15 with a vague notion that I would like to be a comedian but didn't know how to do that and finally got on stage, I don't know, 25? So we're talking 10 years of thinking I'd like to be a comedian but how do you do that and finally now the day has arrived where I've booked into my local comedy club and I'm doing an open spot and I turned up first of all I spent two days drinking taboo because I was so scared of doing it remember taboo no well it was a drink you had to choose between taboo or mirage that was the marketing campaign are you taboo or are you mirage taboo one in the end mirage went a bit I think it was an early sort of brexit day where they sort of said there's only two options you're either a remainer or a lever so i thought i need i can't eat i couldn't eat i couldn't think i just couldn't do anything because i was so terrified of doing this first gig i foolishly invited tara and all my mates to watch the show which i look back now i think is madness because why would i want them witnessing the disaster that's going to happen it was an open spot circuit but i'd never heard of it and some guy said how many of these have you're done and I said well one this is it I assumed you did one and then you became a comedian and they just laughed oh no no no we've been doing this for years I'm on gig number 165 or whatever I just assumed that you did it got told you weren't funny and never did it again or be got booked and word got out there was a comedian in town and you should book him because I was naive and stupid and I remember being introduced and I remember walking to the microphone and I remember before I even got to the microphone thinking this is all right I'm going to do this as a job two quick things before we get to the finish uh I've been lucky enough to be on your would I lie to you and there's nobody quicker in the world how does an instant line come into one's head how does that happen what happens well I don't know I mean I don't I have been told that I'm quick and I don't I can only live in my head so I don't see it as being quick but so I don't know I really don't know what what that is because I don't see it that way and you don't think it before you speak it because there wouldn't be time um sometimes I do sometimes I someone will say something to which I think there is an obvious thing to say on the back of that but maybe it's you're on the opposite side and maybe you're talking to David or somebody else and you three will be chatting and I'll hear somebody say something I'll go oh there's an obvious line there which they are now about to say so I won't interrupt but then I leave it for what feels like a couple of seconds and no one said that line so I think well it's a shame to waste it they're not going to do it so I'll do the obvious line and I'll say the line and it might get a laugh and then I watch it back and everything I've just described which I thought happened in about three seconds happened in about 0.1 second so I think oh I interrupted a bit quickly I didn't know they might have wanted to say that but it's not how I see it at the time I my time scale in my head is perhaps different it's it's yeah I thought I can't explain it really do you have stage fright I mean um do you know what I've I've only ever had it once I think proper stage fright and that was the play I did a year and a half ago uh called the unfriend where I dried up on the first line and I knew I was going to be on that stage for an hour and a half and it was awful such an awful feeling that it took me about two weeks to recover from i was nervous every night after that but up until then no i've i've but i read some of you don't like to appear in with an audience that knows you yeah i think that's why it's odd that i invited so many people to my first show but i've never performed in my hometown of southpaw and i don't think i ever will because i do have that separation where i've got me lee mack the performer and then lee mckillop the real me oh so and so Your passport is Lee McKillop.

1:01:10Your bank account is Lee McKillop. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. So you're two different people. I'm not even two different people. I'm just Lee McKillop. The Lee Mack thing is just, I don't, yeah, if you add up the hours of the day in a year, I'm only 5 % Lee Mack, aren't I? I'm 95 % not that person, you know. So I don't see it as even two people. It's just the one person who occasionally does this act, you know. As Lee McKillop, give me a moment from your early years of joy. When I say joy, what comes into your head? joy I remember my mum making a potato pie when I was very young and to this day I don't really know what potato pie is is it a thing or did she make that up it's very carb heavy isn't it it sounds like a Lancashire thing a good honest potato pie I think it's just basically you cut the pastry off and inside is loads of slices of potato in a sort of sauce and I couldn't believe how nice this pie was It was so nice.

1:02:10And I ate, it looked like it was for like four people or six people. I ate it all. I don't think my brother or my dad were around at the time. And maybe I was supposed to save some for other people. I just ate a lot in one. I've never tasted anything that nice. I remember that being joyful. And what about a moment of sadness? The last time I properly, properly, absolutely cried beyond belief was about three years ago when my cat got run over. And I'd only had my cat for a couple of years, but it was a little, I think they're called British Blue. Is that what they're called? They look like teddy bears.

1:02:50It was just found in the street. The neighbour knocked on the door, took it to the vet, and I had to bring the body back and bury it in the garden. And I cried more than I thought I would about the loss of this cat, even though I've still got the other cats that we had before that, still got them got dogs now we've I've lost family members and I'm not saying I didn't cry when they died obviously I cried but it's almost like the loss of a pet it's it's such um family often are a mixed emotional feeling about everything with them on it you know a pet is just pure uh unconditional love isn't it there's the it so when you lose a pet it has a different type of loss, weirdly, than a family member.

1:03:38Does that make sense? It's not worse than a family member. It's a lot easier to get over within days, I was fine. But the moment of having to bury this cat was awful. The family member you did lose, apart from your parents, of course, who were older, was your brother, who was only a couple of years older than you. And what were the... Did he take his own life? He did, but it was... I don't really like to talk about this. I will happily talk about it to you, but I don't want to talk about it only because I don't... I'm the kind of person that believes that if you open a certain door, you are public property.

1:04:11That's the only reason. It's not that I have problems. I'll talk about it with you off mic easily. No problems at all. But in summary, yeah, I'm happy to say that he did take his own life, but it was alcohol connected. I describe it as somebody... If somebody goes on top of a roof threatening to kill themselves, but they have no intention of killing themselves but whilst they're up there they slip and fall and they die that's how I described it to well to a police officer who then ended up being

1:04:48what's the phrase? misadventure rather than suicide is how it was officially said and I think that's a fair assessment of the situation my brother, like my parents they died of alcohol abuse That's what they really died of. And that's why I'm very... You don't drink now, do you? I don't. It took a while, actually. My brother was the last person to die of the three, and I still drank quite a few years after that. So it's as much to do with family history, but also to do with...

1:05:19I've grown up with alcohol, and I've seen all the so-called benefits and all the so-called negatives. When you're in a pub, you see everything. I saw the parties. I saw the fights in pubs. I saw my dad having to, in very violent situations, having to throw people out of pubs. I've seen him dancing on a pool table, the happiest looking man in the world. So I've seen all the gamuts of emotion that come with alcohol. But the real reason I stopped, I think, I just read a book one day that absolutely fundamentally changed my whole attitude towards it, which was called The Alan Carr's Easy Way, which is, he's famous, of course, for the, not the comedian.

1:05:57It's a different Alan car. I love Alan to bits, the comedian, but I don't really look at him for my lifestyle choices. But this guy had written a book about stopping smoking and my wife had used to smoke and she read it and stopped. He just happened to have written one about alcohol as well. So I read it just out of curiosity. And by the end of the book, I just now like the smoking. It's not that you give it up. You just have no interest in it anymore by the end of the book. And that's how I felt. I just suddenly for the first time saw alcohol for what it was and decided I just wasn't interested.

1:06:31And, yeah, what a preachy way to end. No, not a preachy way. Finally, one last question. You've been around a long while, an extraordinary life, with a remarkable childhood, I think, and a wonderful career. I love what you do. I think you are very, very funny. Well, thank you. And likewise, I have to say, I'm not just saying this. I don't really like doing podcasts anymore because I've got a theory that podcasts have become the new rubbish bins and what I mean by that is the press used to go through people's rubbish bins if you're on the telly to find out some secrets or whatever and that's how they used to get stories didn't they and now I've realized they go through they go through podcasts because you feel unguarded on a podcast and you'll say things particularly on podcasts that you might be doing for a mate who's has a listenership of about four people not this one obviously but and they'll find it and they will pluck something out of it and the next minute you're clickbait i had it with with my own podcast where we were talking about adhd and what it feels like and i said i said the only way to describe it for me is that if you're in a bar you you tune into the four or five different conversations without deliberately doing it and the conversation you're having is as loud as the conversation over there or over at the bar or over and it's all going on at once in your head and i think it was i won't say which newspaper because i might have it wrong but the clickbait headline the next day was lee mack admits to mental health issues and says he can hear other voices in his head and i thought i'm not doing this anymore i've had enough of this right i'm sick of these unguarded chats that get a bit of clickbait from them and so i thought i'm not going to do them anymore but i so i don't like podcasts but i but i like you in the the scales of liking you have outweighed the not liking the podcasts well so that's why i thought i'll do it thank you but if as a result of this i get loads of clickbait and my career ends then those scales will go back the other way i appreciate that we can then do a podcast about that perhaps yes it all came to an end because of rosebud yes As Rosebud comes to an end, what have you learnt?

1:08:41What has life taught you? Life has taught me that if you, particularly in my area of work, but I think this translates to every job, or just the way you live your life. If you are insecure or worried about doing something because you feel like you'll fail, it doesn't matter because I pretty much guarantee that everyone else who's doing it feels that way anyway. So if you, on a very simplistic way, if you want to be a stand-up comedian and you feel like I can't get up there because the other people are different to me, that's what they're thinking. If you go into a social situation and you feel a bit nervous because you feel like, oh, I'm a bit nervous, I'm not very good in social situations, everyone's thinking the same thing.

1:09:28Everyone is pretty much, we're all thinking the same things in life. That's what I think. Everyone else is the same. So you might as well do it anyway because we're all in the same boat. we're all just chances aren't we look at you and me i stickly i quickly stuck me on the end of that so it didn't sound so rude i know it didn't what we're all chances look at you and me and me as well i mean and me and look at all of us i seriously thought red rum was shergar well it's easily done i mean honestly we can't and it's so woven into it now we can't edit it out no well i'm happy for people to think yeah and there's not many horses that many people if you say name three famous horses most people say Red Rum Shergar and Champion and Champion wasn't even a real horse it was a fictional well it was a fictional Champion the Wonder Horse but I'm sure that was his stage name wasn't it his real name might have been or Mr Ed there's another one oh yeah I remember him he was a talking horse wasn't he he wasn't really that was somebody doing the voice no I'm sorry to sat out of the news oh dear we'll put a trigger warning at the top of this trigger that's another one trigger yes that's five you see look how quick you were Look how quick you were You see How I mean the speed I say Trigger And you say there's another one Oh yeah Who had Trigger Who was the Trigger was Who had Trigger Because I think Was he a horse He was a horse He was the one that He came to Liverpool once He was in Only Fools and Horses as well But not that Trigger That was a different Trigger But that's a Trigger named after the original Trigger Trigger Trigger was Who had Trigger I think it's one of the famous cowboys That's what I would go for Who are the famous cowboys Well you've got the Lone Ranger But he had Silver The Lone Ranger Silver!

1:11:03Away! And away! So he had Silver. There was the Cisco Kid. His horse wasn't called Hi-Ho Silver, was it? Yes. Oh, no. Silver. Hi-Ho was the way of saying, come on, let's go. Yeah. His sidekick was called Jay Silverheels. Roy Rogers! What, Trigger? Roy Rogers and Trigger. Right, there you go. Okay. Well, there you go. We got to the bottom of that. And we did. And I think we've named all the famous... An Arkel you've named already. So cue the music. Yeah, yeah.

1:11:30Oh my, thanks to Lee Mac there Very lucky actually to have him on our podcast So if you enjoyed hearing him here This is the only place you're going to hear him At length on a podcast So isn't that great? Actually we are very privileged To hear such well-known people speak With such honesty And now it's time for one of you Our marvellous listeners To speak with honesty As we hear one of your emails This week it's from Michael Keenan Fantastic podcast, Harriet and Giles Good way to start a letter, if I may say so, Michael If you want it read out on Rosebud He goes on to say I listen to the podcast as soon as it drops on a Tuesday and Friday I'm in recovery from a traumatic head injury in May 2024 A fall out of bed which has wiped my memory from before the accident Oh my and I still have cognitive issues to this day.

1:12:25I was off work for six months, so managed to catch up on all the podcast episodes. My Santa list last year was a few of Giles' wonderful books. Thank you both. Well, thank you very much indeed, Michael. The book I'm plugging this year, and I've been, I think, to 40 different places around the UK talking about the book, literally from St Andrews in Scotland to the Isle of Wight off the coast in the south. And I've enjoyed it, I must say, because it's a book about A.A. Milne, because this is a centenary of Winnie the Pooh, or will be on Christmas Eve. And I really enjoyed writing it. I mean, with a book, usually the author will say they enjoyed having written it.

1:13:10That's the satisfaction when it's done. But with this one, I enjoyed The Journey, because it explores childhood, the notion of enchanted places, the nature of childhood, as well as the remarkable story of a very unusual family, the family of A. A. Milne, Christopher Robin, and of course the story of Winnie the Pooh. So I hope you find that on your Santa list this year, Michael. Thanks so much. And I've done all my books on audio, so you may find that if you're into audio, which obviously you are through listening to Rosebud. Who knows? And we might have something specially in store for you next year here on Rosebud in the audio line and the fiction line, but that may be for another day.

1:13:50Oh, thanks so much for listening as ever. Do keep in touch. We love hearing from you. Harriet does her best to respond to every email. Because people so like Harriet, I've decided I've got to sound more Harriet. So I'm trying to be more Harriet. So I'm going to say goodbye like Harriet would say goodbye. Goodbye! And now, if you want something more mature and rounded and mellow, goodbye. Thanks so much for your company. Oh, Giles!

1:14:21Thank you.

1:15:01Rosebud is a Plain Jane production produced by Harriet Jane, hosted by me, Giles Brandreth, with music by Phil Leppard, and recorded this week at the JW Marriott Grosvenor House in London's Park Lane.