Why Joe Marler Owes EVERYTHING to Richard Osman

Richard Osman has been a TV producer, quiz show presenter, podcaster and bestselling novelist. So naturally, Joe wants to know what he’s going to do next. Richard joins the surgery to reveal how he accidentally became famous, why he secretly wrote The Thursday Murder Club without showing anyone, the secret behind a hit TV show and the strange reality of becoming one of Britain’s most recognisable entertainers. Plus, Joe attempts to find Richard the perfect next career. GET TICKETS TO THE LIVE TOUR HERE: https://www.livenation.co.uk/joe-marler-will-see-you-live-tickets-adp1647830 Featuring Joe Marler (@joemarler17) and Jake Bhardwaj (@jakebhardwajtv) Follow the show on Instagram: @willseeyounowshow Joe Marler Will See You Now is a Platform Media production. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:24Speaker 01

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• 0:54Speaker 02

  Jake?

• 0:56Speaker 03

  Yes?

• 0:58Speaker 02

  Where is it?

• 0:59Speaker 03

  What?

• 1:00Speaker 02

  I knew it.

• 1:01Speaker 03

  What?

• 1:02Speaker 02

  I knew it.

• 1:03Speaker 03

  What?

• 1:04Speaker 02

  You took it, didn't you?

• 1:05Speaker 03

  Go on.

• 1:06Speaker 02

  Look me in the eyes, okay? And tell me you did not take...

• 1:10Speaker 03

  I don't get anywhere in those drawers. Go on.

• 1:13Speaker 02

  The Ross Kemp wig...

• 1:14Speaker 03

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:16Speaker 02

  And wear it on Horrible Histories.

• 1:29Speaker 02

  Uh, Jake?

• 1:31Speaker 03

  Yes?

• 1:33Speaker 02

  Where is it?

• 1:35Speaker 03

  What?

• 1:36Speaker 02

  I knew it.

• 1:37Speaker 03

  What?

• 1:38Speaker 02

  I knew it.

• 1:40Speaker 03

  What?

• 1:41Speaker 02

  You took it, didn't you?

• 1:42Speaker 03

  Go on.

• 1:44Speaker 02

  Look me in the eyes, okay? And tell me you did not take...

• 1:50Speaker 03

  I don't get anywhere in those drawers. Go on.

• 1:52Speaker 02

  The Ross Kemp wig...

• 1:54Speaker 03

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:56Speaker 02

  And wear it on Horrible Histories.

• 2:01Speaker 02

  I want you to look me in the eyes and I want you to eyebrows, because I saw on your Instagram a story of you doing Horrible Histories and that wig...

• 2:09Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 2:10Speaker 02

  I went, "Oh, this is so good. I wonder what he's doing." And then I went, "Hang on, that looks a lot like the wig that Ross Kemp had on." It's not in my drawers. Did you nick my wig?

• 2:19Speaker 03

  It may be similar to the Ross Kemp wig, but it's not the Ross Kemp wig.

• 2:22Speaker 02

  Eyebrows?

• 2:23Speaker 03

  So, right, so again, you're gonna need to explain... I would say as a rule, you always need to explain what this eyebrows thing is.

• 2:29Speaker 02

  Okay, eyebrows. Are you betting your eyebrows that you're telling me the truth? And if I find out you're lying, I get to shave your eyebrows? That's how eyebrows works?

• 2:35Speaker 03

  Yes, I'm not...

• 2:37Speaker 02

  Say eyebrows.

• 2:38Speaker 03

  Eyebrows.

• 2:39Speaker 02

  Okay, thank you.

• 2:40Speaker 03

  I would never take anything from those drawers, whether it be the Ross Kemp wig...

• 2:44Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 2:46Speaker 03

  Michael's ball bag.

• 2:49Speaker 02

  Michael Ball's ball bag?

• 2:51Speaker 03

  What is it? Michael Ball's ball bag? No, it's the Michael Ball bag.

• 2:58Speaker 03

  That doesn't get old, does it?

• 3:00Speaker 02

  Sorry.

• 3:01Speaker 03

  Does it? The Michael Ball bag?

• 3:03Speaker 02

  No, it doesn't.

• 3:04Speaker 03

  I also don't think anyone really enjoys it as much as we do. That we got Michael Ball to pick out balls.

• 3:08Speaker 02

  No, did you ever see the clip... Did you ever see the clip where my noose was out and we covered it with Michael Ball's thing? And someone went, "Why have you used Michael Ball's face?" Well, like, it's not Michael Ball's face, it's the face from Michael Ball Bag that's been put on my noose. Plus, you'd rather that than the actual noose.

• 3:26Speaker 03

  It's such a specific Easter egg, the Michael Ball bag. Oh, man.

• 3:34Speaker 02

  Okay, so you didn't nick the wig?

• 3:35Speaker 03

  I didn't nick the wig, but I am doing some scenes in Horrible Histories.

• 3:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's the aggression out of the way.

• 3:40Speaker 03

  I say that now, or I'm filming it at the moment, when it goes to series, they may be like, "All of this is rubbish, we're cutting all these scenes."

• 3:47Speaker 02

  Joey from Friends?

• 3:48Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, it could be. It could be. But you never know. For now, I'm having a very good time trying on different wigs.

• 3:53Speaker 02

  I'm really, really excited.

• 3:54Speaker 03

  I'm very excited.

• 3:55Speaker 02

  Genuinely excited.

• 3:56Speaker 03

  It is a proper, like, you get picked up at half five in the morning, you get to the location...

• 4:03Speaker 02

  Oh, you get picked up?

• 4:05Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 4:07Speaker 02

  I see.

• 4:08Speaker 03

  That wasn't very relatable, was it?

• 4:10Speaker 02

  Oh, okay.

• 4:12Speaker 03

  On this particular... I hear, I've got a bloody cycle here, so, you know, man of the people.

• 4:22Speaker 03

  Yeah, you turn up, you are doing like three, four different characters a day, wigs in, pins in the wig, different costumes, you get mud on your face if you're playing a peasant, you get rings on your fingers if you're playing a king, you get all sorts of... And then you just bang, bang, bang, bang, it's great. It's great. Everyone's so funny.

• 4:40Speaker 02

  Do you have to, like, any accents on it?

• 4:41Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah.

• 4:42Speaker 02

  What, can you... You know that one I saw in a wig? Are you allowed to tell me what sort of...

• 4:46Speaker 03

  Yeah, well, that was a French peasant. So I was being a French peasant, I was doing a French accent, it was not so good, but I was trying my best. Is that your gut, where you put your teeth? There was another one where I was being a gladiator, I had to be a Geordie gladiator.

• 4:59Speaker 02

  I don't think that's very accurate.

• 5:02Speaker 03

  No, but it's a laugh, isn't it?

• 5:05Speaker 02

  I thought the whole point of Horrible Histories was to be informative.

• 5:09Speaker 03

  You thought the whole point of Horrible Histories was historical accuracy?

• 5:11Speaker 02

  I thought it was informative and funny.

• 5:13Speaker 03

  It is informative, it is informative, but as you said, you can have a laugh with it as well.

• 5:19Speaker 02

  You can play with it.

• 5:20Speaker 03

  You can play with it. So that's what I've been doing. You've also been playing a gladiator.

• 5:23Speaker 02

  Oh, I hate pets.

• 5:24Speaker 03

  Because you're a gladiator in Gladiators.

• 5:26Speaker 02

  Good.

• 5:27Speaker 03

  How is it? Is it all right?

• 5:29Speaker 02

  Very tight, Lycra.

• 5:31Speaker 03

  Oh.

• 5:32Speaker 02

  Very.

• 5:33Speaker 03

  Really?

• 5:34Speaker 02

  Very tight, uncomfortably so, to the point of which I had to wear a girdle. You know what a girdle is?

• 5:41Speaker 03

  No.

• 5:42Speaker 02

  Like a fat sucker.

• 5:46Speaker 03

  Oh, what, the thing that pushes everything in?

• 5:47Speaker 02

  Yeah, so I wore a girdle and a Spanx under the Lycra suit that I had to wear in order to tuck in all my jelly.

• 5:59Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 5:59Speaker 02

  But because I was wearing so many layers of Lycra and Spanx underneath it to tuck it away, it made me even more jealified. So it was a good day around, really.

• 6:09Speaker 03

  That's so much more jelly than I thought would be in that answer.

• 6:12Speaker 02

  Mate, but honestly, it was so much fun. So hard.

• 6:16Speaker 03

  Really?

• 6:17Speaker 02

  Way harder, I thought it was gonna be.

• 6:18Speaker 03

  It's average Joes up against an athlete. Surely you're just, like, swatting them like flies?

• 6:24Speaker 02

  That's what I thought it might be like.

• 6:27Speaker 03

  What is it actually like?

• 6:28Speaker 02

  It is a lot harder, and that is all I can reveal.

• 6:31Speaker 03

  Really?

• 6:32Speaker 02

  It is.

• 6:33Speaker 03

  I thought you'd just be like, "Next." Slap them away. "Next." With your pugel stick.

• 6:38Speaker 02

  All I can say is that I kept my pugel stick clean.

• 6:44Speaker 03

  Fine.

• 6:45Speaker 02

  I cannot reveal any more, and you'll have to wait for it to come out. People put big money on who wins Gladiators, mate.

• 6:54Speaker 03

  Do they?

• 6:55Speaker 02

  So I can't reveal anything.

• 6:56Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 6:57Speaker 02

  What I will say is, I didn't realize how popular a show it was.

• 7:02Speaker 03

  Yeah, it's massive.

• 7:03Speaker 02

  It's a mega show.

• 7:04Speaker 03

  Mega show.

• 7:05Speaker 02

  The kids, the amount of families, like, that come up to me and go, "Oh, my God, are you gonna be the new gladiator? You're gonna do Gladiators, you're a gladiator," or that. I was like, "What?" And again, I'm having that same problem, where they go, they now don't know me for rugby, this lot don't know me for Traitors either. They just go, "Oh, you're the new gladiator, aren't you?"

• 7:24Speaker 03

  Really?

• 7:25Speaker 02

  "Oh, my God, I just don't have any identity left."

• 7:27Speaker 03

  And I tell you who's got lots of identities: the guest coming tonight.

• 7:32Speaker 02

  Good.

• 7:33Speaker 03

  This is someone with loads of identities. In fact, someone who has done so many things, it's easier to list the things he's not done.

• 7:38Speaker 02

  If it wasn't for him, I wouldn't have gone on Traitors. And if it wasn't for...

• 7:42Speaker 03

  Seriously?

• 7:43Speaker 02

  If it wasn't for him, I wouldn't be sitting here now with you. If it wasn't for him, I would never have met you.

• 7:53Speaker 03

  Flipping heck.

• 7:54Speaker 02

  Genuinely, that's...

• 7:56Speaker 03

  Right, I'm gonna just burst a bubble now so we can find out what you're on about.

• 7:59Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 8:00Speaker 03

  It's Richard Osman.

• 8:01Speaker 02

  Richard Osman.

• 8:02Speaker 03

  TV presenter, former TV producer, author...

• 8:05Speaker 02

  Writes books, podcaster.

• 8:07Speaker 03

  So what do you mean? He put you in for Traitors?

• 8:10Speaker 02

  I went and met... The booker for Traitors rang me, or rang my agent, and said, "Oh, we'd love to have a meeting with Joe and see if he'd be keen to come on the Traitors." I was like, "Absolutely, yes, let's do it immediately now." And I went and met her, and she turned around, like, opening it. She was lovely, but the opening thing was like, "I'll be straight, I've no idea who you are. I don't really know much about you, and the only reason I was put in touch with you is because of Richard Osman. He said I should take a look at you." He'd been on my previous podcast, he'd met before, I'd done House of Games with him, and he was like, "Oh, have a look at him, mate.

• 8:52Speaker 02

  From a sport angle, he might be something different, or to fill that sport booking you're looking for." And I was like, "What?" This is not... I knew we... I mean, I'd done House of Games with him, I'd met him twice, but we weren't, like, close or anything, and he'd put my name forward, and then the rest is history, which is also part of the podcast family.

• 9:14Speaker 03

  Girl hangar family, which is lovely.

• 9:15Speaker 02

  It's fine.

• 9:17Speaker 03

  That's quite remarkable. So all of this, this entire operation...

• 9:21Speaker 02

  Well, you know, it's pretty much down to him.

• 9:24Speaker 03

  Bloody hell.

• 9:25Speaker 02

  Are you excited to meet him?

• 9:26Speaker 03

  Yeah, I mean, obviously.

• 9:28Speaker 02

  Yeah, but...

• 9:29Speaker 03

  The guy was a TV producer that came up with loads of quiz shows, loads of game shows. I love quiz shows, I love game shows. I used to work in TV as well. He's sort of done everything I wanted to do, but on a gigantic scale. Not because of his height, because of his achievements.

• 9:46Speaker 02

  Okay, right, let's do this.

• 9:49Speaker 02

  Janet, could you send in Richard Osman, please? Thank you.

• 9:56Speaker 01

  Richard Osman, everybody!

• 9:59Speaker 02

  Yes!

• 10:00Speaker 01

  Yes!

• 10:01Speaker 02

  Yes!

• 10:01Speaker 01

  Joe, how are you? Yeah. Hi Jake.

• 10:04Speaker 03

  Richard, hi.

• 10:06Speaker 01

  We're doing tall stuff.

• 10:08Speaker 03

  Yeah, I wouldn't do it, Joe.

• 10:10Speaker 01

  We'll go straight in on that. What, are you 5'9"?

• 10:16Speaker 03

  For the audio listener, Joe just got owned.

• 10:18Speaker 01

  Do your knees fit under the desk?

• 10:21Speaker 03

  Uh...

• 10:24Speaker 03

  Height-wise, yes. Weight-wise, no.

• 10:27Speaker 03

  Which is crazy. If you can see the desk in real life, you'd be astounded by that fact.

• 10:31Speaker 01

  Hello, Joe.

• 10:32Speaker 02

  How are you?

• 10:32Speaker 01

  Yeah, really well. How are you?

• 10:33Speaker 02

  Doctor Joe, thank you.

• 10:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 10:35Speaker 02

  Thank you.

• 10:36Speaker 01

  I'm in a legal, but absolutely. Go for it.

• 10:39Speaker 02

  How did you find Janet?

• 10:41Speaker 01

  Uh, she's great.

• 10:42Speaker 02

  Was she?

• 10:42Speaker 01

  She's writing a novel. So we had a long chat about that.

• 10:45Speaker 02

  Janet's writing a novel?

• 10:47Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 10:47Speaker 02

  The other week, she was selling meth.

• 10:50Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 10:51Speaker 02

  And now she's writing a novel.

• 10:52Speaker 03

  Fifty Shades of Filth.

• 10:53Speaker 01

  Yeah. And it goes from bad to worse, doesn't it?

• 10:56Speaker 02

  What sort of novel is she writing?

• 10:57Speaker 01

  Like a romanticy. It's a romanticy type thing about two podcast hosts. She didn't tell me anything more about it. Both men. Both very different. Both very different men. It's like a kind of opposites attract, love across the divide type thing.

• 11:11Speaker 03

  A former Tory MP and a former Labour spin doctor, perhaps?

• 11:14Speaker 01

  Yeah, that sort of thing.

• 11:15Speaker 03

  Interesting.

• 11:16Speaker 01

  That sort of thing.

• 11:17Speaker 03

  Interesting.

• 11:18Speaker 01

  I'm absolutely certain one of them was a rugby player, but I can't... The other guy, the other guy I didn't know so well.

• 11:24Speaker 02

  Uh, right. Intake questionnaire, let's begin. Full name?

• 11:27Speaker 01

  Richard Thomas Osman.

• 11:29Speaker 02

  Okay. Um, Thomas be a family member usually?

• 11:32Speaker 01

  Uh, my grandfather, yeah. My grandad.

• 11:33Speaker 02

  Good. Um, star sign?

• 11:35Speaker 01

  Uh, Sagittarius. Can't you tell?

• 11:38Speaker 03

  First one?

• 11:39Speaker 01

  No, I'm not your first Sagittarius. How many guests have you had?

• 11:42Speaker 02

  Forty.

• 11:43Speaker 01

  Forty? Are you first Sagittarius?

• 11:45Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 11:45Speaker 01

  That's insane.

• 11:46Speaker 03

  Would you describe yourself as fiery, free-spirited and optimistic, Richard?

• 11:49Speaker 01

  Fiery, free-spirited and optimistic? I don't think I'm any of those things. I am, what's the opposite of fiery? Watery, I suppose.

• 11:57Speaker 02

  Soggy.

• 11:58Speaker 01

  Soggy.

• 11:58Speaker 02

  Soggy.

• 11:59Speaker 01

  Um, uh, optimistic, no. I know the opposite of that, which is pessimistic. Uh, and free-spirited? No, no. Locked up, my spirit.

• 12:07Speaker 02

  Quite confined.

• 12:09Speaker 01

  A confined spirit.

• 12:10Speaker 02

  And ushered around by people telling you what to say and not say.

• 12:13Speaker 01

  Yeah. Are you talking about my publicist, Olivia?

• 12:16Speaker 02

  No, no.

• 12:17Speaker 01

  My publicist, Olivia, has only... She never... I never, ever bring people to these shows, right? Just twice in my entire career of writing, she has come to a show. Once was when I was on Graham Norton and Tom Hanks was on. The second time is now.

• 12:34Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 12:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 12:35Speaker 02

  Now, I'm assuming the way you've teed that up is that that is...

• 12:39Speaker 01

  She's a huge Jake fan.

• 12:43Speaker 01

  No, she is a...

• 12:44Speaker 02

  As am I.

• 12:44Speaker 01

  She is an enormous Joe Marler fan. Harlequin season ticket holder.

• 12:48Speaker 02

  Oh, really?

• 12:49Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 12:50Speaker 02

  Wow, now we're getting into... Yeah, now, okay, now we're getting into it. Fine. Great. Thank you so much for coming. She's on my side.

• 12:56Speaker 01

  She's on, yeah.

• 12:57Speaker 02

  I just have someone in the room on my side.

• 12:59Speaker 03

  Was Joe your favourite player?

• 13:01Speaker 02

  Fucking don't turn it into this.

• 13:03Speaker 01

  Am I allowed to speak? Yeah.

• 13:04Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 13:05Speaker 02

  What's she mean?

• 13:06Speaker 03

  And just so anyone watching this knows, when people come, everyone's allowed to speak. We don't... We don't... There's no...

• 13:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 13:11Speaker 03

  There's no sort of totalitarian, like, sort of thing going on here.

• 13:15Speaker 01

  But the thing is, Jake, in seven years of working with me, she hasn't been allowed to, so I think she's...

• 13:20Speaker 01

  I think she was asking me.

• 13:21Speaker 03

  You were genuinely surprised. I'm allowed to speak in front of, sir.

• 13:23Speaker 02

  Richard, can I speak?

• 13:27Speaker 01

  He was one of them, absolutely.

• 13:28Speaker 02

  Oh, no, no, no.

• 13:31Speaker 03

  Can I just say, I was all for this, but you're here and you couldn't even just lie and say he was. He was one of them.

• 13:37Speaker 02

  Absolutely. It is. Anyway, it's not my... Lovely, thank you though. We'll have that after. Occupation?

• 13:42Speaker 01

  Um, novelist.

• 13:44Speaker 02

  Interesting. Just an out-and-out novelist. What, all the other stuff, you know, the unbelievable popular podcasts you do, all the TV bits?

• 13:54Speaker 01

  You can't be a podcaster as a job. That's insane. You've had a real job.

• 13:59Speaker 03

  Joe, you need to speak to HMRC immediately.

• 14:05Speaker 02

  What, the definition of a job is you're paid for services you provide?

• 14:09Speaker 01

  I suppose so. I just think you have to do a day's work for a day's pay. And you appear not to be doing a day's work. That's what I'm saying.

• 14:17Speaker 01

  By your own admission. I'm a huge fan, as you know. I love the podcast.

• 14:20Speaker 02

  You're fine. Okay, novelist, okay.

• 14:22Speaker 01

  Yes. So is that new to you?

• 14:24Speaker 02

  No, it's... It certainly isn't, but I'm intrigued as to why that is the definitive answer.

• 14:31Speaker 01

  Well, because it's the thing I'm best at and it's the thing I love the most. And, yeah.

• 14:36Speaker 03

  Is it the thing you do the most?

• 14:37Speaker 01

  Oh my god, yeah. That's why I've had to give up all the teddy, because it just... It takes up... Because I try and do a book a year. And if you do that, that's just all your time. I love it. I love it, honestly. I just... I adore it.

• 14:47Speaker 03

  What's that then, page a day?

• 14:51Speaker 01

  That's how I should do it.

• 14:52Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 14:52Speaker 01

  I just typeset it myself. Just a page a day and then glue them in at the end of the day.

• 14:57Speaker 02

  Uh, what did you want to be when you were 15?

• 14:59Speaker 01

  Um, policeman, probably, I think is what I wanted to be, or a sports writer. Those were the two things I really wanted to be.

• 15:07Speaker 02

  What, a generic sport writer? Or was there a sport in particular that you were like, oh, I love this?

• 15:11Speaker 01

  I love football. I love golf. I love things like darts and snooker and things like that. Um, so yeah, I just love sport, still love sport. And so, yeah, I would have... That's the thing I would have loved to do.

• 15:22Speaker 02

  And a policeman?

• 15:23Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 15:23Speaker 02

  Do you have a policeman in your family?

• 15:25Speaker 01

  My grandad was a policeman, yeah.

• 15:26Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 15:26Speaker 01

  Uh, in Brighton, uh, and along that coast. So, yeah, I fancy that, solving crimes and stuff. And...

• 15:33Speaker 02

  I think you would have made a really good CDO.

• 15:36Speaker 01

  A CDO?

• 15:37Speaker 02

  A custody detention officer.

• 15:39Speaker 01

  Those are my favourites. When you watch 24 Hours in Police Custody, because they absolutely don't... They take nothing from anyone. Yeah, they just go...

• 15:45Speaker 02

  You're just here with me for the night.

• 15:46Speaker 01

  Yeah. Um, how are you feeling? You feeling okay? Yeah, I imagine you are stressed. Yeah, you've just been... Yeah, you've been arrested for murder. I get it. So you're feeling a little bit stressed. Okay, I just need to... You know, you've been arrested before? You have, yeah. I do recognise you, yeah, yeah. Uh, and like, but this person can be like screaming at everyone, like flinging... As soon as they talk to the CDO, they're like, yeah, mate, it's John, John Edwards. Yeah. Thank you, John. That's really kind of you. Uh, and so you've been arrested for murdering four people, is that right? Yeah, yeah, that was me, yeah.

• 16:15Speaker 02

  Allegedly.

• 16:15Speaker 01

  And then off they go again, and then they're swinging their arms at people again. I'd like to... I'd love to be a CDO.

• 16:20Speaker 02

  I think you'd be good. I think you'd struggle now.

• 16:22Speaker 01

  What do you think?

• 16:23Speaker 02

  Yeah, I don't think you'd be able to go back and...

• 16:25Speaker 01

  I think people would get used to it very quickly. I think they'd be like two seconds of, aren't you the guy from House of Games?

• 16:29Speaker 02

  I think the crime rates would go up. I think they'd be like, I want to get arrested, just so I can go and speak to Richard.

• 16:35Speaker 01

  Can I get my book signed?

• 16:38Speaker 02

  Let's do that.

• 16:38Speaker 03

  I don't think that... Yeah. I can't see many of them saying, "House of Games"? I just don't think the Venn diagram's there.

• 16:45Speaker 01

  You don't think that there's a... That offenders are watching House of Games?

• 16:49Speaker 03

  I don't think they are. I don't think they are. Is that mad?

• 16:51Speaker 02

  That is such a mental insult.

• 16:54Speaker 01

  That's a...

• 16:54Speaker 02

  That is the worst thing you've ever said to a guest.

• 16:57Speaker 03

  I just don't think people are...

• 16:58Speaker 02

  You've said his show... It was your baby, you came up with it.

• 17:00Speaker 01

  House of Games, yeah.

• 17:01Speaker 03

  I love House of Games.

• 17:02Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 17:02Speaker 01

  Doesn't sound like it, mate.

• 17:04Speaker 03

  Guys, I love House of Games. This is... I don't want this to be the thing, okay?

• 17:08Speaker 01

  Sounds to me like you think they're not watching it.

• 17:10Speaker 03

  I'm just saying that, like, majority of people who are going into custody, I don't think...

• 17:15Speaker 02

  Why are you looking at Georgia and Tom for help here, mate?

• 17:17Speaker 03

  I don't think they're watching House of Games.

• 17:19Speaker 02

  You have a conversation with us.

• 17:20Speaker 01

  You've dug this hole yourself, mate.

• 17:22Speaker 03

  I don't think that... I think if you're out doing crime...

• 17:25Speaker 01

  Why not?

• 17:25Speaker 03

  You're not sitting there being like, all right, let me get high score on Answer Smash.

• 17:29Speaker 01

  You don't think?

• 17:30Speaker 03

  I don't know. I don't think so.

• 17:32Speaker 01

  That's... Jake, that's absolutely mental.

• 17:35Speaker 03

  Okay, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I am sorry.

• 17:38Speaker 01

  You just think if you're a murderer, you would never watch a quiz show?

• 17:40Speaker 03

  You would, but Million Pound Drop, you'd be watching that sort of thing.

• 17:43Speaker 01

  Million Pound Drop.

• 17:44Speaker 03

  Do you know what I mean?

• 17:45Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 17:46Speaker 03

  It's... We're talking about people who are hardwired to seek thrills, okay? Not to sort of sit and ponder...

• 17:53Speaker 01

  And so someone who's...

• 17:54Speaker 02

  Oh, he's going.

• 17:56Speaker 01

  Wow!

• 17:57Speaker 02

  No, no. Let him go.

• 17:58Speaker 01

  Oh my god. Yeah, no, carry on, Jake.

• 18:00Speaker 03

  House of Games is very thrilling. I did it with Michael Sheen. It's very good.

• 18:02Speaker 02

  Oh! Ew, what a way.

• 18:05Speaker 01

  It doesn't sound like you do think it's thrilling, because it sounds like you said that people who are seeking a thrill wouldn't...

• 18:10Speaker 03

  I just don't think hardened criminals are watching House of Games, okay? Hands up. That's what I'm saying.

• 18:14Speaker 02

  What do you want to be when you're 75?

• 18:16Speaker 01

  Oh, well, still a novelist. Uh, I'd love that. Um, I think, yeah, I think a novelist and just doing like live shows around the country and just hanging out with people. I like... I think AI has made it very special to go out and just be amongst people and, you know, I like to hear people laughing. That's the thing I really love.

• 18:35Speaker 02

  Go-to quiz name?

• 18:38Speaker 01

  Oh, that's the worst thing in the whole world, is the, um, is the quiz name. It's... I always feel, in the same way, I always feel like I should be good... At poker, but it feels like it's my skill set and I'm really bad at poker. I feel like I should be good at coming up with quiz names, quiz team names, and I'm not.

• 18:53Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 18:54Speaker 01

  So it'll be something in the news that week, always.

• 18:57Speaker 02

  Jake, you're good at quizzes. Do you ever go to Quiz Day, mate? You host loads.

• 19:01Speaker 03

  Uh, I do host a lot of pub quizzes, um.

• 19:04Speaker 01

  Is it Criminals Don't Watch House of Games?

• 19:07Speaker 03

  See, genuinely, that would be more interesting to have than what is basically, it's just an epidemic of replacing jizz with quiz and then various body parts. It's quiz on my face, quiz on my back, quiz on my tits, quiz on my toes, um, quiz wherever you like. It's, uh, I'm sick of it.

• 19:24Speaker 01

  Agatha Christie, all that stuff, it just, if you can't.

• 19:27Speaker 03

  Christina Aguilera, Quiz Akabusi, enough, Quizzy Rascal, it's enough is enough. Quizlamic State, enough is enough.

• 19:33Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 19:34Speaker 03

  Enough is enough.

• 19:35Speaker 01

  Just call yourself Team Seven. The, the, the, the name I always give, just because it annoys quiz masters, is, and in seventh place with nine points.

• 19:45Speaker 03

  Oh, that's brilliant. That's lovely.

• 19:47Speaker 02

  Good.

• 19:47Speaker 01

  Because then you have to go, and in ninth place with fourteen points, it's in seventh place with nine points, or whatever I said. They don't like it.

• 19:56Speaker 02

  Last time you impressed someone with a fact.

• 19:58Speaker 01

  Huh, last time I impressed somebody with a fact. My brother sent me a really great, uh, question yesterday, but it's visual.

• 20:08Speaker 01

  So what are we gonna do about that? Nothing we can do. It was like a visual, like, it was, it was like a visual, you have to, you have to look at it.

• 20:14Speaker 03

  We're happy to fuck off the audio listeners on this.

• 20:16Speaker 02

  Pops read is a visual question.

• 20:18Speaker 01

  It's a visual, so you know, um, you know, questions?

• 20:21Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 20:24Speaker 01

  And you know visual.

• 20:24Speaker 02

  So you read them with your eyes?

• 20:26Speaker 01

  Yeah. Jake, come over.

• 20:28Speaker 03

  Oh, thank you.

• 20:28Speaker 01

  Are you allowed over?

• 20:29Speaker 03

  Yeah, I, I, I am, and so obedient, this moment you said, come over, I jumped up like a spaniel. Yes, sir.

• 20:38Speaker 01

  So that, what is that?

• 20:41Speaker 03

  What is the above? What is the above? Um, and we've got A, H, R, B, Q, D, W, E, F, L, M, N, S, X, G, I, J, K, O, P, C, T, V, Y, U, Z. Okay.

• 20:55Speaker 01

  So it's all the letters of the alphabet, but in an unusual order.

• 20:57Speaker 03

  Unusual order.

• 21:00Speaker 02

  What is the above?

• 21:02Speaker 03

  It's gonna be spelling out an event, or it's gonna be spelling out.

• 21:06Speaker 02

  Ask him, quote.

• 21:09Speaker 01

  Hold on.

• 21:10Speaker 02

  Ask.

• 21:10Speaker 01

  Ask him, interesting, you're on to something there.

• 21:13Speaker 02

  Him, right.

• 21:14Speaker 01

  Is this good podcasting?

• 21:16Speaker 03

  We'll put this on the YouTube.

• 21:18Speaker 01

  Put it on the screen.

• 21:19Speaker 03

  Uh, and, and, and all the things.

• 21:20Speaker 01

  And I'll tell you at the end what it is.

• 21:22Speaker 03

  Um, that stumped me, Richard.

• 21:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's good. It stumped me for a little while. I got it in the end.

• 21:26Speaker 02

  Okay, very cryptic. No, don't tell, at the end.

• 21:29Speaker 01

  I'll tell you at the end, because that's a, again, because then people keep listening.

• 21:33Speaker 03

  Then they'll keep listening. That's brilliant.

• 21:34Speaker 02

  Duke and said to be analyzed by someone who's not a real doctor.

• 21:37Speaker 01

  For sure.

• 21:38Speaker 02

  Speed at which he said that. That's great.

• 21:40Speaker 01

  Of course.

• 21:44Speaker 02

  What surmises that you've spent your career reinventing yourself.

• 21:48Speaker 01

  Huh.

• 21:48Speaker 02

  From TV producer to on-screen talent.

• 21:51Speaker 01

  So interesting.

• 21:52Speaker 02

  Um, and to now being the biggest selling adult author of the decade.

• 21:57Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 21:58Speaker 02

  That's an accolade, isn't it?

• 21:59Speaker 01

  Yes, yeah. We have to say adult because Julia Donaldson of the Gruffalo sells more, and rightly so.

• 22:06Speaker 02

  As far as I know, Julia Donaldson is an adult.

• 22:10Speaker 01

  Oh, no, she is. I see what you mean. Books for adults, not grownups who write books, not adults who write books. She is an adult.

• 22:17Speaker 02

  So you're the bestselling grownup writer.

• 22:20Speaker 03

  And yours aren't like adult books?

• 22:22Speaker 01

  Not adult books, not, not like Janet's.

• 22:24Speaker 03

  Fine, sure.

• 22:25Speaker 02

  Erotic novels?

• 22:26Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 22:27Speaker 02

  No.

• 22:27Speaker 01

  Just essentially the two of you going at it, Hammer and Tongs.

• 22:32Speaker 03

  Hammer and Tongue, what a double act.

• 22:33Speaker 02

  Oh.

• 22:35Speaker 01

  Which, which one's Hammer, which one's Tongs? That's what everyone's asking.

• 22:38Speaker 03

  Find out next week.

• 22:41Speaker 01

  But that's, I think that's what it's called, the novel. I think it's called Hammer and Tongs.

• 22:46Speaker 02

  You are, you're the master of metamorphosis. What I want to understand.

• 22:52Speaker 01

  Yes, of course.

• 22:53Speaker 02

  Is the secret of these transformations, where you've gone from TV producer to then bestselling adult author, not of erotic novels or adult, but you're an adult.

• 23:04Speaker 01

  Give it time.

• 23:05Speaker 02

  Um, but I now want to work out maybe what's next.

• 23:10Speaker 01

  Yeah, okay. Sorry, what's the question?

• 23:12Speaker 02

  There's no question.

• 23:13Speaker 01

  Okay, great.

• 23:14Speaker 02

  This is a surmise.

• 23:15Speaker 01

  Oh, okay.

• 23:16Speaker 03

  He's doing his surmising.

• 23:18Speaker 01

  Yes, doing it really well.

• 23:22Speaker 02

  Let's start at the beginning with the first of your reinventions. Is it true you became a TV personality by accident?

• 23:29Speaker 01

  Yes, completely by accident.

• 23:30Speaker 02

  And that's not a made up story?

• 23:31Speaker 01

  That's not a made up story, no. It was a, uh, it was, I was a TV producer for many years. Uh, you will get occasionally TV producers who rise above the station and become on-screen talent. I don't know if you know anyone like that.

• 23:45Speaker 03

  Sickening.

• 23:47Speaker 01

  We, uh, were pitching Pointless to the BBC, like we'd pitched a million shows before, and I always make sure the producers play the presenters in that, um, situation because they know the format, they know what can go wrong with it. So I played the, the, the guy behind the keyboards when we played it through for the BBC. They loved the show. Um, and they thought they need someone a bit like me to play the role that I played. And then someone said, well, Richard is a bit like himself, perhaps Richard could do it. And so I remember I sat at my desk and someone came and said, the BBC said, would you do it? And I thought, well, I guess why not? I had zero interest in doing it. I, I mean that, there's no ego there at all.

• 24:25Speaker 02

  So you never, you never wanted to be famous? You never wanted to be on, on the screen?

• 24:29Speaker 01

  I had no interest. I loved working in TV. I loved writing, so I loved doing all of those things. But I thought, because, you know, most shows go for one series, uh, and I thought, well, listen, I'll do it. Story for the grandkids, something, that's interesting. Uh, and then it just got bigger and bigger and bigger, and suddenly, yeah, I was a, like a TV guy.

• 24:48Speaker 02

  Did you notice, once you'd made that jump and that decision, then people started treating you differently?

• 24:53Speaker 01

  Yeah. The thing about it is not in my personal life, not in my business life or anything like that, in the way that people suddenly start asking your opinions on things, uh, and think they have some importance. And like, you know, we asked about the state of the world, or, and you just think, I'm just, I'm just doing a TV show. Like, I'd run this big company at Endable for years and years and years. And, you know, you'd have these conferences and I've never been asked to talk at one of them. The second I was like a co-host on a quiz show, they go, oh my God, you should come do the keynote speech, like the biggest speech in the whole of television. And I'd be like, huh, because I'm a guy from a, as you know, fame is a very, very unusual thing.

• 25:36Speaker 01

  Uh, and if you approach it from the right angle, it can bring you lots and lots of lovely things. But it tells you something about the world. It tells you something very interesting about the world and how certain people are, the opportunism, the opportunism of some people. Um, and yeah, it's, I got well-known much, much, much later in life, mid-forties, where I, you know, had a good idea about who I was. So I was able to deal with it in interesting ways, and I'd seen loads of people get famous before, so I knew that. But so I found, I found, I found it very, very interesting.

• 26:04Speaker 02

  Do you think that helped?

• 26:05Speaker 01

  How have you found your newfound fame?

• 26:07Speaker 02

  It has been very strange in the last twelve months. But equally, and loads of people go, oh, you must be so bored of it, or you must be so annoyed with it. And I go, well, it's better than someone coming up and calling me a twat or kicking me in the dick. Do you know what I mean?

• 26:21Speaker 01

  It's like. It is better than that, yeah.

• 26:22Speaker 02

  So it's like, it's nice. It's not like they're coming up and abusing me or anything like that. So it's like, yeah, I mean.

• 26:27Speaker 01

  And ninety-five percent of people are lovely.

• 26:29Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 26:29Speaker 03

  The binaries that you present as, as, as the only options of reality, I just always find fascinating. It's either love what you're doing, or a photo, or, or you're a twat. There's, there's no way you can visualize a middle ground, is there?

• 26:41Speaker 02

  Yeah, but I mean, that sort of sums it up, really.

• 26:43Speaker 01

  The dick kickers.

• 26:44Speaker 02

  What, um, did you any, did you witness any, I'm not interested in names or anything like that. It's more examples or behavior traits.

• 26:56Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 26:57Speaker 02

  Any on-screen talent, as you, in your days as a producer,

• 27:02Speaker 02

  that made you a little bit more, when you did become on-screen and more famous and recognizable to everyone?

• 27:08Speaker 01

  For sure.

• 27:09Speaker 02

  That you were like, I don't want to behave like that person, or actually, I'd love to behave like that person because they just held themselves with such grace and.

• 27:17Speaker 01

  Most people, most people, I think, are nicer, have good experiences than most people. There's one particular person who I, who I always mention, who was a bully. And, you know, that, that I find very, very difficult. Honestly, I, I, there was an agent once who was so incredibly rude to someone who worked for me and called him an idiot, something, something. And he was a big agent, and I, I rang him the next day. I said, look, you don't ever speak to somebody who works with me like that, don't ever do it. Here's the client's email address. I want you to send him an apology. Uh, and he never did, never did. Can you imagine? Like, Ben, like, he's rich, this guy, successful, had big, big clients.

• 27:58Speaker 01

  Uh, and someone, he, he's a researcher, and the researcher didn't know which way, like, his client had gone. He said, oh, I think he might have gone that way. And he went that way and came back and goes, he hasn't gone that way, you idiot. And you're like, whoa, okay. I didn't witness it happening, but I heard about it, so just thought. I mean, that sort of stuff, come on, man, it's TV.

• 28:17Speaker 02

  Has there been, has there been a shift in TV? From, like, because you hear of all these horror stories from the past, in the eighties, nineties, all that lot. But has there been a big shift now where it's like, you don't have to be a helmet?

• 28:31Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 28:31Speaker 02

  To people in order to make something successful. You don't have to be an asshole to, to make a hit. It's like, you're better off having a group of people that feel happy, comfortable, um, excited to be there, to get the most out of them.

• 28:45Speaker 01

  I think so. I think there's a generation of comedians who came along, who'd probably now be in their forties, I guess, who were just incredibly collegiate and nice to each other and nice to people they work with. And the generation above them were less nice to people and less nice to people they worked with. I think maybe because there was more, I don't know, there was something about the, the world they were in. And so, yeah, I think there's definitely been a change. And also, far more, um, uh, women on screen now in panel shows and things like that, and that makes a big difference. But yeah, I think there's been a big change. I think I just got in on the tail end of that weird kind of nineties, because the eighties, I think, was insane, because everyone who's on TV was so famous and so well-paid. And I caught the tail end of that, which was interesting. But then you get into the stage where, yeah, people tend to be much nicer.

• 29:30Speaker 02

  Right, it's time for a special part of the podcast called Could You Survive? Brought to you by the upcoming film release Heart of the Beast. In cinemas September 23rd. Jake, let's talk survival.

• 29:47Speaker 03

  Love to. Joe, I'm very interested to know how you would survive in, say, like a desert situation. Stranded in the desert, how do you think you'd do?

• 29:55Speaker 02

  Are there any, like, animals around me?

• 29:58Speaker 03

  Oh, if you can survive long enough to keep walking for two or three days, in this situation, I will allow a camel to appear.

• 30:06Speaker 02

  Okay, right, so then after the two or three days, I will find this camel, and I will say, "Hello camel."

• 30:14Speaker 02

  I go, "Nice to meet you." And he goes, "Hmm." They spit, don't they?

• 30:19Speaker 03

  Yeah, they do.

• 30:20Speaker 02

  And then, but that's a term of endearment, like, that's a, that's like, "Oh, nice to meet you," and all that lot. So I go, "Huh." Spit back at him. And then we sort of bond. He gives me, like, a little ride, but then I go, "Oh, I'm a little hungry." And then unfortunately, the inevitable has to happen. And you cut to me climbing out of its rib cage,

• 30:41Speaker 02

  having slept the night in it because a sandstorm had come over. So that's how I'd go about surviving in the desert. What about you? What would be your go-to action to be like, "Right, how am I gonna get out of this?"

• 30:53Speaker 03

  I would survive via the cacti.

• 30:58Speaker 03

  Most important thing you can do. The cacti are holding a lot of water in them.

• 31:02Speaker 02

  How are you getting the water out of the cacti?

• 31:05Speaker 03

  I assume, I mean, we've got to have a, like, a, some sort of, like, penknife in this situation, haven't we?

• 31:10Speaker 02

  No, you're not, I've just said, you're not.

• 31:11Speaker 03

  There's nothing.

• 31:12Speaker 02

  You have no knife.

• 31:14Speaker 03

  I wouldn't survive.

• 31:17Speaker 03

  I wouldn't survive. I wouldn't survive. In the desert, no, I wouldn't survive at all. Next scenario, Rufio. Quite simple. You versus a hundred geese.

• 31:26Speaker 02

  I've got no knife?

• 31:28Speaker 03

  You've got no knife, just bare hands.

• 31:30Speaker 02

  Bare hands, but I have clothing.

• 31:32Speaker 03

  You have clothing, but where are you going with this?

• 31:34Speaker 02

  Do I have shoes?

• 31:35Speaker 03

  You've got shoes, where are you going with this?

• 31:37Speaker 02

  Are they laced or laceless?

• 31:38Speaker 03

  They are laced, where are you going with this?

• 31:39Speaker 02

  Okay, I have laces, so I would get the laces out of my shoes.

• 31:43Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 31:44Speaker 02

  I would tie them together and form a noose around them. And I would, I would engage in becoming a, a geese boy.

• 31:57Speaker 03

  Oh.

• 31:58Speaker 02

  Which is like a cowboy, but with geese.

• 32:01Speaker 03

  What I thought you were saying was you would have got the shoes as nunchucks, like, you've made, like, nunchucks, and you're sort of, like, using one end of the shoe to hold, and the other end of the shoe is just smacking these geese.

• 32:15Speaker 03

  Like that.

• 32:17Speaker 02

  Now that you've done that.

• 32:18Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 32:19Speaker 02

  Obviously, that's what I should have done.

• 32:21Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then finally, imagine I'm raining down the pain.

• 32:27Speaker 03

  Like, it's not just a normal me versus you, I'm raining the pain.

• 32:30Speaker 02

  How am I surviving that? Probably just giggling.

• 32:33Speaker 03

  Fine.

• 32:36Speaker 02

  Do you know what I think would help me with all of those scenarios?

• 32:39Speaker 03

  Go on.

• 32:40Speaker 02

  It would be nice to have a little bit of company. And do you know what I'd love to have by my side, and he would help? Both from a physical point of view, I think Rufio would have helped me, but also from, like, an emotional company point of view. If I had Rufio. If I had Rufio.

• 32:54Speaker 03

  My dog.

• 32:55Speaker 02

  My big black lab that I fell in love with. By my side whilst you're on top of me raining down the pain.

• 33:03Speaker 03

  You can get through anything.

• 33:04Speaker 02

  He would just be like, A, looking at you, probably giggling in a, in a dog way, as he could.

• 33:10Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 33:10Speaker 02

  Same way that I'm giggling. But I'm sure if it ever turned nasty and menacing, he'd, he'd pounce on you.

• 33:17Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 33:18Speaker 02

  He'd get you off me.

• 33:19Speaker 03

  So, I'm, I'm gonna hazard a guess, you're probably excited to see Heart of the Beast.

• 33:25Speaker 02

  I'm very excited to see Heart of the Beast.

• 33:27Speaker 03

  New film starring Brad Pitt, and one of the central themes is that compassion and that bond between a man and his dog.

• 33:34Speaker 02

  Also, it's Brad Pitt, mate.

• 33:35Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 33:36Speaker 02

  Who doesn't wanna see Brad Pitt on screen?

• 33:37Speaker 03

  Exactly.

• 33:38Speaker 02

  Heart of the Beast, starring Brad Pitt and J.K. Simmons, is a story of survival that depends on one man and his dog's unbreakable bond. It takes you on an emotional and action-packed journey as we follow James, played by Brad Pitt, and his dog, Odin, a loyal and devoted companion, in their fight to overcome unimaginable challenges. An epic story of trust, loyalty, brotherhood, sacrifice, and unconditional love. Heart of the Beast is in cinemas September 23rd. Book your tickets now.

• 34:16Speaker 02

  Jake, you're sort of, you're like a mini version of Richard.

• 34:21Speaker 03

  Sure. You know, like.

• 34:22Speaker 01

  I mean, isn't everyone?

• 34:25Speaker 02

  As in, you know, you've, like, everything I've done in the last 12 months that's involved TV or bits and bobs like that, that have, and the people I've met on it have gone around, "Oh my god, you work with Jake, don't you?" I was like, "Everyone knows you." From all your days as a TV producer and all the different bits of it, and I'm like, "My god, mate, you've been going for, like, years." And I hadn't heard of you, I hadn't seen it, until we were introduced to do this podcast and fell in love with you straight away. And I was like, "This is gonna be great fun." And then to see the way you've sort of transitioned to comedian and on-screen talent. But you're sort of following in, in Richard's footsteps, aren't you?

• 35:04Speaker 03

  Massive footsteps, you've gotta follow them. Um, they, you can't miss them, really. The size of those, what, what size are you, Richard?

• 35:10Speaker 01

  Uh, 14.

• 35:10Speaker 03

  14. I mean, you're gonna follow, yeah, I, genuinely, I did mean it when, when, when I said earlier. Just massive, massive fan.

• 35:17Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 35:18Speaker 03

  What it is, and I do, I do appreciate what Richard was saying earlier, is that when you, when you get to, like, make and come up with formats, and quiz shows, and game shows, and panel shows, it's just the most fun in the world. And, uh, yeah, the, the reason I got the chance to do some of this stuff was basically, sadly, because they're just not making them as much anymore. So the stuff I was doing, like, on my live nights or whatever, was just, was an extension of being able to make a panel show but on stage, because they're just not making them anymore.

• 35:48Speaker 01

  It's more fun.

• 35:49Speaker 03

  It's so fun.

• 35:50Speaker 01

  It's more fun.

• 35:50Speaker 03

  It's so fun.

• 35:51Speaker 02

  Uh, secret behind a TV hit?

• 35:54Speaker 01

  Huh, I mean, I don't know.

• 35:56Speaker 02

  What do you mean, you don't know?

• 35:57Speaker 01

  Well, how, because otherwise I would just churn them out.

• 36:00Speaker 02

  Well, but you did, you churned out Pointless.

• 36:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, but, I mean, you know, there's, I've had more flops than hits, for sure. Um, so it's like saying the secret of winning a rugby game, I mean, you know.

• 36:10Speaker 02

  Where you score more points than the opposition.

• 36:12Speaker 01

  Exactly, and that's the secret of a TV format. It is, it is, you have to, it has to have a big hook, it has to make people feel slightly better about themselves, it has to ask a question in the first minute that it answers in the last minute, which is why that code we're gonna do right at the end. So it has to have all those things. Uh, but people have to feel comfortable on that journey, but then on that journey, you have to entertain them. Uh, on that journey, they have to be with people, in people's company, who they want to be with. So that, really, you have to take them on a journey. They know there's a safety to it, but they know there's a jeopardy to it, they know, they know something is gonna happen, they don't know what it is, but along the way, they have to enjoy being in your company. I think that's, that's the closest I can get to, to defining it.

• 36:52Speaker 03

  What are some of the shows that you were involved in coming up with?

• 36:58Speaker 01

  Eight Out of 10 Cats, if we're gonna talk about panel shows. A Deal or No Deal was the, that's the only one that I thought, "Oh, this is gonna be a hit." Just from playing it, you're like, "Oh, this is great." Just, you know, you know the, the direction of travel, but it was that, uh, that was a really, really fun one. Yeah, um, Pointless, Million Pound Drop, I was involved in, which I, I believe, uh, very, very popular in, uh, ballstalls and in the criminal justice system.

• 37:26Speaker 01

  Unlike certain shows I could talk about, right? Unlike, oh, in House of Vanilla.

• 37:31Speaker 03

  Oh, no.

• 37:34Speaker 02

  So, aside from, um, House of Games, what's the worst idea you've ever pinned? You've ever pitched, or been pitched?

• 37:42Speaker 01

  Uh, the worst idea I've ever pitched or been pitched? Well, we did a show that, that was on the list called The 24 Hour Quiz, which is a cross between Big Brother and Who Wants to be a Millionaire, except much less good than either of those. We had a show called While You Were Sleeping, which is, you make people's dreams come true, but while they're asleep. We didn't make this show. Like, you're a huge F1 fan, uh, and we wait for you to fall asleep, and then David Coulthard comes around to your house and kind of, and does a selfie with you, but you're asleep, so they didn't know it, and the next morning, we show it to you. That didn't come off for lots and lots of reasons.

• 38:15Speaker 03

  Suck it up.

• 38:17Speaker 01

  Well, there was a time.

• 38:18Speaker 02

  It's like Michael McIntyre's midnight game show without the consent.

• 38:21Speaker 01

  I did that the other day. With, not me, not, not me being, but I, I, I helped, I helped out on someone else's. It's mental, right?

• 38:30Speaker 02

  Brilliant.

• 38:31Speaker 01

  You've done it, right?

• 38:32Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 38:33Speaker 01

  But you were the person whose house they went to?

• 38:34Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 38:35Speaker 01

  And you really didn't know?

• 38:36Speaker 02

  I had no idea whatsoever.

• 38:37Speaker 01

  But your wife, your wife isn't full makeup?

• 38:39Speaker 02

  You've probably heard this before, I know you guys have, and the listeners. I, it was meant, it was a mental time, everything was going, I was saying yes to everything. It was great fun, but also burnout. And I remember, I was struggling with my neck, so I took a couple of days of Pams before bed, a couple more, and then said to my Daisy, I was like, "Look, I'm done with this. I need to go and get a real job." As you alluded to earlier. "I need to get a real job, I'm sick of this TV stuff, it's mental." And she'd usually sit up and engage, and we'd chat, and go through it all, and she'd help me with it. She just went, "Okay, cool, we'll talk about it in the morning." And then rolled over, I pretty much passed out, and she said she was just sat there giggling, knowing that McIntyre was coming in in an hour.

• 39:21Speaker 01

  Well, we were.

• 39:23Speaker 02

  She was like that, like.

• 39:25Speaker 01

  Because we're on the other side of that, we're in the production office, and you're sitting around there with various other people, and you are literally someone getting a text from this person's wife saying, "He's still awake." "He is still awake," and you can't get in the car until he's fallen asleep. It's like, it's mental, it's really depressing.

• 39:42Speaker 02

  You've become like the voice

• 39:45Speaker 01

  Oh yeah.

• 39:45Speaker 02

  of entertainment in the UK. Like, I listen to your podcast and you're like, you and Marina are just...

• 39:53Speaker 01

  Yeah. Well, I think that, again, I alluded earlier to sometimes if you're in the public eye, they ask your opinion on things, right? You'll get asked your opinion on political things or stuff that's happening. And I always think I'm not qualified to talk about any of those things. Whereas I do think, if I'm qualified to talk about anything, it's TV, radio, script, stuff. That's, that's the, you know, that's the stuff I've done for 30 years. So I'm happy talking about it. And, you know, Marina, the same, she's done it. So it's, yeah, we just get together, you know, every Monday morning and talk about the big entertainment stories, talk about big celeb stories.

• 40:25Speaker 02

  But do you feel any pressure with that? Because the amount of people that do listen to you and go, well, your word's gospel then, whatever. If Richard and Marina, like, we've experienced it recently when we said the release date of The Traitors.

• 40:37Speaker 01

  We got such trouble.

• 40:38Speaker 02

  And we got in trouble and we were like, what?

• 40:39Speaker 01

  Neither of us actually know it.

• 40:40Speaker 02

  We don't know the date, but we were just taking the piss.

• 40:43Speaker 01

  Oh my God, we did a live The Rest Is Entertainment at the Royal Festival Hall and Joe came on as our guest. And by the way, was magnificent.

• 40:51Speaker 02

  Did you?

• 40:52Speaker 01

  You were so good. And we're talking about The Traitors and you threw a date out and we're going, oh my God, that's the date of Celebrity Traitors. It was clearly a joke. The next morning, all the papers full of, oh, by the way, not Joe Marder is giving away when Celebrity Traitors is on. Richard Osman gives away when Celebrity Traitors is on. So, you know, I go on, just, the only things at home, Instagram and on the podcast, just said, oh, it was a joke. I don't know when it is. And then the next week, all the stories were, Richard Osman gets the date wrong. It isn't even that date. You think, yeah, I know it's not that date because me and Joe were having a joke. And you think, oh my God, that's an industry, isn't it? The press picking up on those things.

• 41:29Speaker 02

  Does that actually, are you conscious, more conscious of your, what you say now? Because you know everything's getting picked up because of how big you've become off the back of it.

• 41:39Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's like I talked about, about my view that Jack Loudon might be James Bond. And that got picked up over it. He's now like the favourite for the bookies. And I don't know, but I know that he's in the mix. I certainly don't know who's going to be James Bond. No, I like it. The more, like with the books, like the TV shows, you're in it for the entertainment. You're in it to entertain people. And so the more people who are listening, as long as you're proud of it, as long as you're being yourself, and so long as, you know, there's no artifice to it, the more people who listen or read, the better. That's how I've always thought of it. The more pressure is when people are not really listening. That's when you really get pressure in TV and stuff, is when the audience starts tailing off. But for, yeah, for the moment, I feel like it's stuff I'm allowed

• 42:22Speaker 01

  to talk about. I'm with someone, Marina, who I really respect and I really like and does something different to me. And I feel like it's providing, I think people feel entertained by it and they feel better at the end of it than they do at the beginning. And that's, so I'll take that.

• 42:36Speaker 03

  So, Richard.

• 42:37Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 42:38Speaker 03

  Having listened to the podcast all the time, and having sort of worked a bit in TV as well, we're all very aware of the different pockets of entertainment and media that are struggling for different reasons.

• 42:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 42:51Speaker 03

  We thought we might quickfire you

• 42:53Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 42:54Speaker 03

  on some thoughts, ideas, plans on how different sections of media could maybe be revitalised.

• 43:01Speaker 01

  I got you.

• 43:02Speaker 03

  Does that feel like too much pressure or can we have a go?

• 43:03Speaker 01

  No, let's, let's do it.

• 43:05Speaker 03

  The cinema. How do we get people coming back? How do we get people excited about going to the cinema?

• 43:11Speaker 01

  Young people are going to the cinema a lot, especially in the States. They are watching a different generation of film stars. They are not watching the people we think of as film stars. They're just not. So they're coming back. My view is television in the cinema. You've got these big buildings, got these great buildings with great seats. Everyone loves TV. Start showing TV in the cinema. If you had a cinema in the middle of various cities that just showed Friends and things like that back to back, and you knew on Monday night it was Friends night, on Tuesday night it's Star Trek night, on Wednesday night it's Succession, on Thursday night it's The Sopranos, it would be packed every single night. You've got a huge screen, you've got the seats, stick a bar at the front, we all go and watch TV together. That's cinemas for you.

• 43:50Speaker 02

  Have you said that out loud already?

• 43:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 43:52Speaker 02

  Fuck's sake.

• 43:53Speaker 01

  It's a good idea, right?

• 43:54Speaker 02

  Someone else is gonna do that. I thought that was ours.

• 43:57Speaker 01

  Sorry, you thought this would belong to you because I just said it on your... What do you think I've signed? What is it you think I signed before I came on?

• 44:04Speaker 02

  No, no, no.

• 44:05Speaker 03

  TV?

• 44:05Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 44:07Speaker 03

  Is there sort of like magic fix of the sort of thing people should be commissioning? Or is it a case of just reevaluating expectations of what TV is in our landscape?

• 44:15Speaker 01

  Yeah. If you're my age or even your guys' age, we grew up with terrestrial television, a certain amount of channels and things on at a certain time. That has gone. There's still enough people who are 55 and above that it's going to keep going for a little while, but it is not a growth industry in any way whatsoever. We're not going to have just, oh, commission this, commission this, commission that. There'll be a few big shows on the, on the terrestrial broadcasters, but the future is not that. The future is iPlayer having content from BBC, ITV, Channel 4, this big player that can somehow compete with Netflix. We have to get all of the UK production stuff together, put it in one place. That's the way that TV is going to, you know, last longer than it currently does. But it's not, oh my God, I had the real glory days of TV. I was very lucky.

• 44:58Speaker 01

  But it is not. This is, I'm sitting in the studio here with lovely Tom, who I've worked with as a TV producer for many, many years. This is where it's all happening now. And that's, I think it's good because the barrier to entry is smaller. There's no obstacles. There's less money needed to make content now. And so I love that. So I think terrestrial TV is one thing and we need to look after that industry. But I do think the content that's coming up on screens, on podcasts and all this kind of stuff, I just think, to me, it's a real net positive.

• 45:29Speaker 03

  Books. Is the whole thing of we need to get people reading more similar to what you're saying about the cinema and actually people are going to the cinema, people are reading?

• 45:36Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 45:36Speaker 03

  Or is there something that needs to be done or could be done to get people reading more?

• 45:40Speaker 01

  You know, I've just done a tour for the new book. I've been up and down independent bookshops, all up and down the country, and they're booming, which is great news. You know, book sales are going up and up and up. Bookshops are getting bigger and bigger and bigger. So the death of reading, I absolutely get it. And in the world of AI, but again, you know, books are the antidote to AI. And this generation growing up seems to really, really, really hate AI. There's lots of useful things we can do it with, but using it as a creative force, right? It's not, it's not something that's useful to anyone. Books are the antidote to it. Books are getting bigger and bigger and bigger all around the world. Absolutely, there's lots of schemes that where you can get books for, to kids and use your local library, use your local bookshop and stuff like that. But no, I think books are very, very healthy and I think will continue to be so because they are,

• 46:23Speaker 01

  if you grow up not having something with the whole of your culture being super quick, super quick, super quick, the human brain hasn't really changed over thousands of years. You know, we still want a bit of meat, you know, we still want something. And so, and, and books, if you discover books for the first time, you're like, this is insane. Wow, the stuff that's in this. After what I've grown up watching and consuming, this is incredible. These emotions, the lives of completely different human beings in a different century, in a different part of the world. This is like witchcraft. And I think there's a generation who are, who are understanding that and it's, it's really appealing to them.

• 46:59Speaker 03

  And finally, any thoughts on improving this podcast?

• 47:04Speaker 01

  God, it's such a good question.

• 47:05Speaker 03

  It's hard to be obvious.

• 47:06Speaker 01

  I think it's great. I think it's really good. I do think it's great.

• 47:09Speaker 02

  Whoa, whoa, whoa. I don't want, well, I don't know if I'm ready for this.

• 47:14Speaker 01

  Yeah. Why are you, why are you so defensive? What do you think's gonna happen?

• 47:18Speaker 03

  You don't think you're ready for Richard's jelly?

• 47:22Speaker 03

  Sorry, I don't know what that was.

• 47:24Speaker 01

  Firstly, there's always going to be shows that do better than your show.

• 47:28Speaker 02

  And you, as once you accept that, that's quite freeing, isn't it?

• 47:31Speaker 01

  That's incredibly freeing. And also, if you ever are number one, you will always be number one. That's incredibly freeing. The only thing you'd always do is do a show you're proud of, work with people you like, and, you know, do exactly what you're doing. I wouldn't...

• 47:45Speaker 03

  So we've got a lot to change then, basically.

• 47:46Speaker 01

  I wouldn't change anything. I would put Jake a tiny bit further away.

• 47:51Speaker 01

  And also, just, just less of the prison stuff.

• 47:54Speaker 03

  Oh no. I keep thinking you might forget about it. It's never gonna happen. It was so...

• 48:01Speaker 01

  Here's what I think. I would not change it. I think this is, when you said you're gonna do this podcast, and I knew that Tom was involved as well, I thought, oh, fucking hell, there we go. But it's so great. It's really great. And the two of you are great and it's so beautifully put together. And, you know, that's the beauty of this thing, because it would not have happened on television. People would not have allowed it to happen. And if it had happened, they would have told you exactly what it had to be. And you would not have been able to muck about and you would not be able to have all these running jokes. And you would not be able to do it in the way that you want to do it. So I think it's great. I think, carry on, keep doing, keep doing what you're doing.

• 48:33Speaker 02

  That's really kind of you. I appreciate that. And I haven't actually said this, I don't think I've told you this, you lot this. After Traitors happened, I asked to meet up with Richard for some advice, because it was all kicking off. And I was like, I don't know what to, I don't know how to deal with all this. Like, it's your world. Get any chance you can. You're the one that got me into it. So you can help me out of it. Thank you. And we met up for lunch. I can't remember the place. It was very posh and lovely though.

• 49:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, you chose.

• 49:06Speaker 02

  And you said to me, I said, oh, what advice? You said, well, ultimately, what I took away from it, we had a lot of back and forth, but you went, find something you enjoy doing and with people that you can trust and that understand you or get you, or at least give you some leeway to make mistakes and be yourself. And then from that, that's all you've sort of got to do. That's, that's what it is. And then

• 49:34Speaker 01

  Look at you now.

• 49:35Speaker 02

  this lot turned up and I was like, I have so much fun. I have so much fun doing this.

• 49:42Speaker 01

  Comes across.

• 49:43Speaker 02

  And prattling about and the, how lucky I feel with getting guests like yourself and everyone else on it. That we can sit in a room, make this with everyone, prattle about, I can call it work, and then still have Richard Osman come on and say, this isn't work. And I go, yeah, you're right. It isn't, it isn't work. It pays the bills.

• 50:05Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 50:06Speaker 02

  But it isn't work.

• 50:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 50:07Speaker 02

  Because it's so much fun. So I'll always be grateful for that.

• 50:10Speaker 01

  Everybody.

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• 51:46Speaker 02

  We interrupt this episode to remind you that we are going on tour.

• 51:50Speaker 03

  Yes, Janet, it's been hard at work and organised, not one, not two, not three. I don't have time for this. It's seven shows across the UK. Can't believe it.

• 51:57Speaker 02

  Seven?

• 51:58Speaker 03

  Seven.

• 51:58Speaker 02

  But where are we going?

• 51:59Speaker 03

  You can't even count to seven.

• 52:00Speaker 02

  I can. Look, I've got seven fingers.

• 52:02Speaker 03

  I know. Well, I don't know, you saying I've got seven fingers sort of proves that you're mathematically gifted.

• 52:07Speaker 02

  Okay, right. We've worked the numbers out, but what about the destinations? Where are we going?

• 52:12Speaker 03

  I, I, I, let me try and do it in one breath. We're going to Birmingham, York, Manchester, Bristol, Northampton, Brighton, and London all this autumn.

• 52:19Speaker 02

  Look, Janet's put a lot of work into this tour, and it would genuinely upset her if you didn't buy a ticket. That is, of course, me guilt tripping you in buying the tickets, which is actually unkind. We want you to want to buy the tickets.

• 52:33Speaker 03

  We want you to want to buy the tickets, but also we don't want you letting her down. She's been hard at work all year putting this tour together. I just don't want her in a bad mood because no one's come to the shows, okay? I mean, I already have to work with him. He gets quite in a bad mood a lot anyway.

• 52:46Speaker 02

  Tickets are on sale right now. Just find the link in the episode description. And who knows? You might even get to see a little more of Janet in the flesh than you bargained for. I don't think she's, is she up for that? Have we got clearance that she's all right with that?

• 53:00Speaker 03

  You've written that in?

• 53:01Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 53:04Speaker 03

  So don't now backtrack from it. Unbelievable.

• 53:07Speaker 02

  Sure.

• 53:08Speaker 03

  I can't work like this.

• 53:15Speaker 02

  Richard, you're the king of daytime TV. You've come up with all that, your on-screen talent.

• 53:19Speaker 01

  Shoulder Peak.

• 53:21Speaker 02

  The what?

• 53:22Speaker 01

  Shoulder Peak, Access Prime. It's not daytime, that kind of, that kind of six o'clock thing you call it. You call it Shoulder Peak.

• 53:28Speaker 02

  Okay, so you've gone from the chief of the shoulder primes.

• 53:32Speaker 01

  Hmm, okay, you've mixed the two of them up there.

• 53:33Speaker 02

  Okay, fine.

• 53:34Speaker 01

  So either Shoulder Peak or Access Prime.

• 53:35Speaker 03

  Shoulder Prime's something you find in a butcher. That's very, that's very different.

• 53:38Speaker 02

  You've got the prime shoulder going on.

• 53:39Speaker 01

  Yeah, okay.

• 53:41Speaker 02

  You've become this successful on-screen talent, having been successful off-screen talent.

• 53:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 53:48Speaker 02

  Were you a novelist before all of that? Were you writing novels? Or did you then go, oh, I'm going to jack that all in and become a novelist?

• 53:55Speaker 01

  No, I've, I've always been a writer, as it's the truth. Everything else was slightly weird. So in my teens, I was writing journalism. In my twenties, I was writing sitcoms. And I've always done joke writing and gag writing and stuff like that. And so I started many novels over the years. I think my novels in my twenties and thirties wouldn't have been particularly good. So I was always waiting, really, just because if you are someone who writes, then writing a novel is kind of the marathon of that. And I got to my kind of late forties and I had the idea, this Thursday Murder Club idea. And I thought, okay, maybe, maybe this is the one. Maybe this is the time I finally finish a novel. I had a little bit more time on my hands because the kids had grown up and I was doing a bit less TV. And yeah, so it was, I was just waiting and I'm glad I did wait because I think what's in the books is much better than it would have been, say, 20 years before.

• 54:40Speaker 01

  But no, I've always, blank piece of paper and a pen, that's how, that's how I've always been, I've always written.

• 54:45Speaker 02

  Is it true that you wrote Thursday Murder Club secretly?

• 54:48Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 54:48Speaker 02

  And didn't show anyone?

• 54:49Speaker 01

  I didn't show anyone. No, because...

• 54:51Speaker 02

  What about Ingrid?

• 54:52Speaker 01

  No, no.

• 54:53Speaker 02

  You showed no one?

• 54:54Speaker 01

  I showed no one, because no one wants to read someone else's novel, right? If a friend of yours is writing a book, you're like, oh my God, please, don't show it to me. And I didn't want to show it to any publishers or anything like that. I just wanted to write it and finish it just so I'd done it, just so I could prove to myself I'd done it. And I put it in a drawer so many times and gave up on it so many times, because I just thought, well, it's this. But when I finished it, I showed it to Juliet, who's now my agent, and I just said, what do we think? And she loved it and I just, I was still worried about that thing of, oh, but people, people think of me as a guy from TV, even though I'm not, I never, you know, I never have been. But then she sold it in Germany before she sold it in the UK. And I thought, oh, good, because I don't know who I am. They just read the book.

• 55:37Speaker 01

  So we sold it in six territories before we sold it in the UK. And I thought, okay, that's okay. That gave me the confidence to think, no, it's, it's a real book. And we sold the film rights in the States before we signed the deal as well. So I thought, oh, okay, that three years was worth it and it's a proper book. And it's, I, I know I'm a writer, but you have to, other people don't necessarily know I am. So it was, that, that was, that was a nice thing for just my confidence.

• 56:03Speaker 02

  So that was the Thursday Murder Club?

• 56:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 56:06Speaker 02

  This is We Chase Shadows.

• 56:08Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 56:09Speaker 02

  Can I offer you some feedback?

• 56:10Speaker 01

  Yes. I would like, do you know what? I would absolutely fucking love that. Honestly, that's the thing I've been lacking.

• 56:18Speaker 02

  So just, just on the, the title.

• 56:22Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 56:23Speaker 02

  We chase shadows.

• 56:24Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 56:24Speaker 02

  But we chase shadows means like, that doesn't mean that.

• 56:28Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 56:29Speaker 02

  You can't ever chase shadows. Like, the whole point of chasing shadows is, is not achieving it, like, you'd never get to it.

• 56:35Speaker 03

  That's why, that's why, sorry, I didn't mean to shout, that's why it's a phrase.

• 56:37Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 56:38Speaker 02

  What do you mean?

• 56:39Speaker 03

  It's, it's a phrase because that's what he's trying to say. We're chasing shadows because it's something that we can't do.

• 56:44Speaker 01

  But we do it anyway.

• 56:44Speaker 03

  No one says, no one says I'm catching shadows because you don't catch shadows.

• 56:48Speaker 01

  You would like the first book in this series.

• 56:50Speaker 02

  Help me.

• 56:50Speaker 01

  It was called We Solve Murders.

• 56:53Speaker 02

  Makes sense.

• 56:54Speaker 01

  Do you know what I mean?

• 56:54Speaker 02

  I know what that book's going to be about.

• 56:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's about solving murders. Whereas this, because, you know, other people have read the first book, it's the second book, so it has a similar vibe to it, but this is We Chase Shadows, which is because there's a chase all around the world in this book. The shadows because we have shadowy figures as well. And so they do chase shadows. That's the point. You chase rumours and hints and when you're trying to work out who's murdered someone, all you're doing is chasing shadows. And that's what they do across the world. So the first book is We Solve Murders, so we've absolutely set that in stone. You've got that, that's safe, that's in the bank. You can take that home. And now we kind of go, huh, maybe we can be a little bit less literal. How's that for you? It's no hammer and tongs. I get that, because I know what I'm getting there. Two guys absolutely just going to town on each other.

• 57:41Speaker 01

  I get it. I know what that is from the start.

• 57:44Speaker 02

  It's the, it's the emphasis on going to town that you do.

• 57:47Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 57:47Speaker 02

  Going to town on each other.

• 57:49Speaker 01

  It's not me doing it, mate.

• 57:50Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 57:52Speaker 02

  I honestly did not think...

• 57:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 57:56Speaker 02

  A podcast with Richard Osman would end up like this.

• 58:01Speaker 01

  Yeah, I know.

• 58:02Speaker 02

  I didn't, whoa, whoa, whoa, I did not slag off your title.

• 58:05Speaker 01

  No, I know you didn't.

• 58:05Speaker 02

  I offered feedback.

• 58:06Speaker 01

  You did, yeah. No, but you know what I mean? So it is, it is a chase and it is about shadowy people.

• 58:10Speaker 02

  It's out now.

• 58:11Speaker 01

  It's out now. It's got a lovely front cover, so I'm very, very proud of it. It's my other series away from Thursday Murder Club. This is like an ex-cop who lives in the New Forest, doesn't ever want to leave the New Forest.

• 58:22Speaker 02

  Does he ride a horse?

• 58:23Speaker 01

  He's got a, he doesn't actually. He's got a cat, he's got a pub quiz team, he's got his mates who he has lunch with every, at the pub every day, never wants to go anywhere. He's got his daughter-in-law, Amy, who's a bodyguard for billionaires, who always going around the world. And in the first book, she's in trouble, he has to go, oh, God, now I've got to get on a private jet and fly over to St Lucia to help my daughter-in-law. And her client is a woman called Rosie Dantonio, who's the world's best-selling novelist. And the three of them, in the, at the end of the first book, set up this detective agency, and this is their first case.

• 58:51Speaker 02

  You've got me.

• 58:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 58:53Speaker 02

  I'm in.

• 58:54Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 58:54Speaker 02

  No, I'm in.

• 58:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 58:56Speaker 02

  What are the chances of me being able to read that to my 10-year-old daughter?

• 58:59Speaker 01

  Do you know what? With Thursday Murder Club, a lot of, 12, 13, I would say is a starting point.

• 59:04Speaker 02

  So a little bit of the whole, yeah.

• 59:05Speaker 01

  Yeah, like, you know, I think lots of people started reading Agatha Christie at that sort of age and this got, there's no, I never swear I'm not interested in that particularly. It's, yeah, I think it is kind of funny and, you know, there's sad bits in it and there's, you know, the stuff like that, but you can, couple of years, maybe.

• 59:20Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 59:21Speaker 03

  How come you are so interested in murders?

• 59:24Speaker 01

  Um, I think that, you know, my grandfather was a police officer. So I've always been interested in criminality. And what I'm, I'm interested in Britain and the world and people. I'm interested in people, this thing I'm really interested in. What a murder mystery gives you, like a TV format, funnily enough, and I've always read them, is, look, at the beginning of this, I'm going to kill someone. At the end, we'll find out who did it. Okay, so that's, that's our contract. And in between those two places, I can take you anywhere. I can talk about whatever I want to talk about. I have whatever characters I want. I can talk about what I think about the world without it ever being a lecture, because my characters are doing it. I can make you laugh, hopefully I'll make you cry. And at the end, there's a satisfying puzzle is solved. And that, I love writing.

• 1:00:06Speaker 01

  Crime fiction is so incredibly diverse, because so long as you do that, that, you know, you start here, we end there, you tell whatever story you want. Tell whatever story you want about whatever era you want, about whatever part of the country you want, about anywhere in the world, about whatever people you want. And, you know, and that's why, you know, it's, it's, it's the biggest honour in the world.

• 1:00:24Speaker 03

  Richard, I don't know if you know, I don't even think you know you've done this, but that's exactly how you describe the secret to a hit TV. You did know you did that. Yeah, fine. Okay.

• 1:00:33Speaker 01

  Interesting, you see.

• 1:00:34Speaker 03

  But that's exactly what, how that.

• 1:00:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:00:35Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:00:35Speaker 01

  It's exactly that.

• 1:00:36Speaker 02

  We've already said to you, you're the biggest selling adult author of the decade.

• 1:00:41Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:00:42Speaker 02

  Sorry to bring that back up again. Um, but do you look at that and go, I'm really proud of that?

• 1:00:49Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:00:49Speaker 02

  Like, you are really proud of?

• 1:00:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, I am really proud of it. Um, and it's, look, you, you, you take these things, you know, with a, slightly with a pinch of salt. But I love the books. I'm proud of the books. The books represent who I am. They're sort of the culmination of a lifetime of the way I've thought about the world and about people and what I think is right and what I think is wrong and humour and all of that stuff. And it's all in there and it's the thing I'm proudest of. So for me, the more people that read it, the happier I am, because it's not something I've compromised for a single second on. It's not something I've, there's not an ounce of cynicism in any of it. It is absolute limit of what it is that I want to do and what I want to show of myself. It's all in there. And so, yeah, the more, the more people who read it, the better. That's, I'm, I'm proud of the books.

• 1:01:35Speaker 01

  The sales are lovely, because I want more and more people to read it. But the thing I'm proud of is having sat down and written the books and year after year, just, just keep writing these books and these characters and telling stories.

• 1:01:50Speaker 02

  Richard.

• 1:01:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:01:51Speaker 02

  We've spent this session exploring the extent of your metamorphosis.

• 1:01:54Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:01:55Speaker 02

  And we've spent a lot of time exploring that. But there's one last thing I want to help you with. It's subjective, isn't it? It's always subjective.

• 1:02:03Speaker 01

  Um, you want to help me with something?

• 1:02:05Speaker 02

  Yeah, I want to help you with what's next.

• 1:02:07Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:02:07Speaker 02

  Jake, how are we going to do this?

• 1:02:08Speaker 03

  So this office doubles up as many things. Part psychiatry, part psychology, part whatever Janet's up to, but also in part, a careers adviserers, a careers advice office.

• 1:02:22Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:02:22Speaker 03

  Um, and do you know those flow charts that they do at school to try and work out exactly what career you might end up with? We've sort of designed one for you to find out exactly where you could end up.

• 1:02:32Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:02:32Speaker 03

  Uh, Joe's got some questions. Um, if you could answer them, it should lead us to, well, we've generally, we've got, we've got a few here where it could end up at. We'll find out what it is.

• 1:02:40Speaker 02

  Would you be prepared to chase something down the street as part of your job?

• 1:02:43Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:02:44Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 1:02:45Speaker 02

  So no. Okay. Would you be happy if your work clothes routinely got covered in somebody else's body fluids?

• 1:02:51Speaker 01

  Uh, I would not be happy.

• 1:02:53Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 1:02:54Speaker 02

  Would you be happy if your job involved occasionally being bitten?

• 1:02:57Speaker 01

  I would not be happy.

• 1:03:00Speaker 02

  Would you rather be respected or liked?

• 1:03:03Speaker 01

  Um, oh, that's a good question, isn't it? Would I rather be respected or liked? Um, liked.

• 1:03:10Speaker 02

  Interesting.

• 1:03:10Speaker 01

  I'd like both.

• 1:03:11Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:03:12Speaker 01

  Ideally, but no, no, I'm not asking for both. You can't be, you can't be hammer and tongs.

• 1:03:18Speaker 02

  Could you make a living from being charming?

• 1:03:21Speaker 03

  I think he already is.

• 1:03:22Speaker 01

  Could I make a living from being charming?

• 1:03:24Speaker 02

  Yeah, like, could you, would you be happy making a living?

• 1:03:26Speaker 01

  Oh, would I be happy? Yeah, for sure. For sure.

• 1:03:31Speaker 02

  Do you think you'd be good at keeping a secret?

• 1:03:35Speaker 02

  I could answer for you.

• 1:03:38Speaker 01

  What about you? But no.

• 1:03:38Speaker 02

  It's a no.

• 1:03:41Speaker 02

  Could you make small talk with a stranger for an extended period of time?

• 1:03:44Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah. That's one of my favourite things.

• 1:03:45Speaker 02

  Loves that. Could you spend a day working with someone you absolutely hated?

• 1:03:51Speaker 01

  No. Why do you think I quit Pointless? That's a joke. That is a joke. I love Xander. I genuinely love Xander. Um, no, I couldn't, I'm really bad with people I don't like. It takes, I can't, I cannot do it.

• 1:04:06Speaker 02

  Do you tell them that you don't like them?

• 1:04:07Speaker 01

  No, but I, I, I disengage very, very quickly.

• 1:04:11Speaker 02

  Okay, good.

• 1:04:12Speaker 01

  I can't do it.

• 1:04:13Speaker 02

  And then finally, do you feel comfortable holding a whistle at work?

• 1:04:18Speaker 01

  I mean, I don't feel uncomfortable. I guess I don't feel uncomfortable.

• 1:04:22Speaker 02

  Okay, right. Um, shall we put that into the?

• 1:04:25Speaker 03

  Yeah, it was all sort of pointing one way, but then that whistle chat really pointed to PE teacher. So I'm not really sure what that. Um, we've got, he's sociable, he's resilient, he's comfortable dealing with a wide range of characters. We think you, Richard, are best suited to be the nation's pub landlord. You're a local friendly pub landlord. Everyone's welcome. You make everyone feel at home. You're charming. Um, yeah, we're going to go with pub landlord. That is your new career job we're giving you there.

• 1:04:53Speaker 01

  My grandad, the only piece of life advice he ever gave me, as I say, he was a police officer. He said, if you're ever called to a fight in a pub, make sure you're second through the door.

• 1:05:01Speaker 02

  Good.

• 1:05:02Speaker 01

  It's good advice.

• 1:05:05Speaker 02

  What if, what if the fight's outside?

• 1:05:07Speaker 01

  If you're ever called to a fight in a pub. So it was all there, all the information was there.

• 1:05:11Speaker 03

  It's got you there in small print.

• 1:05:16Speaker 02

  That is the end of our session.

• 1:05:18Speaker 01

  Excellent. Shall I tell you the answers of the code?

• 1:05:20Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 1:05:20Speaker 02

  Uh.

• 1:05:22Speaker 03

  Yeah, obviously, yes, Joe.

• 1:05:24Speaker 01

  Yeah, let's put it back on the screen. When you say them out loud, that is the letters of the alphabet in alphabetical order.

• 1:05:29Speaker 03

  Oh.

• 1:05:31Speaker 02

  What?

• 1:05:32Speaker 03

  Oh, wow.

• 1:05:34Speaker 01

  It may change. If you say H, then it's not. But if we say H, so A, H, R, B and so on. So when you say them out loud, it's the letters of the alphabet in alphabetical order, ending with Z, which begins with Z, of course. Lots of them beginning with E there, as you can see. L, M, N in that order. Do you see? C right at the bottom, because it's, you know, this starts with an S.

• 1:05:58Speaker 03

  It's like you're talking us through the board on Pointless again. That's fantastic. Absolutely fantastic.

• 1:06:03Speaker 01

  Yeah. It's good, isn't it? I mean, it's annoying.

• 1:06:06Speaker 02

  Really good.

• 1:06:06Speaker 01

  It's really hard to get. It took me a long time to get it.

• 1:06:08Speaker 03

  That's really, really good. A, B, E, C, D, yeah.

• 1:06:11Speaker 02

  Um, that, thank you so much. That is, that is the end of your session.

• 1:06:14Speaker 01

  You know what? It was terrific fun. Thank you.

• 1:06:16Speaker 02

  Have you, have you learnt anything about yourself in this process?

• 1:06:18Speaker 01

  Oh, my God, yes. Yes. Mainly about the, you know, people who've been convicted and how much they like certain shows I do. But, uh.

• 1:06:27Speaker 02

  It's been quite the running theme, isn't it?

• 1:06:28Speaker 01

  That's useful knowledge.

• 1:06:29Speaker 03

  Can I retract that bit?

• 1:06:30Speaker 01

  Sure, go on.

• 1:06:30Speaker 03

  Yeah. I retract the idea that prisoners don't watch House of Games.

• 1:06:35Speaker 01

  So you think they do watch it?

• 1:06:37Speaker 03

  Now.

• 1:06:41Speaker 02

  Shit. I think you're fucking brilliant. You've helped me so much. I've told you this before. Uh, you literally did change my life by going and making that call to, to the booker for me. And, uh, you're great fun. You're genuine. You're not what loads of people say about you. Um.

• 1:07:03Speaker 02

  Honestly, you've been brilliant. I love your work. I am, I promise you, I can promise you this, I will endeavour.

• 1:07:10Speaker 01

  Yeah, start it.

• 1:07:11Speaker 02

  To try and start reading again, because I think it is going to help me.

• 1:07:14Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's important.

• 1:07:15Speaker 02

  Um, you've been brilliant. Thank you so much.

• 1:07:17Speaker 01

  Thank you. Thanks, everybody.

• 1:07:18Speaker 02

  Before you leave.

• 1:07:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:07:20Speaker 02

  You don't go away empty-handed.

• 1:07:22Speaker 01

  No way.

• 1:07:22Speaker 02

  You get a lollipop.

• 1:07:23Speaker 01

  No way. That's great.

• 1:07:24Speaker 02

  Help yourself to a lollipop and you get a badge.

• 1:07:27Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 1:07:27Speaker 02

  And what are we going with the badge options?

• 1:07:29Speaker 03

  As our Master of Metamorphosis, we have given you this badge. I'm a beautiful butterfly, which you are, Richard.

• 1:07:35Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 1:07:35Speaker 02

  Huge.

• 1:07:36Speaker 03

  That is yours to take home if you so wish.

• 1:07:38Speaker 02

  That badge is going to look really, really tiny on him.

• 1:07:40Speaker 01

  Thank you so much. MC Tongs, thank you. MC Hammer, thank you.

• 1:07:44Speaker 02

  Uh, you've been absolutely brilliant. Thank you so much. Richard Osman, everybody!

• 1:07:51Speaker 02

  Thank you.

• 1:07:56Speaker 02

  If you want to join the doctor's waitlist, then please subscribe to our YouTube channel and follow us on Instagram, at We'll See You Now Show. Remember, unless it's not clear enough already, I'm not a real doctor. If you need any professional help, you'll find a link to great support services on our Instagram. He's been Jake Bhardwaj, I've been Joe Marler, and this has been Joe Marler, We'll See You Now. See you next time. Bye-bye.

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