More Rosebud - Gyles Diary, episode 52

Another classic episode of Gyles's diaries for you today. Gyles has been keeping a daily diary since he was ten years old, and in these episodes (released on alternate Tuesdays), he reads selected extracts aloud to Harriet, the Rosebud producer, and they chat about them. We've now reached 1981. If you want to go back to the very beginning, the episodes are in chronological order in our back catalogue. Today's edition opens with Gyles and Harriet chatting about leaf blowers, and then we play in a really very special, and exclusive, voice note from one of our celebrity listeners... you won't believe who it is - make sure you listen, as it will surprise and delight you. And transport you back to your childhood days. Then we read out some of the autobiographical poetry we were sent by listeners, inspired by our conversation with the great Larry Lamb. Thank you Zoe Grace Couzens and Liam Dugan for your excellent poetical contributions to Rosebud. Gyles's 1981 diaries feature Liberace, Christopher Biggins, John Schlesinger, Kenneth Williams, Bonnie Langford and Melvyn Bragg. Yes, all human life is here! (Well particularly if they're famous...) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy https://acast.com/privacy for more information.

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 2:19Speaker 02

  Hello again. This is More Rosebud. I'm Giles Brandreth and I'm in a bonny mood because today, following my policy of blue sky before blue screen, I went out into the garden and was faced by a bed, a bed of the most beautiful leaves all across our little lawn. Wonderful golden leaves, light brown leaves, ochre leaves, autumn leaves. Harriet.

• 2:49Speaker 03

  Hmm, sounds like you need to get invested in a leaf blower.

• 2:53Speaker 02

  Dial. Everybody in my street has got a leaf blower.

• 2:55Speaker 03

  I don't.

• 2:55Speaker 02

  The noise.

• 2:56Speaker 03

  I actually don't approve.

• 2:57Speaker 02

  I loathe it. The noise from other houses.

• 2:59Speaker 03

  Just get a rake. What's wrong with a rake?

• 3:01Speaker 02

  What, indeed, I like to think of myself as something of a rake.

• 3:05Speaker 03

  I can't imagine you ever raking anything, Giles.

• 3:07Speaker 02

  Funny enough, I know how to use a rake.

• 3:10Speaker 03

  Well, of course you, I mean, I mean, I'd be worried if you didn't know how to use a rake. That's like saying you don't know how to use a fork.

• 3:18Speaker 02

  And I think in my time, in younger and happier days, I saw myself as a bit of a rake.

• 3:22Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 3:23Speaker 02

  And I'd wear a hat in the garden at a rakish angle and do the raking. We do now have one of these. I didn't know they were called blowers. They do seem to be blowers. They suck up the leaves, don't they?

• 3:31Speaker 03

  No, they blow them just to the side.

• 3:33Speaker 02

  Oh.

• 3:34Speaker 03

  Which is, so I just think they're the sort of pinnacle of, sorry, apologies to any of you listening that have a leaf blower. I kind of think they're the pinnacle of human laziness, that you can't even push some leaves to the side on your own.

• 3:47Speaker 02

  What Harriet doesn't know is that in the pipeline for possibilities to advertise with us are the leading leaf blowing company in the country. We've just blown that quite literally. Now, I tell you, we have a leaf blower because in our little sort of front courtyard bit, the leaves get everywhere and so clearing them up is a bit of a problem because it's gravel.

• 4:05Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 4:05Speaker 02

  Okay, so it's useful.

• 4:06Speaker 03

  No, it is useful.

• 4:07Speaker 02

  But the noise of it is unbearable and our neighbors seem to use their leaf blowers at unsocial hours.

• 4:15Speaker 03

  Oh.

• 4:15Speaker 02

  So, anyway.

• 4:16Speaker 03

  Wow, who knew?

• 4:18Speaker 02

  Who knew?

• 4:18Speaker 03

  First of all, problems.

• 4:19Speaker 02

  A little leaf blower rage.

• 4:20Speaker 03

  Late night leaf blowing.

• 4:22Speaker 02

  Gyles Brandreth on a Tuesday morning. If you're listening to this first time around, it's a Tuesday, this is More Rosebud. Every other Tuesday, we have extracts from my diaries, which is what we're going to do today. But occasionally, we have interviews with interesting people. And if we have quite a few interesting people, we sometimes have two interviews in a row.

• 4:41Speaker 03

  So we do.

• 4:42Speaker 02

  But, but, but that's because we, we hang loose. We're a bit flexible, aren't we? That's okay. Now, look, Harriet, parish notices tell us what are, yes, the parish notices are. We have a Christmas party coming up, don't we?

• 4:56Speaker 03

  We do, yeah, because it's actually nearly December. I mean, it's terrible how the year.

• 5:00Speaker 02

  Well, it's nearly November.

• 5:01Speaker 03

  Racist.

• 5:01Speaker 02

  It's nearly November.

• 5:02Speaker 03

  Well, in my head, I'm thinking about December already. So, yeah, on the fifth, Saturday, the 5th of December, we are having a Christmas party at Grosvenor House in London's Mayfair. And you have to be a member of the Rosebud family to come. But if you are a member of the Rosebud family, you can come for free.

• 5:22Speaker 02

  Hey.

• 5:23Speaker 03

  To have a Christmas party with me and Giles and various other people.

• 5:29Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 5:30Speaker 03

  And friends.

• 5:31Speaker 02

  Family, family members.

• 5:32Speaker 03

  Family members, yeah.

• 5:33Speaker 02

  The idea is at Christmas time to meet members of the Rosebud family, maybe to have some mulled wine, some mince pies. I'm hoping there may be some hot chocolate, which I rather like. Harriet does not want us to play party games, but I may do.

• 5:45Speaker 03

  I don't, I never said that.

• 5:46Speaker 02

  Oh, did you? Oh, good.

• 5:47Speaker 03

  I was always trying to make out I'm some sort of Scrooge character.

• 5:51Speaker 02

  No, I didn't think you wanted party games. Oh, good.

• 5:54Speaker 03

  You haven't mentioned party games.

• 5:55Speaker 02

  Oh, well, I was just thinking maybe it's a party game. Oh, it was my grandson doing the magic you didn't want. I think that was it.

• 6:03Speaker 02

  I thought we might have some close-up magic.

• 6:05Speaker 03

  I love magic. It was just.

• 6:06Speaker 02

  Oh, well, he's a very good magician. So if people want to come to the party, there may, there will be some singing because you, I hope you're going to come and sing for us.

• 6:15Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 6:15Speaker 02

  And there may be some members of your choir.

• 6:16Speaker 03

  Maybe. I haven't.

• 6:17Speaker 02

  Some Christmas songs. Well, there could be.

• 6:19Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 6:19Speaker 02

  I might do one of my funny poems.

• 6:22Speaker 03

  Right.

• 6:22Speaker 02

  Because I have got quite a funny Christmas poem.

• 6:24Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 6:24Speaker 02

  There might be some party games or there might not. The point is, we, it actually, we just wanted to be a nice civilized party.

• 6:32Speaker 03

  Hmm.

• 6:32Speaker 02

  So maybe no party games.

• 6:34Speaker 03

  No, I think an uncivilized party is much more fun.

• 6:36Speaker 02

  Hey, anyway, the point is, it's the Rosebud family Christmas party. If you want to join the Rosebud family, it's very simple. You just go to patreon.com.

• 6:46Speaker 03

  Forward slash.

• 6:47Speaker 02

  Forward slash Rosebud. And it's $4.99 a month plus VAT, that sort of thing. And you get ad-free listening, extra episodes on a Sunday, and invitations to things like the, the party.

• 6:58Speaker 03

  Hmm. And the extra Sunday episodes are really good, even though I say so myself.

• 7:03Speaker 02

  Well, people come up to me who are members and say, my gosh, the family secrets. You really do give us some family secrets.

• 7:11Speaker 03

  Yeah, and we read out Winnie the Pooh last Sunday and that was really nice.

• 7:14Speaker 02

  That's proved very popular.

• 7:15Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 7:16Speaker 02

  That's something we call Rosebud Reads. And we may be getting some more. People seem to want some more of us doing Winnie the Pooh.

• 7:23Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 7:23Speaker 02

  And I'm the narrator and Harriet does the voices, which is good.

• 7:27Speaker 03

  But, you know, when you're just having that Sunday afternoon lull and you're thinking, oh, I've got nothing to do now, or life's a little bit sad at this point on a Sunday, then we pop at three o'clock with some fun conversation, which I think is the perfect time for it.

• 7:45Speaker 02

  I do, because I do occasionally suffer from what I think is known as the Sunday blues.

• 7:49Speaker 03

  I get that, big time.

• 7:51Speaker 02

  And I don't know, people say, oh, it's because you're going to get back to work on Monday. But actually, I'm looking forward to going back to work on Monday, so it can't be that. There must be something else in the air.

• 8:00Speaker 03

  Something in the water.

• 8:00Speaker 02

  A lot, but don't you think a lot of people suffer from it?

• 8:03Speaker 03

  Absolutely, yeah.

• 8:04Speaker 02

  And I'm not quite sure what it is. It's a kind of, oh.

• 8:07Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 8:08Speaker 02

  Anyway, so we hope that we're there on a Sunday afternoon to be, well, to be there, to be companionable.

• 8:14Speaker 03

  Exactly. Keep you company.

• 8:16Speaker 02

  Yeah, keep you company. And also, we dig a bit deeper, maybe than we sometimes do when we're just doing the diaries, though I hope the diaries, well, anyway. Before we get to the diaries, has there been any interesting correspondence we should be dealing with?

• 8:29Speaker 03

  Well, I mean, I think this is possibly the most interesting correspondence we've ever had.

• 8:35Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 8:36Speaker 03

  I mean, yeah, because a couple of diaries ago, I actually know the date because I checked. It was the 1st of January 1980. So we've just finished 1980, last, last episode. And I think two episodes before that, we were on New Year's Day, 1980. And you said in your extract, just been to see Sooty and Sweep, the Sooty and Sweep show at the Mayfair Theatre.

• 9:00Speaker 02

  Which I loved.

• 9:02Speaker 03

  Sooty's the star of the show, but my favorite is Sweep. But I think you said, I can't stand Sue. And then in our chat, you said you thought Sue was a bit wet. Well, guess who was listening?

• 9:17Speaker 02

  No.

• 9:18Speaker 03

  Sue.

• 9:19Speaker 02

  No.

• 9:20Speaker 03

  The voice of Sue.

• 9:22Speaker 02

  From the Sooty on television?

• 9:24Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 9:24Speaker 02

  The person who was the voice of Sue.

• 9:26Speaker 03

  Who has voiced Sue for over half a century, who's called Brenda Longman, who is not only a brilliant voice person, because we're about to hear her, she's also delightful, charming, a huge fan of Rosebud, and extremely funny, which you're about to hear.

• 9:48Speaker 02

  So I can't believe this. There I am dissing Sue.

• 9:50Speaker 03

  I know, and Sue's listening.

• 9:52Speaker 02

  And Sue is actually listening all these years later. And this happened in 1980, which is 50 years ago.

• 9:57Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 9:57Speaker 02

  Or so.

• 9:58Speaker 03

  And as you can imagine, Sue, AKA Brenda, she wrote us an email. She wasn't impressed, Giles. She was upset because I think I said I thought Sue was condescending or something awful, patronizing. I mean, it's awful. Anyway, Sue, we love you. And what we're all about to hear now is Sue's voice message to us. Which is a thing of absolute brilliance. And we're so honored, Sue, that you've sent us this message and we retract anything we said that was unkind about you. We love you, Sue.

• 10:36Speaker 02

  We do love you, Sue. And Sooty probably would have called as well, but if he had, we wouldn't have heard what he had to say.

• 10:42Speaker 03

  Oh, Sooty and Sweep feature in this.

• 10:44Speaker 02

  Oh, do they?

• 10:45Speaker 03

  Message.

• 10:45Speaker 02

  Oh, my gosh.

• 10:46Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 10:47Speaker 02

  Oh, this really is a, a Rosebud special, isn't it?

• 10:50Speaker 03

  This is a big, big thing. Yeah, you're in for an absolute treat.

• 10:53Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 10:54Speaker 03

  Coming up.

• 10:57Speaker 04

  Dear Harriet and Giles, firstly, I cannot begin to express my gratitude to you for the wonderful divertissement that Rosebud has become in my life. I, Sooty, Sooty, for goodness sake, how many times have I told you not to hover when I'm sending important messages? Turn it off, turn it off.

• 11:23Speaker 04

  I love listening to your glorious eclectic mix of guests, some of whom I count amongst my own friends. Well, that said, I had come to think of you two as rather dear friends yourselves. But when listening to the latest Brandreth 1980 diary entry about Sooty at the Mayfair. Oh, horror! What was that, Giles? Sue? Wet? How dare you! Sooty turned that thing off. How many times? What? What? You'll show Giles who's wet next time you see him. Well, how are you going to do that then?

• 12:08Speaker 04

  Oh, pardon? You'll get him back with your water pistol. Yes, of course.

• 12:22Speaker 04

  Oh, no! Sweep's just kicked a football through the kitchen window. Oh, Lord, what is this place like? Oh, no! Now the smoke alarms go. Oh, I'm so sorry, Harriet and Giles. You see what I have to put up with? Oh, dear. Throw that cake out the window, please. Oh, well, perhaps one of you could read out the rest of my email. While I, um, while I sort this lot out, the rest of the email sort of puts the record straight for pandas. In the meantime, bye-bye, Giles and Harriet. Bye-bye.

• 13:06Speaker 02

  Oh, Harriet, that's beyond hilarious and charming and dazzling. What's she say in the rest of her email that she sent?

• 13:15Speaker 03

  Uh, I mean, I can't, I absolutely can't believe we've just put that on Rosebud. We're so lucky.

• 13:22Speaker 02

  We are really lucky.

• 13:23Speaker 03

  That's amazing.

• 13:24Speaker 02

  A full episode, it seems.

• 13:26Speaker 03

  You just heard Sweep and your face when you heard Sweep.

• 13:29Speaker 02

  I love hearing Sweep.

• 13:30Speaker 03

  Oh, wow. So in that voice note, Brenda says, or Sue says, "Read the rest of the email because I set the record straight for pandas." So I'm just going to read you the rest of the email. She says, "Fortunately for you, I realised you were reading from your 1980 diaries." Because in 1981, Sue was completely overhauled and morphed into a feisty and lovable character.

• 13:59Speaker 02

  Oh, so I got the old Sue.

• 14:02Speaker 03

  Yes. And she goes on, Brenda goes on to say, "That Sue was many little girls and boys' favourite character, in fact. She was capable of great comic moments at times, due to the wonderful scripts written by Matthew Corbett in the 80s and 90s. Matthew came to realise, the more dialogue and exposition he gave to Sue, the less he would have to learn, and she became in loco parentis to him, Sooty and Sweep, thereby winning the team a 1998 British Comedy Award."

• 14:37Speaker 02

  Oh, congratulations.

• 14:38Speaker 03

  The first ever awarded to a children's programme.

• 14:42Speaker 02

  That's fantastic.

• 14:42Speaker 03

  How amazing.

• 14:44Speaker 02

  But this is brilliant. So what she's explaining is she was still the voice of Sue in 1980.

• 14:48Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah.

• 14:48Speaker 02

  But they changed the personality. They reinvented Sue from 1981 onwards.

• 14:54Speaker 03

  And she says, yes, initially Sue was wet.

• 14:56Speaker 02

  Oh, good.

• 14:57Speaker 03

  And some say she sounded like she'd had one too many gins. Maybe, she says she's worked with, she's actually voiced Sue for 45 years. So actually, maybe she started in 1981. And 1980 was maybe a different person. We should check. I'm sure Brenda will be in touch to clarify that.

• 15:16Speaker 02

  How interesting. Yes, because 45 years would be.

• 15:18Speaker 03

  Is 1981.

• 15:20Speaker 02

  Exactly. So I'm listening to the old Sue. And that upset her. She now discovers. So, oh, fantastic.

• 15:26Speaker 03

  Good. So we're exonerated.

• 15:27Speaker 02

  We are exonerated, but I'm also thrilled. I mean, did you, was, did Sooty mean anything to you?

• 15:35Speaker 03

  I mean, I definitely watched Sooty, but I wouldn't have said it was my top favourite programme. But not because I didn't like it, it just wasn't, you know, I was into The Muppet Show. You know, you're just into different things, aren't you? Um, but, and there were lots of kids' shows I loved, but I definitely saw Sooty and Sweep. Yeah, yeah.

• 15:52Speaker 02

  Of course, when I began with Sooty and Sweep, it was with Harry Corbett. And Harry Corbett's original Sooty is now in my teddy bear collection.

• 16:01Speaker 03

  Wow.

• 16:01Speaker 02

  At Newby Hall near Ripon in North Yorkshire.

• 16:04Speaker 03

  Gosh.

• 16:05Speaker 02

  Yeah. So that's rather lovely, isn't it? Well, it's very exciting.

• 16:09Speaker 03

  And my main teddy bear was a panda. Just putting that out there for Sue. Yeah. So I am a big, big fat panda fan.

• 16:15Speaker 02

  Do you have a panda still?

• 16:16Speaker 03

  Uh, I do, somewhere. She's upstairs. Yeah, she's called Panzi.

• 16:20Speaker 02

  Would Panzi like to spend a season up in Yorkshire?

• 16:23Speaker 03

  Ooh.

• 16:24Speaker 02

  At the Brandreth Bear House.

• 16:25Speaker 03

  Probably.

• 16:26Speaker 02

  Alongside the original Fozzie Bear.

• 16:28Speaker 03

  Oh.

• 16:29Speaker 02

  Dame Judi Dench's bear.

• 16:31Speaker 03

  Wowza.

• 16:32Speaker 02

  Bears of the, you know, the, the oldest Paddington in the world.

• 16:35Speaker 03

  I mean, that's amazing.

• 16:36Speaker 02

  I think your panda, Panzi, should be up there.

• 16:40Speaker 03

  Ooh.

• 16:41Speaker 02

  Yeah, I think it's going to be a fun thing to do. Yay. Now, could we invite Brenda to join us for the Christmas party?

• 16:47Speaker 03

  Oh, that would be good. Then Sue could.

• 16:51Speaker 02

  Could she bring a?

• 16:51Speaker 03

  Read a Christmas thing or do a Christmas bit or sing a Christmas song. Oh, wow. We've already got a, um, we've got an, an ex bishop. I don't know what you're called. He told me what you're called when you're no longer a bishop. But you were always, once a bishop, always.

• 17:06Speaker 02

  He's not a de-frocked bishop, I know.

• 17:08Speaker 03

  No, no, no, no. He's just retired.

• 17:09Speaker 02

  Ah, fine, retired bishop.

• 17:10Speaker 03

  But once a bishop, always a bishop.

• 17:11Speaker 02

  I think you're always a bishop.

• 17:12Speaker 03

  He's still, he's still doing things all the time.

• 17:14Speaker 02

  He's still a bishop, but he's not, he hasn't got a, um.

• 17:16Speaker 03

  That's the thing. Yeah, he's got, there's a name for it.

• 17:19Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 17:19Speaker 03

  Um, sorry, Johnny, you're probably listening to this. Um, we've got Johnny, who listens a lot and is a bishop. And he said that he wants to do a Christmas blessing at the Christmas party.

• 17:32Speaker 02

  We'd love to.

• 17:33Speaker 03

  A bishop, from a bishop. That's pretty big.

• 17:36Speaker 02

  Look, there are lots of other podcasts out there, but we're the only one that has a resident bishop.

• 17:40Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 17:41Speaker 02

  Can I tell you?

• 17:41Speaker 03

  Who's going to give us a, do, say, grace or do a blessing or something.

• 17:46Speaker 02

  There'll be no need for grace. We provide our own grace. But to be blessed at Christmas by a proper bishop in, in full fig.

• 17:52Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 17:53Speaker 02

  You know, in, oh.

• 17:54Speaker 03

  Come off it, Giles.

• 17:55Speaker 02

  That's fantastic. So you're going to have a bishop at Christmas? You're going to have Sue at Christmas? This is a Christmas party you have got to be at. But actually, seriously, if you are a family member and you do want to come, send us the email at the usual address, but mark it Christmas party. And it can be you and a plus one, if you want a plus one.

• 18:10Speaker 03

  Yes, that is true. That's what you need to do. You need to send us an email. Yeah.

• 18:14Speaker 02

  Okay. So that's for family members. Now, back to business today. Fabulous, Brenda. Thank you for giving us Sue. I mean, wouldn't it be exclusive?

• 18:22Speaker 03

  It really is.

• 18:23Speaker 02

  We shouldn't be asking people for things because I'm never going to get around to reading my diaries. What was the episode when we said to people, oh, send us a poem? That was a mistake.

• 18:30Speaker 03

  Oh, so, yes, sorry.

• 18:33Speaker 02

  Because we've had so many poems.

• 18:34Speaker 03

  This is a long intro today. We thought we should acknowledge and read out a couple of the poems people sent in after we did the episode with Larry Lamb, which, if you heard it, it was a really brilliant episode. Larry had written a lot of poetry about his life story. It really is excellent.

• 18:52Speaker 02

  It's a remarkable episode because he tells the story of his life through poetry.

• 18:56Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 18:56Speaker 02

  And yet it works. It makes sense. And in fact, we're going to put some of the poems that he read, uh, linked by me onto YouTube, because a lot of our episodes are on YouTube already, so do check them out there. But Larry's is a little bit different, but we decided, because people love the poems so much, that we're sharing those.

• 19:13Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 19:13Speaker 02

  The first poem that's been sent in to us is by a female poet, so I think you should read it. And it comes from France. What do we know about this? What, what sort of, why did we ask people for poems and what poems did we ask for?

• 19:24Speaker 03

  Well, because Larry had written poems about his life, we said, you know, maybe you've written a poem about your life or about your memories. And we got a few lovely poems and so I just picked out a couple. This one is by someone called Zoe Grace Cousins, and I think she's British but lives in France. And, um, she gave me a bit of a backstory. So this is about her in the womb. It's imagining herself in the womb. And she said in her email that she found out when she was a child, because I think her mum told her quite a lot. It's awful what some mothers say. Her mother said that she hadn't wanted her. And actually, she'd made an effort to try to miscarry her.

• 20:06Speaker 03

  And that, you know, just by sheer grim determination, this baby had hung in there. Hooray, because now she's a person. And, um, but I think that had affected Zoe a bit. And so she's written this poem about herself in the womb, imagining her. And, um, yeah.

• 20:25Speaker 02

  So she's a person and a poet.

• 20:27Speaker 03

  She's a person and a poet, and she was a lovely baby in a womb and her mum had her and it was all lovely in the end.

• 20:32Speaker 02

  And I see the poem is called "Life Before Life."

• 20:34Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 20:35Speaker 02

  I love that title. Please, would you, Harriet, read us the poem?

• 20:38Speaker 03

  Okay. "In the womb is the water and sounds of movement. The soft texture against my skin, silken, spins a love of the prism within the cloth. My foot moves and I'm fascinated by the fear and the longing. The longing to be without fear and to stand without exception but with courage. A bubble of notes blown by my body, danced to in my spirit, waiting, waiting for my lungs to expand the refrain. I and those whose names exceed pronunciation nurture my organs and my eggs in the sure joy of foretelling of the beauteous results of reproduction.

• 21:23Speaker 03

  I'm so small in this place and yet all life and spirit stretches out from me. Against experience and yet with experience, I trust and so am born."

• 21:38Speaker 03

  Isn't that wonderful?

• 21:39Speaker 02

  And also, given what you've told us.

• 21:41Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 21:42Speaker 02

  That she'd been told by her mother that she didn't really want her.

• 21:46Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 21:47Speaker 02

  And had tried not to have her in a way. This is defiant.

• 21:51Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 21:52Speaker 02

  I love it. I trust. She believes in herself. I trust, and so am born. It's fantastic.

• 22:00Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 22:00Speaker 02

  Against experience and yet with experience. It's very interesting because sometimes you can't put a thought into a normal sentence.

• 22:10Speaker 03

  Hmm.

• 22:11Speaker 02

  Um, and sometimes, you know, expressing it a coherent sentence, it ends up sounding like a cliche or a truism. And so two or three words may seem elusive, but it's a good way of expressing things. Anyway, I love, I love that.

• 22:28Speaker 03

  Isn't that amazing?

• 22:29Speaker 02

  Well, we should send this to Alexander Armstrong.

• 22:31Speaker 03

  Oh, I know.

• 22:32Speaker 02

  Do listen to his episode because his first memory is being born.

• 22:34Speaker 03

  I know.

• 22:35Speaker 02

  And maybe, maybe he could write a poem about that.

• 22:39Speaker 03

  And actually, someone was telling me, there's a book that's just been written about people's memories from in the womb.

• 22:46Speaker 02

  Oh, really?

• 22:47Speaker 03

  So it is a phenomenon, people who believe they remember things in the womb. We should look into that one episode, maybe, and talk to an expert about it. Yeah.

• 22:57Speaker 02

  Great.

• 22:58Speaker 03

  Do you want to read the next poem, which is a bit more of a, just a sort of comedy poem?

• 23:02Speaker 02

  Oh, good. That's more my style. And also it's by a bloke, Liam.

• 23:06Speaker 03

  It's by a man, and he came to see us in Edinburgh.

• 23:08Speaker 02

  Oh, lovely, because he's based in Edinburgh, isn't he?

• 23:10Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 23:11Speaker 02

  That's good.

• 23:11Speaker 03

  And it's, it's about being mediocre.

• 23:14Speaker 02

  Oh, I like it.

• 23:14Speaker 03

  Well, exactly. Yeah. This is going to make us all feel better.

• 23:18Speaker 02

  Mediocre's fine. Mediocre's good. All's well that ends well. Everything's as it should. A fool wants accolades. Take pride in being middle. Don't be waitrose, don't be farm foods, be the centre aisle of Lidl. Take this poem, for example. It's functional at best, but at least I wrote it by myself. Yes, I failed my English test. Examples of half-baked success can be found on every channel. Love Island, star struggling to speak with plastic for tooth enamel. Why not write a glossy book about your favourite horsé? Or marry well, get a lawyer, then become a rich divorcee?

• 24:03Speaker 02

  Don't buy the hype, you must be great, or own an Aston Martin. Why pay a bucket load of cash for leather seats you fart in? Don't feel the need to be great, superb. Don't scream and shout. Most stars are mediocre. There's a lot of it about.

• 24:20Speaker 03

  Hmm.

• 24:21Speaker 02

  Isn't that clever?

• 24:22Speaker 03

  Isn't that fun?

• 24:23Speaker 02

  I think that's really good.

• 24:24Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 24:25Speaker 02

  I love it. Let's hear it for the mediocre people. Oh, I love that. Well done, Liam.

• 24:29Speaker 03

  The reason I picked it was I just thought anyone who gets the line, take pride in being middle, don't be waitrose, don't be farm foods, be the centre aisle of Lidl.

• 24:39Speaker 02

  It's very clever, isn't it?

• 24:39Speaker 03

  Brilliant.

• 24:40Speaker 02

  It is brilliant. It is brilliant.

• 24:42Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 24:43Speaker 02

  Absolutely. Oh, well, well done.

• 24:45Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 24:45Speaker 02

  Not little that we think you are in any way mediocre. We'd be grateful for advertising to support Rosebud. It's because we, we get waitrose, you know, waitrose have sponsored us.

• 24:54Speaker 03

  The central at Lidl is.

• 24:55Speaker 02

  Is where we'd like, is there for the taking.

• 24:58Speaker 03

  You can buy all sorts of things.

• 24:58Speaker 02

  Liam Dugan. The reason I didn't mention his name earlier is I wasn't sure it was Dugan. Dugan. D U G A N.

• 25:04Speaker 03

  So we haven't actually attributed the poem to you, Liam. So you're Liam from Edinburgh, and your surname is either Dugan or Dugan.

• 25:11Speaker 02

  Dugan.

• 25:12Speaker 03

  Dugan. D U G A N.

• 25:15Speaker 02

  Nothing mediocre about the name Liam Dugan, is it?

• 25:18Speaker 03

  No.

• 25:18Speaker 02

  That is a stylish name.

• 25:19Speaker 03

  I mean, I'm just struck by, as I am so often, and so are you, by the talent of the Rosebud family. We've got Sue, we've got poets, we've got a bishop, we've got also, we've got Ben Shepherd.

• 25:35Speaker 02

  We've got remarkable people listening to us.

• 25:37Speaker 03

  We really have. Hello, everyone. We love you.

• 25:39Speaker 02

  Thank you very much for being there.

• 25:41Speaker 03

  Can I ask you a question? Does someone ask me the other day? I, I mean, I think I know the answer. Does the king listen to Rosebud?

• 25:48Speaker 02

  I have to tell you the truth. I don't think the king does.

• 25:51Speaker 03

  Oh, boo. I always like to imagine him lying there with his crown on.

• 25:55Speaker 02

  Ah, I don't honestly know, but I do know, some years ago, when I was doing a Canal series with Sheila Hancock.

• 26:04Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 26:04Speaker 02

  That was rather lovely. Um, the Queen said to me, oh, I've been, I'm loving the series you're doing with Sheila Hancock.

• 26:10Speaker 03

  Wow, the Queen was watching it.

• 26:11Speaker 02

  And I, I've got, I've got him to watch.

• 26:13Speaker 03

  Ah.

• 26:14Speaker 02

  And then at a later occasion, I said to the King, I understand, sir, that you've been enjoying my Canal series. He looked at me with a totally blank face.

• 26:23Speaker 03

  Oh.

• 26:23Speaker 02

  And I realised she was just being sweet to me.

• 26:25Speaker 03

  Oh.

• 26:26Speaker 02

  I think she tried to encourage him.

• 26:28Speaker 03

  Right.

• 26:28Speaker 02

  To be honest, I know that he has almost no time for that sort of thing. He's not into television.

• 26:34Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 26:34Speaker 02

  I think he is into the radio a bit, but I don't know how much time they have. I do know he listens to Just a Minute, the radio show they do.

• 26:41Speaker 03

  Oh, good.

• 26:42Speaker 02

  He's an enthusiast for Just a Minute. Indeed, he told me that in the old days, when his sons were at home, he used to leave messages on their phones, on their answer phones, on their phone, in the manner of Just a Minute, you know, without hesitation, deviation or repetition.

• 26:57Speaker 03

  I'm sorry, listeners, but today you've had a voice note from Sue from City and Sweet, two brilliant poems and an amazing fact about the king of the country.

• 27:08Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 27:08Speaker 03

  I mean, blimey, just turn off the podcast now and go to bed. This is just gold dust.

• 27:13Speaker 02

  They will have turned off the podcast because they're probably not into name dropping.

• 27:17Speaker 03

  Oh, that was brilliant, Giles. That was so interesting. We haven't even started reading the diary.

• 27:22Speaker 02

  Is it time for the diary?

• 27:23Speaker 03

  No, just to keep chatting about all the amazing people that listen to Rosebud or don't.

• 27:27Speaker 02

  Well, we love you listening to us. Thank you very much for being there. And we're now going to go back to January nineteen eighty-one.

• 27:34Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 27:34Speaker 02

  Which is forty-five years ago.

• 27:36Speaker 03

  Hmm, when Sue became feisty and fun. Yeah.

• 27:39Speaker 02

  And I was, I think, oh gosh, I was already in my thirties. I had three small children. I'm living in Camden Hill Gardens, which is near Nottingham Gate Tube Station, and I'm working a bit in the theatre, a bit in television, a bit in radio. I've got a company that is creating books by celebrities that we are publishing.

• 28:00Speaker 03

  Hmm.

• 28:00Speaker 02

  And one of those books is by Kenneth Williams, who's become a friend of mine and who is featuring here.

• 28:06Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah.

• 28:07Speaker 02

  And one of our good friends is Noel Davis, who is, I think, one of the funniest people I've ever known and who was a casting director and had worked with me when I was putting on plays in Oxford.

• 28:18Speaker 03

  That's a very good praise, see, Giles. Thank you.

• 28:20Speaker 02

  Wednesday, the seventh of January nineteen eighty-one. Just in from dinner at John Schlesinger's. It was the rematch of our happy kitchen supper with John and Noel and Kenneth, except that tonight wasn't happy at all. It didn't work, partly because it was grander and less cosy, but chiefly because Kenneth was impossible. The problem, Kenneth was not the star attraction. Alan Bennett was also of the party, and he was so droll, so gently wicked, so comfortably amusing, that he quite stole the show. As the evening wore on, Kenneth got louder, queenier,

• 29:04Speaker 02

  ever more outrageous. John won't want to see him again. Pity.

• 29:10Speaker 03

  How interesting. Yeah.

• 29:13Speaker 02

  I do, we look forward to it so much. John Schlesinger was a very famous film director.

• 29:19Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 29:20Speaker 02

  And, um, had a lovely house in Kensington and had this very grand dinner party at which Alan Bennett, I think John Schlesinger was making a film, Alan Bennett had written the script, something like that. Anyway, he simply stole the show and Kenneth couldn't cope.

• 29:38Speaker 03

  And just remind me when, sort of how far through Kenneth's life is this? When did Kenneth die?

• 29:43Speaker 02

  Well, I mean, Kenneth was born in nineteen twenty-six.

• 29:46Speaker 03

  Oh, right.

• 29:47Speaker 02

  Uh, and, but he dies in nineteen eighty-eight, and we don't know whether he took his own life or whether it was an overdose. Um, but by this stage in his life, I think he was feeling that he'd painted himself into a corner professionally and that he'd become just an amusing voice, somebody who appeared on chat shows.

• 30:08Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 30:09Speaker 02

  And his real ability as an actor, as a versatile actor, was not being used properly. So there were frustrations.

• 30:16Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 30:17Speaker 02

  There were great pleasures and highs. I mean, he loved doing the books that we did together. Um, but he became increasingly impossible, particularly, I think, when drink had been taken.

• 30:26Speaker 03

  Ah, yeah.

• 30:27Speaker 02

  And it was sad because this was a rematch for a lovely supper that we'd had in our kitchen, I think that featured in Last Time's Diary or the time before.

• 30:42Speaker 00

  This episode is sponsored by Zocdoc. Have you been putting off a doctor's appointment or need a dentist and you don't know where to start? We've definitely been there and that's why we use Zocdoc. Actually, over the holidays, Michael had a dental emergency and seemingly every office was closed. But we hopped onto Zocdoc, found an in-network dentist, had great reviews, saw real-time appointments available, which was key, it was on New Year's Day, and booked an appointment in just minutes. It took so much of the stress out of the already stressful situation. Zocdoc makes it easy to search and compare over 250,000 local in-network providers across more than 200 specialties.

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• 33:12Speaker 02

  Wednesday, the 28th of January, 1981, New York. Oh, in London, they are breaking the mold. Shirley Williams, Roy Jenkins, David Owen and Bill Rogers are leaving the Labour Party to form a Council for Social Democracy, whatever that may be. And Rupert Murdoch is buying The Times. The Times, they are a-changing indeed. Here in New York, too. I'm writing this in the Rockefeller Plaza, where I'm having a celebratory coffee. This is what I like best in all the world. Having a cup of coffee on my own, surrounded by strangers in an interesting place. Hmm.

• 33:53Speaker 02

  I've just come from a meeting with Dan Perks at Associated Press News Features. I've agreed to write a weekly column on words and language to be syndicated across the United States to whichever newspapers are inclined to take it. If enough do, I shall make serious money. Art Buckwald is a rich man. Have you heard of him?

• 34:16Speaker 03

  No.

• 34:16Speaker 02

  He was an American columnist. He wrote a humorous column, which was syndicated in more than 550 newspapers.

• 34:22Speaker 03

  Wow.

• 34:23Speaker 02

  Uh, my own alphabet soup column appeared in about 50, but it did run successfully for several years.

• 34:30Speaker 03

  Hmm, that's fantastic, yeah.

• 34:32Speaker 02

  Last night, I went alone to Barnum at the St. James Theatre. Jim Dale is a joy and the show an inspiration. I think P.T. Barnum knew my great-great-grandfather, Dr. Brandreth, the Pill King. I must follow their entrepreneurial example. Ideas, energy, action, follow through. When I return to London, I'm going to raise my game. Tonight, I'm going to ain't misbehaving. Why are you chuckling?

• 35:04Speaker 03

  The hollow laughter was because Giles constantly says to me, "Harriet, we are going to raise our game. Next month, we're going to raise our game. In 2027, we're going to raise our game." And I realize now, it's 1981. He's still saying he's going to raise his game.

• 35:24Speaker 02

  And I've got to.

• 35:25Speaker 03

  How high can your game go, Giles? I mean, it's been pretty high for quite a long time.

• 35:30Speaker 02

  Funny enough, all this morning, coming in here, and you can cut this out if you like, all this morning, coming in here, I was saying, "I've got to raise my game. We've got to raise our game." And then I said to myself, "I mustn't say that to Harriet." I really, and I.

• 35:43Speaker 03

  Because it gives me the feeling that we're sort of in the doldrums.

• 35:46Speaker 02

  No, we're not in the doldrums, but we can always raise our game.

• 35:49Speaker 03

  Oh, God, it's exhausting.

• 35:51Speaker 02

  Always raise our game.

• 35:52Speaker 03

  Exhausting. I like just thinking our game's going really well and just sitting at the edge, watching the game and having a cup of tea.

• 35:58Speaker 02

  You're right.

• 35:59Speaker 03

  Or gin and tonic.

• 36:00Speaker 02

  I have to say, when I saw, I'd seen Barnum before, I think, in London with Michael Crawford. When I saw it in New York with Jim Dale, I just loved the show. I loved the songs from the show. And I was exhilarated by the greatness of the performance.

• 36:13Speaker 03

  Hmm.

• 36:14Speaker 02

  And because I knew, in fact, I do now know the detail of the proper friendship between P.T. Barnum and my great-great-grandfather.

• 36:21Speaker 03

  Wow.

• 36:21Speaker 02

  Uh, that made me feel, "Eeeeh, I've got to, I have got to raise my game." And I always feel that at the beginning of the year. I want to raise my game. We're going to go bigger, we're going to go better. You know, that's exciting.

• 36:31Speaker 03

  Yeah. It makes me feel sort of tired.

• 36:34Speaker 02

  I know, it's so funny. I know I'm ridiculous, listeners.

• 36:37Speaker 03

  No, it's brilliant, it's brilliant.

• 36:39Speaker 02

  Last night, this is quite funny. The other night, um, we, I was very excited because on YouTube, you can see if people are watching you and what the episodes are. And a few weeks ago, we hit 10 million views on YouTube. I thought, "Yeah, this is so exciting." So we did, we celebrated together, we had a biscuit together. And last night, we hit 11 million views.

• 37:02Speaker 03

  Wow.

• 37:02Speaker 02

  And I happened to be watching as it went from.

• 37:05Speaker 03

  Oh, really?

• 37:06Speaker 02

  Yeah, I actually saw the moment.

• 37:08Speaker 03

  You saw it tick over?

• 37:09Speaker 02

  And I, I rushed to the phone and sent a text to, I knew Harriet was out with a friend. And I said, "If only I'd know what table you were at and what restaurant, I'd have sent over some champagne." It was so exciting. Because I felt, "Ew, we are raising our game." So I like raising my game.

• 37:22Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 37:22Speaker 02

  Um, but there we are. Saturday, the 7th of February, 1981. I spent the day working, this'll make you laugh. This is the reality of my life, never mind raising the game. Saturday, 7th of February, 1981. I spent the day working on the Snap, Crackle and Pop games I'm creating for Kellogg's New Look Packs of Rice Krispies. "Mock not," I put in brackets, "someone's got to do it and it turns out to be me. The fruits of my endeavor will give pleasure to millions."

• 37:52Speaker 03

  Well, I think I was one of them.

• 37:54Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 37:54Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 37:55Speaker 02

  I created a series of games that went on the back of packets.

• 37:57Speaker 03

  I love.

• 37:58Speaker 02

  Those mini packets of Snap.

• 37:59Speaker 03

  Love anything on a cereal pack, yeah.

• 38:01Speaker 02

  I spent the evening in Row C of the stalls at the Wimbledon Theatre watching a theatrical farago called Big Bad Mouse. It's a farce by Philip King, in which Eric Sykes and Jimmy Edwards have been touring for years. They've done two long stints with it in the West End and taken it all over the world. It's a ropey piece made bearable by the way the two old rascals use it as a springboard for a anarchic improvisation. Essentially, they send up the play and play to the crowd. Jim even plays his trombone in it for no good reason. He also has pint pots strategically placed all over the stage so that he can take a swig whenever he needs one, which is often.

• 38:43Speaker 02

  Afterwards, in his dressing room, I noticed that he has a milkman's crate for his vodka, so he can carry six bottles around with him at the same time.

• 38:52Speaker 03

  My goodness.

• 38:53Speaker 02

  At the Italian restaurant where we went to eat, I sat next to him and watched the pulse in his temple throb as the waiter took an eternity to bring us the wine. I thought Jim would explode with desperation. Once the drink was with us, he was fine, almost mellow. He had a young man called Philip with him. As Barbara Windsor puts it so well, "Funny to think Jim's Tommy two ways, isn't it?"

• 39:20Speaker 03

  That expression again.

• 39:22Speaker 02

  Well, these are period diaries.

• 39:24Speaker 03

  Yep.

• 39:24Speaker 02

  We've got to accept that. Thursday, the 12th of February, 1981. The world is awash with alcohol. Lunch in Cambridge with Melvyn Bragg. Gosh. He is intelligent, smooth, charming, gracious. He drinks a bottle of red wine and he is still intelligent, smooth, charming, gracious. Went to see Irene Josefe, my agent, at St Thomas's Hospital. She's not well. The drip, drip, drip of gin is taking its toll. We'll soon be back at Muriel's, she said. The last time we were there, both Dan Farson and Francis Bacon fell off their stools. It's gone midnight.

• 40:07Speaker 02

  We're just in from Alex and Katie DeYoung's party in Harley Gardens. Alex drank so much that eventually he simply slid to the floor. When I went to the gaudy with him at New College, coming out of Hall after dinner, he fell forward and rolled down the long flight of stone steps from the top step to the bottom, sixty steps or more and steep. At the bottom, he got up and strode off across the quad as though nothing had happened.

• 40:35Speaker 03

  Gosh.

• 40:36Speaker 02

  It's amazing.

• 40:37Speaker 03

  Gosh, people did.

• 40:39Speaker 02

  They really did drink.

• 40:40Speaker 03

  Drink a lot. I mean, people do drink a lot in the UK, I think, even now. But, I mean, then, people, yeah, they'd

• 40:47Speaker 02

  Years later.

• 40:48Speaker 03

  Drink at lunch, drink at dinner.

• 40:49Speaker 02

  Years later, obviously, I got to know Melvyn Bragg better than this.

• 40:53Speaker 02

  He told me that he did go through a period, he would drink for three months and then stop drinking for three months.

• 40:57Speaker 03

  Oh, wow.

• 40:58Speaker 02

  So, you know, and look, he's still with us, so it doesn't seem to have done him any harm. And Alex DeYoung only died last year, so he kept going for a while, too.

• 41:08Speaker 03

  So what are you saying, Giles? Keep drinking, everyone.

• 41:12Speaker 02

  I'm saying that I sound a bit judgmental here.

• 41:14Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 41:14Speaker 02

  I am less judgmental now.

• 41:15Speaker 03

  I see, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, it's jolly good.

• 41:19Speaker 02

  Saturday, 14th of March, 1981. Michelle's birthday. Hayward Gallery for the Edward Hopper exhibition. Soothing. National Theatre for lunch. Not bad. 7:45pm, present laughter at the Vaudeville. It's not an easy play. A lot of wit, not much heart. Drink afterwards with Donald Sindon, who was fruity and brilliant, and Julian Fellows, who plays the young playwright Roland Maul. He was good, but not extraordinary. When I saw it with Nigel Patrick in the Gary Essentine part, Richard Briers played Roland Maul, and he was extraordinary, hilariously nervous and manic. I'd not seen Julian since we shared a bath in Wetherby Place.

• 42:03Speaker 02

  He's very jolly, and I like that. We had dinner at Langham's Brasserie, seventy-five pounds and five pence, including service. And think how shocked I was thirteen years ago when dinner at the Elizabeth came to five pounds.

• 42:18Speaker 03

  Yeah, you've come a long way, Giles.

• 42:21Speaker 02

  Donald Sindon didn't believe it, but it's true. On Monday, we went to the Haymarket to see Maggie Smith in Virginia, the Edna O'Brien play based on the writings of Virginia and Leonard Woolf. We sat in front of an American couple who were disappointed to find there were no songs. They had come to Virginia thinking it was a sequel to Oklahoma.

• 42:44Speaker 03

  Is that true?

• 42:47Speaker 03

  Oh, dear.

• 42:48Speaker 02

  Thursday, the 19th of March, 1981. I like leading a double life. I like the mixture of the serious and the slight. For example, this morning, I had coffee with John Wayne. John Wayne was a poet and a critic, not the

• 43:05Speaker 03

  And he wrote a novel, which I read.

• 43:07Speaker 02

  Ah.

• 43:08Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 43:08Speaker 02

  Ah, yeah. So it's not the American film star who played Cowboys?

• 43:12Speaker 03

  No, W A I N.

• 43:14Speaker 02

  That's it. And we talked about Tom Gunn and Philip Larkin. Then I had lunch with John Inman, and we talked about Pajama Tops and Molly Sudden. Tonight, we are going to the Quintavale's, where, no doubt, we shall talk of Catholicism and the ethics of reproduction. It will be earnest but interesting, and leavened, balanced and made bearable, by our glorious High Camp outing on Monday with Chris Biggins and Dougie Squires to see Rita Moreno at the Talk of the Town. I do prefer the company of people with better minds than mine, but I like all the frou-frou nonsense, too. Actually, what I think I like is the best of everything, whatever it is.

• 43:59Speaker 02

  Rita Moreno is an all-singing, all-dancing fag-hag, but she's an Oscar winner, too. She won an Oscar for a performance in West Side Story, I think.

• 44:09Speaker 03

  Oh, brilliant.

• 44:09Speaker 02

  She was sensational. Friday, the 3rd of April, 1981. In Washington DC, President Reagan, 70, has survived the attempt to shoot him. A bullet hit him in the lung, three inches from his heart. In hospital, as he was being given an anaesthetic, he said to the surgeons, "I hope you guys are Republicans." In London, Asians and skinheads are rioting in the streets of Southall. I'm sitting here, waiting for Simon and Stephanie to come for supper. I had lunch today at the National Playing Fields Association in Ovington Square. Josephine Sekim has moved there from Action Research and wants me to help with the fundraising. I said yes, for three reasons. One, she asked.

• 44:54Speaker 02

  Two, when I was a child, Ma always used to use the NPFA diary, so somehow, quite irrationally, I feel committed to the cause. Three, the Duke of Edinburgh, Prince Philip, is the president and apparently quite actively involved. Michelle says I might get to meet him, and I'd like that. Tomorrow, I'm going to Norwich, to Anglia, to record thirteen epilogues on the trot.

• 45:29Speaker 06

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• 46:33Speaker 01

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• 48:04Speaker 02

  Thursday, twenty-third April, nineteen eighty-one. Last night with Simon, we went to the Palladium to see Mister Jim Bailey, female impersonator, and Mike Yarwood, general impersonator. Both good, both skillful, both a bit soulless. We telephoned Mike later. We didn't go round. He's just a bit dull, that's all. Tonight, we went to Chelwood House, Gloucester Square, for supper with the porters. Leslie is the NPFA appeals chairman, thoroughly nice, diminutive, sixty, bumbly, affable. He's also the chairman of Tesco, but frankly, would he be, were he not married to the founder's

• 48:44Speaker 02

  daughter? I think not. He doesn't seem that bright, and he enjoys a drink, when a Shirley, daughter of Jack Cohen, is as sharp as a knife. Lady Cohen was on parade. She told me about the early days. Jack, Jacob, really did start with just one market stall in Hackney in nineteen nineteen. He used his D-Mob money to buy surplus Naffy stock and sell it at a profit. He was twenty-one. By the time he was forty, he had opened one hundred Tesco stores. How did he manage it? He was honest, and he wasn't greedy, and he gave his customers what they wanted before

• 49:24Speaker 02

  they knew they wanted it. And he never stopped working, never. Hard work, it's the only way. She looked towards Leslie and sighed a little.

• 49:35Speaker 03

  Wow, you're in there with the people that run Tesco. That is interesting.

• 49:40Speaker 02

  The chairman of Tesco and his wife, Shirley Porter, who became a controversial figure. She was on the

• 49:45Speaker 03

  I remember her name, yeah.

• 49:46Speaker 02

  The Greater London Council and was involved in some dealings that I think some people thought weren't reputable. And then she went over to live in Israel, where I think she died not long ago. I'm interested, I became, as you will see as the diaries go on, I got to know Leslie Porter better, and became extremely fond of him. And I think, I'm wrong here, I think he was a shrewder person than I perhaps realised at the time.

• 50:14Speaker 03

  Yeah, well, I mean, I think that goes without saying, because what an operation Tesco is.

• 50:19Speaker 02

  And he was, he was the chairman, but there's no doubt that his wife, Shirley Porter, was brilliant. She was the daughter of Jack Cohen, who founded Tesco, and she should have been running the business.

• 50:32Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 50:32Speaker 02

  But it ended up being run by various sons-in-law.

• 50:35Speaker 03

  Because they didn't think women could do that.

• 50:38Speaker 02

  Isn't that extraordinary?

• 50:39Speaker 03

  But this is, you know, Margaret Thatcher's Prime Minister, it seems.

• 50:42Speaker 02

  This is the beginning, well, this is the beginning of the Thatcher era, you know, it's only just begun. Yeah, and indeed, Shirley Porter was a huge admirer of Margaret Thatcher.

• 50:52Speaker 03

  Yeah, I'm sure. But, I mean, they did well, these sons-in-law did well to, you know, set up what is one of the biggest supermarkets chains in the world, so, you know.

• 51:02Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. But aren't I leading this extraordinary life?

• 51:04Speaker 03

  Yes, Charles.

• 51:05Speaker 02

  I'm meeting these amazing people.

• 51:06Speaker 03

  Amazing.

• 51:07Speaker 02

  Here I am, having drinks with the people who own Tesco. One minute, and the next minute, it seems to be, look, Wednesday twenty-ninth April nineteen eighty-one, we went to Liberace's gala night at the Palladium. He was wholly preposterous. He is not handsome, he is sixty, and looks like an outsized doll made up to look like Liberace. His piano playing is good, but not unique. His patter is amusing, but quite predictable. You remember that bank I cried all the way to? Well, I bought it. His costumes are sumptuous, but essentially gaudy. Only his jewellery feels authentic. It sparkles, it dazzles. He sparkles, he dazzles, non-stop, from the moment he's swept

• 51:49Speaker 02

  on in a diamond-encrusted limousine to the grand finale, when waltzing waters and indoor fireworks explode around him. Why does it work so well? Why is this man still the highest-paid entertainer in the world? Jack Tinker, who was the Daily Mail theatre critic, Jack Tinker was there with Biggins, of course, both squealing with delight, but they couldn't answer that question either. Had lunch with Patrick Moore at the Mykonos in Frith Street. He got through two bottles of Othello Red and gabbled away nineteen to the dozen about

• 52:29Speaker 02

  astronomy, music. He's composed a symphony for orchestra and xylophone, cricket and Mrs. Thatcher. Mrs. T hasn't gone far enough, Patrick. Genghis Khan is the man for him. I observed that whatever he says, he never smiles. "I'm glad you noticed," he said. "It's a policy of mine, never be seen smiling. If you do, the public don't take you seriously." He said that I must send Bennett, our boy, down to his house in Sussex one weekend. He will let him use his telescope.

• 53:04Speaker 03

  How weird. So Patrick Moore never smiled in public?

• 53:09Speaker 02

  And he really never did. In fact, I don't ever, I don't remember seeing him smiling at all, but certainly when a camera hovered in view, he made his face look very grim and serious.

• 53:17Speaker 03

  Gosh, I might start employing that strategy.

• 53:21Speaker 02

  Oh, no. I love you when you smile. Your smile brings you to life. I try to smile all the time.

• 53:27Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 53:27Speaker 02

  Because I think my face looks very degubberish when I don't smile.

• 53:29Speaker 03

  Oh, no, no, I mean, it's crazy to not want to smile. It shows you how times have changed. That's hilarious.

• 53:34Speaker 02

  He was quite a character.

• 53:36Speaker 03

  Yeah, clearly.

• 53:36Speaker 02

  But he was full of, I tell you, he was full of life and energy and enthusiasm and intelligence and knowledge, you know, fantastic. Tuesday, fifth May, nineteen eighty-one. Jermaine Greer arrived at the office at two-thirty as planned. She was wild and strident and determined to shock. The book we are doing with her is about fertility, but for some reason, Jermaine is determined that the cover should feature a close-up photograph of female pubic hair, preferably her own. Or, if we think it'll be too grey, grizzled and unappealing, then she will consider a model's pubes, a fine, full bush, something you can grab hold of.

• 54:21Speaker 03

  Crumb. Sorry, listeners. We should put a trigger warning before that paragraph.

• 54:28Speaker 02

  Tonight, we went to the Duchess of Malfi at the Roundhouse. When it was over, Michelle said, "Never again. I have been to my last Jacobean revenge tragedy. The Duchess of Malfi, the White Devil, I don't need them, I don't like them, I don't want them no more. That's that. Thank you very much."

• 54:48Speaker 03

  Well done, Michelle.

• 54:49Speaker 02

  I know what she means. Thursday, the seventh of May, nineteen eighty-one. Went to the Poetry Society in Earl's Court for the evening to celebrate Every Man's Book of Nonsense and Every Man's Book of English Verse. The idea was an hour of drinks followed by an hour of readings to be introduced by me. During the drinks, I was stuck in a corner with John Heath Stubbs. John Heath Stubbs was an English poet, and a wonderful poet, actually, and he was afflicted by blindness, I think, from the nineteen sixties. But I couldn't concentrate on anything he was saying, because our star attraction, Spike Milligan, my responsibility, I said I'd get him there, had phoned at the last minute, say he couldn't make it after all.

• 55:32Speaker 02

  The man is impossible, self-indulgent, and not that funny, even at his funniest. Anyway, I rejigged the running order, and at around eight o'clock, the readings began. Truth to tell, it was all a bit flat, until we got to what was to have been the Spike Milligan moment, at which point, there was a sudden banging from a cupboard in the corner. Yes, you guessed. The cupboard burst open and Spike appeared. He had been there all along. He was very funny, and I forgave him everything. So isn't that bizarre? He'd phoned to say he wasn't coming, then he came, early, locked himself in the cupboard for this surprise entry, after about two hours.

• 56:16Speaker 03

  Brilliant.

• 56:17Speaker 02

  Brilliant.

• 56:17Speaker 03

  Anyone that locks himself in a cupboard is a hero in my eyes.

• 56:21Speaker 02

  Yeah. Tuesday, twelfth May, nineteen eighty-one. At five PM, I took Maurice Sartre and Martin Sorrell round the Playhouse Theatre. My scheme remains the same. By night, I run the theatre. By day, they run the Conference Centre. But our problem is that the mystery owner won't come out of hiding to engage in a useful conversation. The agent says he wants four hundred thousand pounds and no questions asked. But Maurice and Martin have plenty of questions, sensible ones. They are shrewd guys, I like them very much, and I like their style, clear, direct, dynamic. We shall see. At eight PM, we went to Katz at the New London Theatre. It's done wonderfully well,

• 57:06Speaker 02

  but it left me cold. There's no story and no sense of engagement. Bonnie Langford gives her all and some, Wayne Sleep, Elaine Page, they all do, but essentially, it's simply T. S. Eliot's verses set to music and stage, Combrion. Fine, but so what? My problem is probably that I know the poems too well. Andrew Lloyd Webber's Macavity isn't my Macavity, and I'm not sure that Eliot's verses as lyrics really work. The best song by Longway is Memory, and it's written by Trevor Nunn.

• 57:45Speaker 03

  Wow, Charles, you're quite outspoken there about a few people, aren't you?

• 57:51Speaker 02

  I am.

• 57:53Speaker 03

  Well, that's diaries for you.

• 57:54Speaker 02

  That's, and funnily enough, I don't think I'm like that now in my diary.

• 57:59Speaker 03

  That's nice, yeah.

• 58:00Speaker 02

  I don't think I am. I think nowadays, I'm just recording what happens.

• 58:04Speaker 03

  Oh, you don't pass comment.

• 58:05Speaker 02

  And let the incidents and the remarks that people make speak for themselves. Interesting. You know, I'm forming judgements here. What did I know of the world? Maybe just as one gets older, one becomes less judgmental.

• 58:20Speaker 03

  I think you probably are more forgiving, because you realise, oh, we're all a load of silly old, silly old billys, aren't we?

• 58:26Speaker 02

  We are all a load of

• 58:27Speaker 03

  Who am I to, yeah.

• 58:30Speaker 02

  And I think, I don't know, I don't know, what do I think of myself, then? All that striving. Um, what was the poem? Who wrote the poem? Speaking of poems, we began with poems. Why must all that aching go to making dust?

• 58:46Speaker 03

  Gosh, that's good, Giles. I don't know that poem.

• 58:49Speaker 02

  I gotta check it out, see who it was. It's a good poem, isn't it?

• 58:52Speaker 03

  Very good.

• 58:53Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 58:53Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 58:54Speaker 02

  So there you go.

• 58:55Speaker 03

  I mean, if you think like that, you really never get out of bed in the morning.

• 58:58Speaker 02

  That's the truth. So I think the Lady Cohen, the wife of the man who founded Tesco, wait for it, she said it really was, he just had one stall in Hackney.

• 59:08Speaker 03

  Amazing.

• 59:09Speaker 02

  In nineteen nineteen. And look, it's only a hundred years later, this huge Tesco empire. He, in his lifetime, before he was forty, he had a hundred Tesco stalls.

• 59:18Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 59:18Speaker 02

  How did he do it? Work.

• 59:20Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 59:20Speaker 02

  Work. If you stay in bed, nothing happens.

• 59:23Speaker 03

  That's true.

• 59:24Speaker 02

  You gotta get up, you gotta show up.

• 59:25Speaker 03

  You do have a lovely rest.

• 59:27Speaker 02

  That's true.

• 59:28Speaker 03

  And nice pyjamas.

• 59:29Speaker 02

  I hope you've been having a lovely rest in nice pyjamas while listening to, well, probably can't afford nice pyjamas if you're supposed to have a lovely rest. But if you work hard, you can afford any pyjamas you want. Though, funny enough, in my view, silk pyjamas are greatly overrated.

• 59:43Speaker 03

  They're a bit chilly when you put them on, aren't they?

• 59:45Speaker 02

  And also they slide around the bed. It's like silk sheets. Who wants silk sheets?

• 59:48Speaker 03

  Well, oh, silk sheets, no thanks.

• 59:50Speaker 02

  No, thanks.

• 59:50Speaker 03

  But my friend's just had an operation and she was saying, actually, I think they're satin, her pyjamas. They're rather good because it means when she turns over, it hurts, but they help her to turn over in a slippery, quick way and not go, ow. Yeah.

• 1:00:06Speaker 02

  Well, there we are. Enough.

• 1:00:07Speaker 03

  They've got their uses.

• 1:00:08Speaker 02

  Enough pyjama talk. Um, thank you very much for sharing our diaries. Our particular thanks to Sue for her amazing contribution.

• 1:00:15Speaker 03

  Oh, Sue slash Brenda. We really honestly can't tell you how delighted we are by that and thrilled. And, um, and I'm sure everyone listening was absolutely delighted about it.

• 1:00:27Speaker 02

  So let's see if she can come to the Christmas party. If you want to come to the Christmas party, go to patreon.com forward slash Rosebud.

• 1:00:33Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:00:33Speaker 02

  And sign up to be a family member there. We will be back for free for love on Friday.

• 1:00:40Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:00:40Speaker 02

  We've got an exciting guest this week. Every week.

• 1:00:42Speaker 03

  We've got Gary Kemp from Spandau Ballet.

• 1:00:44Speaker 02

  Are we revealing who we've got? Why not?

• 1:00:45Speaker 03

  Another musician. Oh, do we not do that?

• 1:00:47Speaker 02

  Sometimes we can. Why not? No, I think it's good.

• 1:00:50Speaker 03

  Gary Kemp. In fact, um, on Rosebud Reflections, our Facebook group, someone the other week said, why don't we have Gary Kemp on Rosebud and?

• 1:00:59Speaker 02

  You just said it.

• 1:01:00Speaker 03

  As if by magic.

• 1:01:01Speaker 02

  We manifest them.

• 1:01:02Speaker 03

  He's going to be our guest.

• 1:01:02Speaker 02

  We've had some interest. Nobody has done better than Bill Wyman, who claimed to be the world's oldest working rock star.

• 1:01:10Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:01:10Speaker 02

  But if you know an older one, let us know and we'll have them on Rosebud.

• 1:01:13Speaker 03

  We will, yeah.

• 1:01:14Speaker 02

  Also, didn't people love Francis Rossi?

• 1:01:17Speaker 03

  Oh, they did. Yeah.

• 1:01:18Speaker 02

  Wasn't that interesting?

• 1:01:19Speaker 03

  I have to say, I did. I thought he was very charming.

• 1:01:21Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:01:21Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:01:22Speaker 02

  So I think I quite like these old rock stars.

• 1:01:24Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:01:25Speaker 02

  Yeah. Anyway, but we have young people coming up too.

• 1:01:27Speaker 03

  Yeah. If you're an old rock star listening to this, you know, we've got Ben Shepherd, the king, possibly not, Sue from City and Sweep, the bishop, if you're an old rock star.

• 1:01:37Speaker 02

  That's fantastic.

• 1:01:38Speaker 03

  Let us know.

• 1:01:39Speaker 02

  We've got a shepherd, a panda, and who else was it? Who was listening to us?

• 1:01:45Speaker 03

  A bishop.

• 1:01:46Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:01:46Speaker 03

  And the king.

• 1:01:47Speaker 02

  We've got, no, we haven't got the king. We've got a bishop, a shepherd and a panda listening to Rosebud. Look, this is the place to be. Thanks so much for your company. Thanks for enjoying the diaries if you did. And we'll be with you with Gary Kemp from Spandau Ballet on Friday and next Tuesday. Actually, we've got another interesting guest, haven't we?

• 1:02:05Speaker 03

  Hmm.

• 1:02:06Speaker 02

  Yeah. Anyway, I'm Giles Brownruth. This is Harriet Jane. Thank you for your company. Cue the music.

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