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Private Notes
Lee & Herring explode from two wooden crates and onto BBC2 declaring their intentions to provide things for idle hands to do, after they've finished performing the devil's work, and Rich is overawed at having met Jeremy Paxman off of the telly. Simon Quinlank starts as he means to go on by providing this week's hobby of "Ringing Norris McWhirter At Three In The Morning & Asking Him What The Biggest Leaf In The World Is".
He is deranged.
Stew tells the audience that he has been labeled obsessive & dysfunctional for keeping all his records & possessions in alphabetical order, he has a detailed list of everyone who's said this about him. The celebrated Lee & Herring "Gnat's Chuff" joke is brought to television, as Richard "confuses the art of simile" once again.
Frustrated at his inability to date actual women, and just strings of meaningless gnats, Rich heads off to a dating agency where he is partnered off with Alan Stevens (played by John Thompson) and enjoys a night out quoting Monty Python, playing video games& drinking.
Peter Baynham then pops up as "Peter" to share his recipes from his & brother Charlie's cook book "One is Quite Lonely Actually" - based on Delia Smith's "One Is Fun". First up is Frozen Chicken Lollies, for which you'll need some frozen chicken breast - and a fork.
He also tells us of his thoughts on easy time travel, and how he has fun with words - imagining the name of removal firm "Renta-Crates" is actually an old Greek philosopher. Pete closes by demonstrating his recipe for mouth trifle.
The fruits of your labour are shown now, as Rich & Stew unveil the Gall-Ery - a collection of images brought together by asking listeners to their radio show to send in anything they fancy. This week, the featured pieces of work are Stew's mutilated football stickers, TV Chef Michael Barry, his curmudgeonly face & some food he's prepared, a photo Stew stole off the wall of the Red Lodge Transport Cafe in Norwich of a singing old man, a hilari
Rich & Stew burst out of their crates and into the second episode of their new BBC2 comedy show. Or at least, that's what's supposed to happen. In fact, Rich's box has been confused for a big wooden crate full of crockery.
This initial mistake now rectified, Rich joins Stew onstage, and instantly recognizes him as "Stewart Lee, off of the telly!". Stew points out that Rich has seen him in his house every day for the last nine years, and that Rich too is now on the telly, but this doesn't deter his overawed enthusiasm
Rich then proudly displays a cutting from the previous week's Radio Times, showing a picture of the two of them, and announces how his mother - a teacher at Blackfield Middle School in Somerset - had held it up to her class to impressed reactions. More Somerset baiting from Stew ensues, as he points out that the children would have been impressed with anything that Rich's mum showed them, because they are - after all - from Somerset.
Peter tells us that he's found a new stain, and Rich & Stew reveal that even top TV celebrities need hobbies, going on to tell the viewing public of Bill Oddie's secret love of spying on birds, and his perversions that come hand in hand with it - thus bringing a new meaning to the phrase "bird-fancying".
Up next is a brief documentary on the phenomenon of "Urban Man", showing how some men live on the streets in nothing but their pants.
Underlining how these creatures may provide a charming reminder of the natural world to city dwellers, but to the country population they are little more than pests. A "blipvert" is screened here offering the urban men's pants to any viewers desperate enough to request them. People actually wrote in.
Back to the Studio now, and Stew brings the first of his diatribes against culture thief Patrick Marber to the fore - which probably made little sense at the time to a large percent of the audience - as he recounts a night circling his buff metallic 1973 Hillman Avenger around Londo
This week, the crates don't house Stew & Rich, they hold Stew & the gimp from Pulp Fiction.
The gimp escapes & is chased before the mistake is rectified & Rich is with us. They kick off proceedings with a letter of complaint from Mrs J Wentall in regards to last week's Jesus parable and their dealings with religion in general. Mrs Wentall tells Rich & Stew that they display a "woeful ignorance of true christian belief, I wonder if you'd dare to broadcast something in the same vein, but targeting a travesty of the islamic faith.
Stew points out that although they may be atheists, they are not stupid and like the use of their hands, and the ability to breathe.
They also had letters of complaint about Stew's Somerset-bashing - this inevitably leads to more abuse of Rich's county folk and into a sketch involving "Ian & Jenny" moving into their new home & being greeted in slightly worrying detail by their new neighbours on Ringfield Road.
High surveillance ruins their life in one short afternoon as their overbearing neighbours reveal the minute detail of their life & show hidden camera footage of a marriage-wrecking affair.
On returning to the Studio, Stew shows the audience his Wixney Junior School photo (which later made it into the Fist Of Fun book) and Rich seems disappointed that his childhood friend Steve Cheek doesn't want to go down to Cheddar Gorge & drink cider with him whenever he rings him up.
Reluctantly, Stew agrees to go cider drinking with him after the show, prompting an infantile Wurzels impression from Rich, while Stew points out that sooner or later you will outgrow your friends. This offends Richard, and links into the first "Captain Oates" sketch, Rich then goes on to complain that his flat has become overrun by mice in the preceding week, and points out the dilemma he's in as a result of being a vegetarian (like Morrissey & Hitler) and therefore unable to condone the murder of mice.
A "Pied Piper" parody explains what he did t
This week, Rich's crate houses a French Richard Herring tribute comedian - leading to more crate-related confusion. As the error is rectified, Richard welcomes viewers to the show that Somerset's "Weston Daily Press'" TV reviewer Chris Rundell described as "not at all funny".
Mr Rundell has stated in his review that "television demands a conscious effort to sit down & concentrate on the images and sounds on the screen." leading Stew to believe that the review was less a critique of their show, more a thesis on the premise of television in general.
Whereas Rich is reveling in his newfound fame, Stew apparently is not enjoying it, describing all their audience as obsessive freaks, pointing out one audience member in particular. Rich is hurt. It is his dad. Initially, there is some confusion with an Aardvark-faced man, but it's soon apparent that Rich's dad is in fact, "The amazing pickled man of Somerset". Being a collection of organs in a jar.
Moving on to a pre-recorded sketch, we meet Pestilence - the milkman of the apocalypse.
Tired of waiting for Armageddon, Pestilence has taken up a milk round, much to the chagrin of the other horsemen. Amongst other things, it makes them look like idiots when they go out together. Famine, Death & War on horseback make Pestilence look oddly out of place on his milkfloat.
Returning to the Studio, Stew tells us that this week he's been filling in his organ donor card.
He suggests the audience can have a bit of a laugh with their donor cards, by putting the name of someone you hate in the "In the event of my death please contact" field.
Stew has chosen the Cornish playwright & puppeteer, Patrick Marber as his contact. In the image pictured right, you can see a blipvert added to warn viewers who may be tempted to copy Stew that "Stewart Lee is a Twat". Click the image to your right for the full caption.
Stew points out that Rich is getting a little overweight - Rich defends this accusation using the age old "b
This week's "crate gag" involves Lee & Herring's crates being mistakenly placed in the Grandstand Studio. The error rectified, the duo are returned to the rightful studio and the show begins.
When asked what he'd been up to this week, Rich recounts the storyline of the movie "Disclosure", before Stew points out that he's confused his life with the events of a film.
A nice link to the storyline from the Harrison Ford film, "Witness", that of the peaceful & gentle religious cult, the amish, who had forsworn the use of all modern 20th century inventions in favour of a simpler life.
This leads to a pre-recorded insert that tells of the Shrewsbury-based anti-modern community, "The Conkies", named after Ian Conkie - their founder. They have eschewed any invention that came after the 6th of December 1983. Their pastimes involve playing old Atari video games, and the staples of their diet include toasted sandwiches and Soda Stream drinks. Stew does try his best to point out the lunacy of their community, but they're not listening.
They seem to like living their bizarre lie.
Returning to the Studio sees more of Peter's lifestyle hints.
After showing off his new pants, Peter suggests simulating going to an open-air rock concert by going to the High Road & looking at the drunk old lady who dances around singing "Eye Of The Tiger" outside the Abbey National.
You can also join in the fun of the National Lottery for no expense, by getting a form and filling it in as the numbers are called out on the television, and imagining what it would have been like if you'd filled them in an hour previously & won.
An alternative is "Lottery Scratch". Scratch yourself six times in different places, and if three or more of the scratches bleed, you win an extra scratch.
He closes his segment with a recipe for "Easy Pasta". Simply put some pasta in your mouth until the saliva makes it go soft, and then serve. Hideous.
Rich comes over and shows Peter some of the fan-mail he
After pop teenagers Ant & Dec burst from Rich & Stew's crates & are chased off set by BBC workmen, Lee & Herring reclaim their show for the last episode in the series.
This means, as Rich takes delight in telling us, that they've been allowed to bring in games. Rich has brought in a "The Sweeney" game and the playing cards that his french exchange partner got him. Stew, on the other hand, has brought in five dolls that represent all the people that have lied to him or about him in the entertainment industry throughout the last five years. And some skewers.
Rich is happily sporting a new badge this week, which reads, "I'm proud to come from God's own county of Somerset". It had been sent in by viewer Simon Rudd in protest against Stew's constant ridicule of the county. However, this only serves to provoke yet more scorn from Stew, as he points out that the pen used to create that badge, must have been the same quill pen that the people of Somerset use to tickle the demons out of the mad folk.
The next sketch up is pillaged from Rich & Stew's work on Lionel Nimrod's Inexplicable World and features the warring factions of Cubs & Scouts. The goodness of the polite young cubs is countered by the sheer vileness of the Scouts, the chopper riding, fag smoking, woodpecker cider drinking, bumfluff covered scourge of the Cubs. Thus keeping balance in the cosmos.
Returning to the Studio, Rich mentions how being on the telly has been great at helping him get back in touch with long-lost friends, and after a brief mention of Mike "Devon" Cosgrave (actually a former "Seven Raymond"), Rich & Stew welcome to the Studio "The Girl Who Smelt Of Spam" from his school.
Referring to her throughout the interview as "The Girl Who Smelt Of Spam", it soon becomes apparent that the only reason Rich has got her on the show is to torment her in exactly the same way he did twenty years previously. His childish taunts reduce "The Girl Who Smelt Of Spam" to tears as she tells of her a
