Authors: Marion Appleby
Are We Live? (4 page)
In 1977, Bob Eubanks, the host of
The Newlywed Game
, posed a slightly risqué question to a young couple that garnered an even more risqué response.
Bob:
Here’s the last of our five-point questions: Tell me where, specifically, is the
weirdest
place that you have ever gotten the urge to make whoopee [have sex]. Olga?
Olga:
[Giggling.] In the ass?
[Slight pause, whole studio erupts in laughter.]
Bob:
No, no, no. What I’m talking about is the weirdest
location
.
Olga:
The weirdest location. I don’t know.
Bob:
Give me an answer, please. He [Olga’s husband] said it was in the car, on the freeway.
Olga:
[Cringes silently.]
Celebrity chef Ainsley Harriott trades in on his West Indian heritage.
Ainsley Harriott:
Those Glamorgan sausages are a little bit on the black side, are they not? You’re prepared to try it, are you?
Contestant:
Yup, yup.
Ainsley Harriott:
Ooh, that’s always good, I like a girl who likes a black sausage [raises eyebrow at camera].
Can’t Cook, Won’t Cook
, BBC One
It’s hard to maintain your decorum when faced with a nasty honk – especially if you’re live on television. Just thank the Lord smell-o-vision hasn’t been invented yet!
‘[Television is] an invention that permits you to be entertained in your living room by people you wouldn’t have in your home.’
VETERAN
BROADCASTER
DAVID
FROST
Pregnant newscaster Kate Silverton nearly vomited during an interview with British comedian David Walliams during an interview on the BBC’s News 24 channel in 2011.
Presented with Walliams’s scratch-and-sniff booklet, Silverton took a good whiff of a panel that was meant to smell like ‘two pairs of moldy socks, one dirty nappy, three rancid tins of tuna, some rotting carpet, an old cabbage and a small pile of cat poo’. While a graphic of the offending page was shown on screen, Silverton could be heard retching very loudly, exclaiming, ‘Oh, that’s exactly what I thought it would smell like!’
Californian weatherman Aaron Perlman felt the need to explain to viewers why he was unable to deliver the weather bulletin without giggling. Welcoming back the audience after the commercial break, Perlman quickly lost it, saying, ‘In all my years as a weatherman I have never come out of a commercial break laughing so hard. Sorry.’ But his colleagues on the news desk wouldn’t rest until he revealed exactly why he was laughing. ‘Aaron had a bodily function error just after the break,’ said one co-anchor. ‘Let’s just say the winds picked up pretty strong in here …I think you know what we mean.’
Perlman attempted to seize back control by continuing to deliver the bulletin, with, ‘The winds coming out of the south are bringing cloudy skies for the rest of the day.’ His co-host quipped, ‘The winds did come out of the south.’ Exasperated and close to collapse, Perlman eventually came clean, ‘Don’t tell me that you guys don’t fart!’
The myths of live broadcast debunked
‘Ambush’, the live episode of popular US medical drama
ER
, was thought to show George Clooney picking his nose.
However, although the episode was performed live twice (for the benefit of east- and west-coast US audiences), the only mistakes made included one actor losing his weapon and another actor dropping his pen. Clooney wasn’t even in it!
Chelsea Johnson gave more than she bargained for when she auditioned for
Canadian Idol
. After composing herself in front of the judges, ready to belt out her song, poor Chelsea belted out instead a languorous fart. ‘I totally just farted!’ exclaimed the stricken contestant.
Never work with animals. Especially on live TV. There’s no predicting what they might do.
In 2012, at the prestigious UK annual dog competition Crufts, a dog, who just happened to be making excellent time on his run, stopped to take a poo. The whole thing was caught on camera, and the dog was immediately disqualified.
California’s KMAX-TV anchor Mark Allen got more than he bargained for when he reported live from the Dixon May Fair in 2008. As he started to deliver his entertainment report, the poor presenter didn’t realize that one of the two cows standing directly behind him had decided to take a lengthy poo. ‘What is your secret?’ Allen asked the cow. ‘I’ve been doing [the] South Beach [diet] and I haven’t had that kind of action for weeks!’
‘Television is more interesting than people. If it were not, we should have people standing in the corners of our rooms.’
ALAN
COREN
Reporting on a dog-shooting incident in Toledo, ABC news reporter Tony Geftos was cradling a 3-foot-long alligator – also found at the scene – in his arms when the miscreant reptile decided to take a leak. The urine could be seen trickling down poor Geftos’s arm, as he ably continued with his report.
