Can't Stand Up for Sitting Down (18 page)

The
elderly seem ever more vulnerable these days too, to what is called ‘elder
abuse’, and so I have done the odd benefit, radio appeals and had my gob
plastered over mail-outs. It takes such a relatively short amount of time so I
can’t understand why all performers and comics don’t do it, although to be fair
to them, the vast majority do.

The
Donna Louise Trust runs a hospice for children outside Stoke. I have visited on
a couple of occasions and three times have done a benefit at the Victoria Hall
in Stoke. On these occasions, Nick Hancock, David Baddiel, Andy Robinson and I
have done a show in which Andy compered, Nick interviewed Dave, and I finished
the night off with stand-up. God, am I sounding ‘holier than thou’ enough yet?
I don’t mean to, but it is a risk even talking about charity coming across like
you think you’re Mother Blinking Teresa. So I’ll keep the altruistic
trumpet-blowing to a minimum.

Comic Relief

Comic Relief is a charity
I’ve been involved with over the years. My initial contact with them was when I
made a brief appearance on
Comic Relief
night in the early nineties, in
a queue of people lining up to kiss Dawn French.

One
fateful year when I must have been slightly pissed I agreed that I would run
the London Marathon to raise money for Comic Relief. It wasn’t as though I had
decided that from a starting-point of no exercise at all, and would suddenly
rise up off the settee and leg it for twenty-six miles. I had already been
running for a bit, having been emotionally blackmailed into it by a couple of
friends. We went to a group run by another friend who is a personal trainer.
Having done no running whatsoever before and not exactly being in the tip-top
bracket of fitness, I was a little worried that I’d run a few steps and drop
dead. We started by running round some school playing-fields, and in order to
kick it off without fatalities we were advised to walk twenty steps, run twenty
walk twenty etc. Even that was a shock to my system and after a couple of
minutes of doing that, I honestly thought my lungs were bleeding. For some
reason though, I stuck at it and I did notice after several weeks that it was
getting easier.

Finally
I was able to run without stopping which was a bit of an advance. As the weeks
went on, we upped our running distances so that on occasion I did four or five
miles at a time. And it was at this point that I was called by Comic Relief to
ask if I could do the London Marathon. Foolishly I agreed. There then ensued
six months of training, which was bloody hard work. Each month I added on a few
extra miles. The main problem was it took so bloody long. I’m sure you can
imagine I’m not the fastest runner in the country, so each Sunday morning was
allocated for a progressively longer run.

Eventually
with the Marathon looming, I managed to persuade my friend Sam to come and do a
couple of long runs with me … round the perimeter of Richmond Park twice (a
mere fifteen miles). God, it was fucking awful. We arrived on two occasions at
seven o’clock in the morning in March (yes, bloody freezing) and parked the car
in a car park from which we set off ‘running’ which was more, in my case, of a
wheezing shuffle. Rather demoralisingly the first mile or so was uphill and I
felt ready to cave in after that. But run it we did after a fashion, even
though it took about four hours. At the end of the first run I couldn’t even
feel my legs, which morphed into pillars of concrete. Also, on the way a few
people stopped me to say hello and have a chat. Those who stopped me during the
last three miles or so probably got short shrift as I was fairly convinced by
then that I would never walk again.

Anyway
having done the crippling fifteen miles twice, I was pretty sure that adding an
extra eleven miles would, at the very least, result in my legs dropping off and
wondered if I was ever going to make it. I was never to be tested, however,
because about a week before the London Marathon I began to feel really grim in
a sorethroaty, headachy hurty-legs kind of way I thought it would pass in a
couple of days, but it didn’t, so I shuffled along to the doc who told me I
would be mad to try and run the Marathon. Secretly I was relieved because I
couldn’t envisage making it round the whole course and it’s SO public. I may
have another bash in the future, but who knows?

Other Comic Relief
projects have been slightly easier on my heart and lungs. When my second
daughter was a few months old, I was asked to do
Fame Academy
for Comic
Relief. This was a programme in which various celebs had a singing competition
and each day one of us was voted out by the public. It involved going and
staying in a huge posh house in Highgate for the duration of the contest. I did
not want to stay away from home so said I couldn’t do it, but eventually was
given a special dispensation to go home every day, which suited me as I’m not
very good at that dormitory thing with people I don’t know.

On the
show were nine of us: Fearne Cotton, Kwame Kwei-Armah, Ulrika Jonsson, John
Thomson, Paul Ross, Doon Mackichan, Ruby Wax, Will Mellor and me.

Before
the show started we were asked which songs we wanted to do. I think we had to
do about ten. Well, I thought to myself, it’s a comedy show so let’s go for it.
I thought I’d do ‘Psychokiller’ by Talking Heads for starters and maybe a song
from a kids’ programme called
Bear in the Big Blue House
which my
daughters loved. Sadly I was prevented because there was a song-list we had to
choose from, with a fair bit of middle-of-the-road stuff on it. So I picked
Dusty Springfield among other things, although I knew I would cock it up big
time. I think David and Carrie Grant, who were the singing teachers on the
show, probably thought this too, but very kindly never mentioned it. I can hold
a tune, but this is the limit of my performance skills as far as singing goes.
I knew I’d get chucked out pretty sharpish.

I
managed to get through the first and second night as Paul Ross and Fearne
Cotton got flung out. On the third day we were talked through the procedure of
booting someone out, the killer blow being that the celebs were narrowed down
to two by a public vote and the other celebs had to decide which one went, by
individually voting for them. We practised this and John Thomson and I were
randomly allotted the parts of the guinea-pig chuckees. People filed up to vote
and voted me out.

That
night, it all went hideously wrong for me singing ‘Build Me Up, Buttercup’. I
couldn’t hear the intro music over the noise of the crowd and put in a
shockingly bad performance as well as being two bars of music behind. Predictably
I was in the bottom two, and weirdly so was John Thomson too. As the celebs
filed up to choose between us I knew I would go, and when my name was announced
I pretended to faint to give the others a laugh. John Thomson’s face was a
picture. I think he thought I’d really fainted.

Anyway,
it was a bloody great relief to get back home. Also, I needed to be booted out
that night as I had another job, which I had to start the next day, so it all
worked out well.

A
couple of years later, I did
The Apprentice You’re Fired
for Comic
Relief too. We were an interesting combo. The women’s team consisted of Cheryl
Cole, Trinny Woodall, Maureen Lipman, Karren Brady and I. The men’s team was
Rupert Everett, Danny Baker, Piers Morgan, Alastair Campbell and Ross Kemp.

We were
shown into Sir Alan’s ‘boardroom’ and in came the famous old grump himself and
instructed us to raise as much money as possible; whoever did so would be the
winner. I attempted to bribe the old curmudgeon with some chocolate, and
although there was the ghost of a smile on his face, he played the part of old
git to perfection.

Our
task was to run an urban funfair with attractions and food in Central London.
We had to bid against the men’s team for certain stalls that we thought would
raise the most money and this farce was filmed as we didn’t get the stalls we
wanted, following a bit of Machiavellian manoeuvring by Piers and Alastair.
Trinny pretty much took charge and started scaring people into giving her money
right away under the guise of ‘buying a ticket for the event’, while Karren and
Cheryl stayed in the hotel phoning people, either to get them to offer
something as a raffle prize, or to make a guest appearance on the night, and
offer some sort of service to someone who paid them loads of money Not sex
obviously although I met a few dodgy, wealthy guys who I think would have been
quite happy to pay for a quickie with a famous person.

We also
needed to provide food stalls on the night so Maureen and I were despatched to
a kitchen in Bermondsey to prepare the food. (Yes, the glamour of this didn’t
go unremarked by us, the older contingent.) We were faced with a mountain of
preparation, but we had a right good laugh doing obscene things with squid and
forgetting to put a big container of chicken away in the fridge, so it went off
overnight.

On the
night of the funfair things were looking good, the food was ready stars were
booked to wander round, and a load of rich people had bought tickets to attend.
Maureen and I were dressed as clowns and stayed serving on the food stall. Many
times, characters from the boys ‘team would run over and take the piss and
inform us for the zillionth time that they were going to win. But I knew that
our secret weapon — Trinny — had cornered a few, very wealthy old ladies and
felt fairly confident.

During
the filming we came into contact with some of the country’s richest people and
ended up at a party at Matthew Freud’s house where I saw David Cameron, Jerry
Hall, Claudia Schiffer and lots of other, very well-heeled guests. I’m afraid
I have a natural antipathy towards wealthy people, I just can’t help it. I met
Philip Green and Stuart Rose, both of whom run huge businesses, and I couldn’t
get away fast enough. They both seemed to have the attitude that because they
were so wealthy people would fall at their feet. I have nothing to say to such
businessmen and I’m sure they have nothing to say to short fat middle-aged
female comics either.

At one
point Karren and I were leaning against the wall surveying all this wealth, unaware
that she was leaning on a huge Gilbert and George original.

‘Excuse
me, can you get off my painting,’ said a voice. There stood Gilbert … or
George — I’ve no idea.

Suffice
to say that the women’s team won the fundraising by hundreds of thousands of
pounds. Girl power! I am being ironic here, since that particular call to
action has done more to destroy true feminist principles than the combined work
of John McCririck and Margaret Thatcher.

My most recent foray into
Comic Relief-ness was being persuaded to dress up as Britney Spears and do a
silly dance for
Let’s Dance for Comic Relief
I was given the choice of
three performers to emulate, Kylie Minogue, Beyoncé and Britney Spears. It
wasn’t a difficult decision to make since, much as I recognise their talent, I
prefer Britney out of the three. I feel sorry for Britters — she has had a
rough ride from the press and struggles with maintaining a balance in the
amoral, evil world that being a pop star can be. However, I liked the song,
‘Hit Me Baby One More Time’ although I thought the video pandered to the worst
male, slightly paedophilic view some men hold of schoolgirls. Thus I felt it
was ripe for a piss-take. I like dancing and I don’t mind looking like a twat
for charity.

I had
roughly a week or so of training with a lovely woman called Steph who patiently
repeated my steps for me in various dance studios in London. She was a good
laugh, and we also had a good laugh doing it, which is very important. This was
overseen by Richard, the boss of the teachers, and his well-placed raised
eyebrow on occasions told me all I needed to know about my dancing skills.

Eventually
I was ready to train with the other dancers, who put me to shame by learning
the steps in what seemed to be about twenty seconds. I was slightly trepidatious
of what they would think of me, as the svelte and (what had seemed to me)
slightly haughty attitude of dancers wasn’t really something that appealed to
me. I needn’t have worried; they were all friendly and helpful. I felt for the
poor sods who had to pick me up at one point and move me from one part of the
floor to another. When I actually put the costume on for the first time, I
roared with laughter because I looked so bloody ridiculous, but it all added to
the surrealism of the occasion that was looming.

So I
had good fun — right up until the night of the show, when I realised just how
uncomfortable my Britney Spears costume was going to be. Once sewn into it I
couldn’t have a wee, and if you are doing live telly nerves dictate that you
want to go to the lay approximately every twelve seconds. As I had two hours to
wait until the show started, I seriously considered just letting myself go in
the costume — not really an option for the poor dancers who had to lift me up
though.

On the day
we did a camera rehearsal in the afternoon and then waited for the show itself
to happen. It was hosted by Claudia Winkleman, a terrifying powerhouse of a
woman who never seems to be below 11 on her energy clock. But she is up for a
laugh, as is her co-host Steve Jones, and I had to be on my guard because it
was a live show and I have a terrible tendency to shoot my mouth off and say
rude things.