The week's comedy trivia

• Alan Carr says he has to fight off indecent proposals from sex-starved women – who see his homosexuality as merely a ‘challenge’. He said: ‘I’m deluged with marriage proposals. I even get naked photos. Some women see me in the same way mountaineers see Everest – I’m a big challenge but they still want to mount me and stick a flag at the top.’

• Noel Fielding hasn’t gone totally showbiz yet. He was heard complaining at the Royal Television Society awards this week: ‘It’s a bit stuffy and I just paid £11 for a glass of champagne – it’s not even good champagne!’

• There was some confusion over the date of birth of Brian Wilde when he died yesterday… and it was all down to a fan of Porridge called Ian who set up a tribute website. When he couldn’t find a date of birth for the actor, he made up June 1, 1924, at random just because he though it sounded ‘about right’. The date was picked up by IMDB and Wikipedia, and later, for some reason, changed by other editors to June 1, 1921 – so early reports of his death – including the one on Chortle - had him aged 86. He was, in fact, born on June 13, 1927, making him 80. Just goes to show you can’t trust anything you read on the internet…

• Gossip website Holy Moly! scored plenty of morality points last month when it decided not to print paparazzi pictures of troubled Britney Spears. Its reputation as a paragon of journalistic responsibility continues unabated through this week’s issue, which exclusively claims that Ross Noble has a small dick, and Russell Brand once asked a girl to suck his balls. The Pulitzer is surely in the bag now.

• Talking of Britney, South Park provoked controversy – no surprise there – by portraying her in this week’s episode. Here it is, in two parts:
  
  

• The name of one unpleasant character in the latest episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm might ring a bell with avid media-watchers. The plot revolves around a new acquaintance of Larry David who borrows $10,000 from him – then blows it on a party and doesn’t invite his old pal. The unsavoury character is called Simon Kelner, after the editor of The Independent, who is, apparently, a friend of David’s.

• Karen Dunbar has revealed that she pissed herself onstage during her recent tour of Australia.

• Don’t think modern comics like Russell Brand have a monopoly on bad behaviour. Tony Hancock, under the influence of prescription drugs, once wandered into a New Year's Eve party in the ballroom under his Pimlico flat dressed only in a candlewick bedspread and wearing a G-string, back to front. He walked up to a woman, who screamed, and said, “I bet you've never seen one of these!”’

SOURCE: Daily Star, thelondonpaper, porridge.org.uk, HolyMoly!, The Observer, Chortle, Daily Telegraph

Published: 21 Mar 2008