WFT: Weekly Trivia File

• ‘Actor and comedian Johnny Vegas has been diagnosed with breast cancer and is set to undergo treatment’. That’s how an ‘hilarious’ false story on comedy website The Spoof began this week. It’s cos Vegas has man boobs, you see, but the story failed to mention that about 300 British men a year contract breast cancer.

• Ricky Gervais, Ian Hislop and Sacha Baron Cohen are among the celebs to have donated signed pairs of underpants to an eBay auction in aid of destitute asylum seekers.

• A man called Jordan proposed marriage to his girlfriend on stage at Jimmy Carr’s Dundee gig last night. Carr joked via Twitter: ‘[She] isn't even pregnant. Which is a first for a marriage proposal in Dundee.’

• Russell Brand says his serial womanising ‘is similar to having an eating disorder’. The poor, afflicted man spoke after he flashed his ‘wooky’ to photographers in Sydney, when he appeared naked on his hotel balcony this week.

• Oh dear:
  

• Noel Fielding was spotted at the Groucho Club again this week – but this time with his parents. What started a ‘nice quiet family lunch’ turned into an 11-hour drinking session. At one point Fielding abandoned Ma and Pa to join Mat Horne in nearby Maddox nightclub. Still Mr and Mrs Fielding were OK, chatting happily to Kate Moss.

• Mat Horne mention No 2: Mat Horne is flogging the £9,295 diamond-encrusted watch he was given as a thank-you for hosting the Brit Awards. The 18-carat gold Raymond Weil timepiece is now on sale at a jeweller’s on The Strand in London for a bargain £4,500.

• Mat Horne mention No 3: His sketch show might have been savaged by the critics, but Horne is very proud of it. ‘I’m very happy with the show,’ he said before adding/threatening: ‘I’d definitely be up for a second series.’

• US comic Demetri Martin is starring in a new film about the Woodstock festival from director Ang Lee. Here’s a trailer:
  

• Ricky Gervais is still trying to think of a new title for his next movie about suburban insurance salesmen in the Sixties, after the Prudential vetoed The Men From The Pru. Cemetery Junction is the new favourite, named after an area of Reading.

• John Cleese has his divorce payout to ex-wife Alyce Faye cut from £106,000 a month to £57,000 after a California judge agreed that the credit crisis meant his settlement should be re-evaluated.

• They don't half take the venues down quick after the Edinburgh Fringe. Take a glace towards Bristo Square on Google Map’s new Street View function and you’ll see the giant purple upside-down cow that is the Udderbelly. Stroll five yards further ahead, and it’s gone....
  

• Argumental team captain Rufus Hound has little time for Jeremy Kyle. ‘If I met him, it would be non-stop volley of punches,’ he said. ‘But he's so sufficiently deluded that he probably wouldn't know what it's for.’

• The Scotsman newspaper today reports on new scientific research that showed drinking tea or coffee too hot can increase your risk of cancer. Naturally, they sought expert comment for their news story – so they called up comedian Simon Munnery. 'It's just health and safety gone mad,' he helpfully commented.

• Freebie newspaper London Lite carried the first of many ‘I became a stand-up after losing my City job’ stories yesterday. Thea Montgomerie-Anderson, who lost her sales job just before Christmas, now runs a monthly room-above-a-pub gig in East London with her flatmate and told the paper: ‘We probably only earn £25,000 a year each.’ 25k? Really. Maybe that’s what an inexperienced act can earn if they look like a model and perform in hotpants:
  

SOURCES: The Spoof, Twitter, The Sun/News Of The World, YouTube, thelondonpaper/Daily Mirror, Sunday Mirror, London Lite, YouTube, Rickygervais.com, Sunday Mirror, Google Maps, The Sun, Scotsman, London Lite

Published: 27 Mar 2009