WTF: Weekly Trivia File

• ‘I can’t remember the last time when I did a set sober.’ Doug Stanhope

• Sarah Silverman had a secret meeting with Barack Obama, she revealed this week. The President greeted he by saying: ‘Oooooo, I'm a big fan! You're very talented! Although I turn the volume down when my girls come into the room.’ Talking about the White House meeting on Howard Stern’s radio show, Silverman said that Obama ‘jokingly’ told her she helped him win Florida, thanks to a viral video she made called The Great Schlep, urging Jewish people to vote in the state. The comic said she was so ‘nervous and excited’ that when the President asked her what she was doing next, she blurted out: ‘I'm going to be naked in a movie!’ To which Obama said: ‘Oh, you'll have to send me a copy of that.’ Silverman insisted his tone was a ‘gracious’ way out of the awkwardness – rather than anything too creepy.

• Being asked for his autograph is commonplace for Inbetweeners star Simon Bird – but it’s not always such a simple exchange. ‘The most unexpected one was a guy who asked me to sign his penis,’ Bird told Shortlist magazine. ‘I drew the line there. Not literally.’ He added: ‘I get some weird fan mail as well. One guy asked me to sign his horse book and, honestly, to this day I still have no idea what that means. That was the totality of the letter, there was no attached horse book as far as I could see.’

• George Michael says stand-up is ‘the bravest thing you can do on stage’.

• Frank Skinner has been breathalysed by police – even though he has been teetotal for 25 years. He was pulled over for speeding on Tower Bridge, when the officer asked him if he’d been drinking that evening, to which Skinner replied: ‘I can tell you now, I haven’t had a drink since September 24th 1986.’ ‘He just looked at me in disbelief,’ the comic told listeners to his Absolute Radio Show. ‘I thought, I’ve never been more confident of passing a test in my life. But there was a tiny grain of doubt in my mind that I might fail the breathalyser test because, even though I haven’t had a drink since then, I’ve never felt fully sober since.’ Needless to say he passed, and the police let him on his way – and allowed him to keep the breathalyser tube as a souvenir.

• Norman Lovett’s fame as the computer Holly on Red Dwarf, is a mixed blessing. At one stand-up gig he noticed a woman asleep at the back. He asked, 'Are you tired, love?' and she replied, ‘No, it's just that I preferred you as Holly.’

• 'I was crimed on'... Stand-up with impressively bad command of the English language:
  

• Interesting start to the Half Moon Comedy gig at Harlow’s Heart and Club last Friday. About a minute into the show, the pub is raided by about 20 uniformed police officers and sniffer dogs. With a stroke of comic genius, the sound techie tracked down the theme from The Bill and played it as ‘20 coppers tried not to laugh.’ Comic Bethany Black, who was on the bill said: ‘Then they left and took half the audience with them, who, it turned out were undercover police.’ Although no one was busted, Black didn’t exactly enjoy the rest of the gig, saying: ‘I went on stage and two lads with dirty tracksuits, a penchant for neck tattoos, violence and Barry McGuigan moustaches turned up and one tried to sabotage the gig. Then as I left I saw a Vauxhall Nova done up like the General Lee from The Dukes of Hazzard.  Essex is everything I ever dreamed it would be. Definitely one of the stranger gigs I've ever had.’

• Kevin Bridges says performing comedy isn’t quite providing him with the groupies he wants. ‘After you finish the gig and go to the bar for a drink, hundreds of guys come up to ask how many birds you get,’ he says, ‘and you're looking over your shoulder seeing every girl leave.’

• But Russell Kane says dressing up as Beyonce for Let’s Dance For Comic Relief has its sexual benefits.‘I'm now even more in touch with my feminine side,’ he said. ‘I was gossiping all day and flirting with the security guys.’ Following the performance, Kane says he has been bombarded with ‘pervy’ online messages: ‘I got a message from a girl claiming that I'd turned her lesbian. I've had gay guys asking me out, too.’

• Tweets of the week:
  Neil Hamburger (@NeilHamburger): A mute, mentally ill woman is pushed onstage in her underwear to flail around for high-paying perverts. Shame on Britney Spears' manager.
  And a couple with the #jewbond hashtag, instigated by David Baddiel yesterday:
  Paul Fidler (@Fidlermanr): The World is Too Much, Already
  Unknown: You only live twice, but to you, once

SOURCES: The List, Howard Stern Show, Shortlist, Radio 2, Absolute Radio, The Skinny, YouTube, Chortle, Daily Record, The List, Twitter

Published: 11 Mar 2011