WTF: Weekly Trivia File

• Wonder if any comedians fell for this? A post on the Facebook Comedy Forum, where gigs are are offered, read as followed: 'I'm currently casting for a unique project to be aired on Playboy TV. What we require is a couple of male comics over the age of 21 who are not afraid of nudity. The project will involve the comedians having to complete a 5 min routine whilst one of our amazing adult actresses performs oral sex on them. Sexual Orientation does not matter and the audience will be made of people from within the adult industry… I know this is a bit of a taboo subject but you will be paid £400 plus a percentage of any sell on equity. Successful candidates will require a full STI check.' To give an idea of the project, the man, going by the name of John Cummins and using the image of the late Deep Throat director Gerard Damiano, posted a very NSFW video of a real Japanese show called Masturbation Karaoke, in which singers attempt to belt out a tune while getting a blow job.

• The Simpsons briefly acknowledged the victims of the Paris attacks in its latest episode. A montage of Broadway theatres in the animation that aired in the States last Sunday included one hosting a show called Lafayette: The Musical, a tribute to the French hero of the American War Of Independence, which also included the image of the Eiffel Tower in a peace sign that has come to symbolise the response to the terrorist attacks.

• John Shuttleworth creator Graham Fellows is one of the comics taking part in Celebrity Mastermind this Christmas… but in fact it's his second appearance on the show - of sorts. The John Shuttleworth radio shows were a specialist subject of contestant Rachael Neiman back in 2011; so we think this might be the first time someone's been a contender AND the subject of a whole round.

• This is the greeting Mike Wilmot got when he took to the the stage of the Punch Drunk comedy club in Ashington, Northumberland… when the crowd as one rose to yell: 'Fuck off you Canadian cunt', having been primed by Brendon Burns, who had been on earlier:

• Somehow Ann Summers missed this range: granny pants featuring the cast of The Golden Girls. There's a pair of each of Rue McClanahan's Blanche, Estelle Getty's Sophia, Betty White's Rose and Bea Arthur's Dorothy, courtesy of Etsy shop Bulletsandbees. You can also get Ryan Gosling, Shia LeBeouf or Democratic Presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders close to your foufoune thanks tot the same company.

•Will Franken gathered a lot of press and plaudits earlier this year for coming out as transgender, now being known as Sarah. But now it appears she's having second thoughts, telling blogger John Fleming of the drawbacks, including abuse, the difficulty in dating women, and the expectations of being a reluctant spokeswoman, which could mean he goes back to presenting himself as a man. In an interview conducted as Will, he said: 'When I became Sarah, there was a feeling of being accepted. But there were a lot of comments and abuse in East London. I'm 6ft 5in; I stick out like a sore thumb. A lot of people were nasty. They shouted out: Gay boy! Trans-sexual! The other problem is... I was kinda swept up in this idea: Oh! Women love confidence! It doesn't matter what you're wearing. As long as you're confident. But I found it was just utterly confusing. The stares, the comments, the wanting to get laid by women. And then there was feeling like I was a poster child for trans-genderism. The first interview you do about trans-genderism feels really cool but, by the time you get to the 15th or 20th, you're like… "I mean, you know I do other things apart from being trans-gender?" I developed sympathy for what black comedians must go through in interviews – black, black, black, black, black, black, black.'

• Dave Gorman's an old hand at book signing, so has come to ask on instinct to check certain names: John with an 'h' or not, and so on. But at his gig in the North East of England last weekend, it led to a priceless exchange, as he revealed on Facebook: 'Sharpie poised, I heard the next punter say, "It's for Ian." Ian or Iain? In Middlesbrough, it's a 50/50 shout. "Just the one I, Ian?" I asked "Or two?" And then I looked up. And saw confusion in the face of a man wearing an eye patch…'

• Want to see Louis CK as a one-armed monster with no torso? Course you do. Here he is, courtesy of the Disney XD animation Gravity Falls.

Tweets of the week

Why is Trident so expensive, are we getting the parts by subscription every fortnight along with a free binder.

— keri (@kerihw) November 23, 2015

I've been watching the news since the 1980s, but under this show runner it's got too grim. Maybe it needs a hiatus or more female writers.

— Ian Farrington (@ianfarrington) November 24, 2015

"Phone fucking home." — E.T., the extra-Tourettesial

— Marty Lawrence (@TeaAndCopy) November 26, 2015

Published: 27 Nov 2015