And Away...

[When working as a bin man in his younger days.] ‘Just stand still and don’t act scared,’ advised Brian. He spoke some soothing wolfhound words and took a step towards the dog. The Wedge looked over his shoulder and took a couple of steps in my direction. I started to back off. ‘Keep still!’ shouted Brian. I stopped moving and slowly took the bin down from my shoulder and held it in front of me like a shield of tinned garbage. Brian was inching forward, still mumbling wolfhound nonsense. Then The Wedge started to bark. I farted. Just walk towards him, Brian told me. ‘He’s feeling trapped. I’ve got to back off’ So Brian backed out of the passage, and it was just me and The Wedge again. I was frozen. My fear of dogs runs deep. This dog had massive teeth and looked hungry for meal
and sport.

‘Brian!’ I shouted, but there was no reply. I lifted the bin up in my arms, preparing to throw it at The Wedge. As I did so, Brian appeared at my shoulder and squeezed past me. He had managed to get in the house and come out through the back door to save me. He then delivered what I think may be the greatest refuse-collector line that has ever been spoken. Walking slowly towards The Wedge, he spoke in the hushed tones of Alec Guinness in Star Wars: This is not the bin man you are looking for. You must give him safe passage to Alderaan. The Wedge started to back off and turn around before sprinting out of the passage back to his boys. The Force was strong with Brian the Bin Man.

I’ve never minded being lightly bullied or playing second fiddle. I suppose that’s what comes from being the youngest of four brothers. It’s a basic tactic for getting someone to like you or at least keep them on your side. A good example of this is provided by Brian. If we were approaching a shop that sold cakes, he would offer me a challenge. Whoever whipped out their side of the road first would win a cake from the other. I would always take up the challenge and always make sure I lost. This way I knew that Brian would grow to love me.

I enjoyed working on the bins. It gave me muscles and meant I could pay Mum for my keep. It’s good, honest, useful work, and at Christmas you received plenty of tips. When the wagon was driving between rounds, me and Brian would ride along stood on the back bumper with the wind in our donkey jackets singing the song from the ‘Texan’ chocolate-bar advert. We felt like renegade cowboys coming to clean up the town.

[November 2015 ...] Paul [Whitehouse] had picked me out a fly-fishing rod and reel for me to use when we eventually went. It had never happened.

He kept phoning and eventually I ran out of excuses. We were to go fishing on the beautiful River Test in Hampshire. Paul would be fly-fishing for pike and I would be float-fishing for grayling. I wasn’t looking forward to it and felt a little bit bullied by Paul and The Wife.

I arrived at the riverbank and there was Paul waiting for me. He had already boiled the kettle in the bankside fishing hut and we sat and had a cup of tea. He was the first friend I had seen since coming home from the hospital. I didn’t look well; my new diet of pulses, grains, nuts and fruit had left me two stone lighter and very wizened in the face. My complexion was pale and I had a very ghostly presence. The fishing hut had a genuine Victorian vibe: old leather Chesterfield sofas, stuffed fish in display cases, ancient fishing rods and tackle displayed on all the walls, a wood-burning stove in the corner and numerous pictures of proud fishermen displaying their catches. Paul sat me down and asked me how I was doing. I bluffed away for a while telling him that everything was as sweet as a lizard’s tits, but he wasn’t about to be fobbed off.

‘No, I’m asking how you are. How are you feeling?’

‘Honestly, I’m fine. A few aches and pains but that’s to be expected’

‘You look like shit.’

‘You look like a bullied monk.’

‘You look like a knackered bollock.’

‘You look like a glassblower’s anus.’

‘You look like the outskirts of Leicester.’

We laughed. It was very pleasant to be talking to an old mate in a non-medical setting. He took me outside to the riverbank and set me up with a float rod before leaving in search of a pike on the next beat. I stood there for an hour or so, lost in the unique rhythms of the water and the gentle, hypnotic lullaby of its flow. There was no one else around and nobody keeping an eye on me. Watching a float bobbing along the surface of a river is one of the most meditative experiences you can have. All your brainpower focused on that little orange tip to the exclusion of all other thoughts and worries. This was a place that I was glad to be in, and then, whoosh!, the float goes under and you strike. You are immediately hit by an intimate connection, both physical and emotional, to another living thing. It’s visceral and exhilarating. The play is over in thirty seconds but contains as much drama as EastEnders packs into a week. I’ve caught a small grayling, with its translucent grey scales and magnificent purple-hued dorsal fin. What a first catch. I am ecstatic and beaming like a pensioner who has just found his missing tin opener. This is what life should feel like; this is participating in the world rather than just watching it go by. I am hooked.

Paul arrives a bit later and I blurt out the details of my catch. As Paul listens and congratulates me, I notice that his hand and wrist are bleeding. He has caught his pike and the pike did not like it, giving him a few puncture wounds with its predator teeth. Its bite delivers an anti-coagulant, which means the flow of blood is difficult to stem. We retire back into the warm embrace of the fisherman’s hut. It all feels like a little escape from the dread and worry of the previous months. I want to do this again.

Something about that fishing trip gave me the kick up the arse I needed. Sitting on my sofa no longer felt enough. I knew what needed to be done. I needed to get physically and mentally prepared for the live tour in January. It was a lovely act of care that Paul showed me by taking me on that trip. He is a wily old fox.

A few days later [sometime in 1994], however, he [Alan Yentob, boss of the BBC at the time], contacted Peter [Bennett Jones, head of PBJ Management, Bob’s agents] and told him he would commission a series of our new studio show [Shooting Stars] and a script for our proposed comedy drama. We decided to take him up on his offer. This silent, seemingly indifferent approach to meetings is something that I have encountered a lot within the upper echelons of TV executives. Sometimes I just put it down to a lack of personality; sometimes to the idea that if they don’t say anything they won’t give away their lack of ideas; sometimes to the insecurity that many executives have because they have never actually gone out there in front of a camera and put themselves on the line. The upper-management levels of the BBC have traditionally been a playpen for Oxbridge graduates. It’s slightly more glamorous than going into finance or politics and certainly less demanding, and yet I think many of them are slightly embarrassed when they come face to face with the actual so-called talent. They know that we know that they know that they are just the guardians of the money bag and not really creators of entertainment. The Oxbridge clubhouse vibe has begun to fade these days and many of the senior people we work with have long histories of making successful shows. Back in the ’90s, though, it was akin to a secret society.