Ricky Gervais Homemade Cape Shame 🦸

Before Ricky was a Golden Globes controversy, he was a boy with his sights set on scientific world domination. This is his story.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
So I've been sitting on this idea for years. I
did start it, then something terrible happened to it and
I just walked away.

Speaker 2 (00:07):
I just left it. It was awful.

Speaker 1 (00:08):
As you're about to find out, it's actually very simple idea. Well,
when you take time to think about it, the objects
of our lives have so much meaning. I think they're
actually alive with the stories of our lives. And one
of my favorite people to interview is Ricky Gervais. Like
all the best people, he's interesting and he's interested, and
I thought he'd be great for this. So ten years ago,

(00:30):
I'm working in London and Ricky gives me two hours
of his time, and his time is precious. I think
he agreed to do it because he liked the idea
and he likes storytelling. Even so, it was a pretty
big deal to get two hours of his time, and
it was. Trust me, it was an incredible interview. I've
done loads over the years. This was the best I've
ever done. Many times we've chatted, but I've never heard

(00:50):
him become so open, raw and emotional telling all these stories.
At the end of the interview, Ricky says to me,
that's the best interview I've ever done TV radio anywhere.
I walk out his office and I'm thinking, this is it.
I've made it. This is incredible. I'm gonna win every
award under the sun. I can't believe it. And then
I go to play it back just outside his office.

(01:12):
Because I'm a professional. You have to check it. You
always check it. It didn't record, there's nothing there, there's
no Ricky Gervais for two hours. Even talking about it

(01:32):
now upsets me, and it's years ago. It is, without doubt,
the worst professional mistake I've ever made over twenty years
of interviewing people. It's never happened ever before. Many times
I wish it had on some of the boring interviews
I've done, But this.

Speaker 2 (01:47):
One, why Now?

Speaker 1 (01:49):
I was so ashamed, deeply ashamed of what happened. I
just killed the whole idea of this show, trying to
erase the memory of it.

Speaker 2 (01:57):
So, after all these years, the.

Speaker 1 (01:58):
Idea for the show has never left me wrapped in trauma.
So I thought, I'm going to ask Ricky to redo this.
If he says no, I'm just going to leave it.
It's not meant to be. But Ricky said, yes, let's
do it.

Speaker 2 (02:11):
Again. Please record it.

Speaker 3 (02:12):
Great, it's same as the thing we did before. But yes, recording, yeah, recording,
yes great.

Speaker 2 (02:20):
So here we are, many years later.

Speaker 1 (02:22):
I'm almost glad the first one didn't record, because I
have to say the first one was great. I think
this one is even better. I'm Christian O'Connell. This is
the stuff of legends today with Ricky Gervais. Finally on
Ricky Gervais.

Speaker 4 (02:37):
Hello.

Speaker 1 (02:37):
I remember the first time I interviewed Ricky. It was
back in two thousand and one. I was handed a
pilot as you were back then on VHS cassette, not
less of the show that two weeks later changed TV
comedy forever.

Speaker 2 (02:49):
That show was The Office.

Speaker 1 (02:51):
Ricky Gervas with Steven Merchant, had invented something completely different,
a new style of comedy, a kind of awkwardness that
changed everything.

Speaker 3 (02:59):
Everything I do is connected to comedy, whether it's narrative,
dramatic comedy, stand up, children's books. Everything I do is
vaguely funny. I guess that's not a great hard sell.
Imagine that my calling God vaguely funny.

Speaker 1 (03:18):
So here is the Redo with Ricky Gervais, with the
story of his life in three of his most treasured objects.

Speaker 2 (03:24):
All right, your first object, what's it going to be?

Speaker 3 (03:27):
Well, growing up, all the things I liked as a
kid were free, friends, nature, learning. They were all free,
which is amazing to some people in the world.

Speaker 4 (03:40):
That's incredible.

Speaker 3 (03:41):
Probably didn't realize it at the time or appreciate it,
but looking back, it's amazing.

Speaker 4 (03:47):
And so I remember one of.

Speaker 3 (03:48):
The first presents I requested that was about learning and
me being in awe of the world was a microscope.
I was probably eleven twelve. I've got a microscope, and i'
I remember thinking, this is a real microscope. This is
the real microscope that scientists use because it was made
of metal, So I thought, this is a real one, right,

(04:11):
this is what they this is what they use in laboratories.
And I remember that I was just fascinated with the world.
From you know, five six seven. I'd be out in
the garden lifting rocks, wanting to know about every creature,
taking things apart and putting them back together. I just
I was just a little a little scientist, you know.

(04:36):
I remember when I was I used to play in
the coal bunker. This this sounds like I was brought
up in a Victorian so it's like a Charles Dickens novel.
We had a coal bunker and I'd sit in the
coal bunker and that was a you know, and I
remember I used to sort of hit the coal with

(04:56):
a hammer to get like these sort of shards. I
was fascinated, like you know, And I remember thinking, so,
think of the juxtaposition here in a kid's mode. He's
sitting in a coal bunker hitting coal with a hammer.
And I remember thinking, I've got to be careful not
to split an at them. So I knew about splitting

(05:16):
an at them. I knew about the you know, the
a bomb and what it could do, and I thought, oh, I'd.

Speaker 2 (05:22):
Be steady on here.

Speaker 4 (05:24):
What did you do? You destroyed Reddin? Yeah? Sorry, Mom,
what are you doing splitting at them? You split an
at them? You silly bugger? Why have I told you
never splitting at them?

Speaker 2 (05:38):
That is, oh dear?

Speaker 1 (05:45):
And how powerful was the microscope? Was it one of
those basic ones? It was like times five times ten?
How powerful?

Speaker 4 (05:51):
Well?

Speaker 3 (05:51):
No, there was three little things you turned round. I
think it was like times ten times one hundred and
times a thousand.

Speaker 4 (05:57):
I think it was like, yeah, that's right. I also
remember I think.

Speaker 3 (06:00):
It was probably metal because it had to because it
had to be stable. Because I also noticed that under
a microscope, if you move something slightly, it looks like
it's gone out of you know, you've only got that
tiny little aperture.

Speaker 4 (06:12):
But I just looked at stuff.

Speaker 2 (06:15):
What did you put under there?

Speaker 4 (06:16):
Everything? You know, a blade of grass, a hair.

Speaker 3 (06:21):
Gob you know, I'd just put a bit of spit
on that scientist you Yeah, today children we're looking at flem. Well, yeah,
I didn't have a lot, did I Did you.

Speaker 2 (06:42):
Put your bogies on there as well? And stuff like that?

Speaker 4 (06:44):
I bet I did, I bet I did.

Speaker 2 (06:47):
Yeah, I can't.

Speaker 3 (06:48):
I can't remember that specifically that that didn't go in
the diary.

Speaker 4 (06:51):
That didn't go in my findings.

Speaker 5 (06:53):
That Yeah, Darwin day twenty seven on the AGMS Beagle,
A look at a bogie.

Speaker 2 (07:07):
Could you describe the microscope to us?

Speaker 3 (07:10):
Well, it was probably big to me, but I was smaller.
I'd say it might have been I don't know, nine
inches tall. And it was black metal, sort of painted
with like real industrial nobbly sort of black paint that
is sort of like you see ships painted with or gates.

(07:31):
And I remember it just came and it's a lovely
little box with polystyrene. You know, it squeaked on the way.

Speaker 4 (07:39):
Oh, look at that, it's squeaked.

Speaker 3 (07:41):
I also remember that something that came with it was
shrimp pegs. You were meant to hatch out what. I
remember that, and I can't remember ever actually doing it.
So not when you've got pubes and bogies to have
a look at.

Speaker 2 (07:59):
You got too much?

Speaker 3 (08:00):
Yeah, yeah, I sent the shimpo.

Speaker 4 (08:04):
Can you send me some of your pubes and bogues?

Speaker 2 (08:06):
Sir? Where did you keep this microscope? Was in your
bedroom or Yeah?

Speaker 3 (08:13):
I did have my own room sort of early on,
because that's the other thing. When I was born, my
oldest brother, Larry, was seventeen, my sister was like fifteen,
and my brother Bob was eleven. I remember saying to
my mom when I was about twelve, why are my
brother's sister so much older than me? And she said,
because you were a mistake. So I just laughed. I felt,

(08:36):
come on, mom, they all were. They were all mistakes.
So yeah, I had my own room early on, which
I remember. I remember when I was about twelve or thirteen,
I was into sort of like being a hippie you know,

(08:57):
you know, lava lamps and things like that. And there was
a shop in red in in the butt center. It
was called but is it Art? And it was like
horrible new age stuff like you know, little buddhas and
you know exactly things like that, right, But I was decited.
But but there was a red light bulb that looked

(09:20):
really cool. And I got a red light bulb from
my room. I thought, that's great, my reck, it looks
like a bloody brothel in here. Why have you got
a red light?

Speaker 2 (09:28):
Right?

Speaker 4 (09:28):
She hated this red light right, and she.

Speaker 3 (09:32):
Thought she was she thought it was awful, right, and
she got me. She went, I can't I can't see
to clean up in there, right, And she went to
she said, I can't see the spiders. I took the
red light out straight away, just got it out now,
right ago check for spiders.

Speaker 4 (09:49):
She knew.

Speaker 3 (09:50):
She knew that if she said she couldn't see to
clean for spiders, that I'd take the red light out.
And I did straight away.

Speaker 1 (10:06):
This is the stuff of legends today with Ricky Gervais.
So after his microscope, I wanted to learn what was
his next treasured item.

Speaker 3 (10:15):
It was a tennis racket from Woolworth's. It was a
shoddy piece of work.

Speaker 4 (10:22):
I remember.

Speaker 3 (10:23):
It wasn't even like a solid piece of wood like
a cool Dunlop maxply which I got later. It was
sort of like like bamboo squished together. It's sort of
you could hear it squishing on the handle, do you
know what I mean. It wasn't really made at a
bamboo well no, but it was like it was like
slaps of wood where they hadn't carved it out of
one piece of oak, you know, it was like just

(10:46):
off cuts. Like it was like one of your NaN's
old chairs, you know what I mean, that's sort of woven.
No Nan made me a tennis racket and the Kramie.

Speaker 1 (11:03):
The image of you trying to hit a tennis ball
with the NaN's old chair and your tennis Whites's emagacy.

Speaker 3 (11:08):
And like the string the strings it was playing with
a fishing net, you know.

Speaker 4 (11:17):
But then.

Speaker 3 (11:19):
Then I remember my first metal racket. I must have
been about fifteen, and my mum made my dad give
me the money for it and I took it home.
It was it was like chrome. It was the most
beautiful thing. It was like an dar to me. It
was incredible. I couldn't wait to play with it. And
the first night I had the racket, I slept with

(11:41):
it on my bed. I just thought I couldn't I
couldn't believe, and that I woke up with the racket
was next to me, and I remember then. I remember
I played with it right and one of the teachers
I used to play the teachers at tennis, and he went,
you haven't taken the cell aphane off the handle. I thought,

(12:05):
I took that off and it was a whole new world.
I had a proper grip. I was really good then, Yeah,
I was. I was probably the one thing. I was
probably best in the school, which wasn't saying much in
my school. And I even thought, oh, it could be
a tennis player, and then you know, you suddenly realized
that there's never been. There's never been a five for

(12:28):
eight tennis player ever.

Speaker 2 (12:35):
I love the image of you sleeping with it, right.
I think that's as as.

Speaker 1 (12:39):
A beautiful image because obviously that was your first metal
one and it meant so much to you because you
didn't have your mom and dad didn't have tons of cash,
they could just buy you whatever you want. It was
incredible when you get that and somebody means something to you.
You were your mom and dad had to sacrifice something
to get it. Yeah, it meant that much to you.

Speaker 3 (12:55):
You took it to bed, I know, and you know
it teaches It does teach you the value of things.
I mean, I shouldn't. I shouldn't have had that racket.
You know, we couldn't afford it. You know, it was
simple as that. So I never really cared for material
things unless they did something.

Speaker 4 (13:12):
You know, I don't. I was never that.

Speaker 3 (13:14):
I was never that bloke who just wanted the the
best trainers. I didn't care they were going to get
scuffed up anyway. Give me any old trainers as long
as though. You know, I've never I've never worn jewelry
or I've never you know, I've never cared. What's the point,
what the what can we do with it? What can
we do with it? It's got to be fun, it's

(13:36):
got to be doing something. And because our body is
just to move us around and do stuff we like,
do you know what I mean, that's what it's for.
So I miss the things I know I love doing.
I don't take it for granted. I don't take life
for granted. I don't take quality of life for granted.

(13:56):
It's it's it's a it's an amazing journey. I say
this in my stand up. I say, I think life
is like a it's a holiday. We don't exist for
thirteen and a half billion years, then a four hundred
trillion to one shot, that sperm hitting that egg creates
us and we we're here for eighty ninety one hundred

(14:19):
years if we're lucky to experience everything, because then we die,
never to exist again.

Speaker 4 (14:24):
And that doesn't scare me. But I know it's all.
It's all.

Speaker 3 (14:29):
We've got our it's our one it's our one shot.
So it's amazing, it's incredible life. It's amazing, and I
don't want to I don't want to get to my
deathbed and go, oh, all these things I.

Speaker 4 (14:42):
Didn't do, all these things I didn't do.

Speaker 1 (14:45):
So yeah, see, this is why I wanted to start
the show A side of Ricky Gervaise. You've maybe never
seen or heard before. A story starts with a tennis
racket and finishes on the meaning of life and.

Speaker 2 (15:04):
Tell us about the third one. Then, so you've got
the microscope and you got the tennis racket, what's your third.

Speaker 3 (15:09):
Item, No doubt about it, the guitar. As I said,
my first love was science, learning and having a laugh,
and then music came along and music probably dominated everything
for a while. There's nothing like it, there's no there's

(15:30):
no art form like it. There's nothing as evocative. Music
is like it's like downloading your emotions that other people
can share. It's it's incredible. I can't describe it. I
can't describe how good music is.

Speaker 4 (15:46):
Do you know what I mean?

Speaker 3 (15:47):
There's no it's beyond words, it's it's it's it's its
own poetry. It's incredible, and I I just somewhat clicked
in me again, probably the same aide thirteen fourteen, when
you when you start making your own decisions, and.

Speaker 2 (16:04):
What were you listening to at that age?

Speaker 4 (16:06):
Simon and Garfunk called Kat Stevens.

Speaker 3 (16:08):
I think folk, beautiful folk lyrics meant a lot, you know,
I suppose at fourteen, so that you know singer songwriters,
James Taylor, all those guys, and I knew every yeah,
every word, I knew everything. And I remember I wanted
to get a guitar so I could write my own songs,

(16:31):
which again I was sort of cutting out them. I
just wanted to get a guitar, and I sort of
did the equivalent of, you know, teaching myself tennis against
a wall.

Speaker 4 (16:40):
I got a guitar, and I.

Speaker 3 (16:43):
Got, you know, looked at the tabs on a you know,
sheet music, and tried to work it out. And I
think I know the same chords now as I did
when I was fourteen, you know what I mean? I thought,
those are those are due? B was too hard, don't
need you never need, be boy, And I did it

(17:04):
to write songs.

Speaker 4 (17:05):
And I remember, so who taught you?

Speaker 2 (17:09):
Ricky?

Speaker 1 (17:10):
Well?

Speaker 3 (17:10):
Again, I sort of taught myself. There was a mate
who could play guitar that was you know. I think
he might have showed me the easiest. So what's the
easiest chord? And he said, he Minor, it's just those two.
I went right, and I I sort of went from there.
I sort of went from there. I've always liked the shortcut.

(17:30):
I've always liked to look at something and go I
can I can, ye give me the gist of it,
I can do the rest.

Speaker 2 (17:36):
Where did you practice at home? Was it this again again?
In my bedroom?

Speaker 3 (17:39):
I remember going up there right and trying to play
the chord, and my stupid little fourteen year old soft
hands couldn't hold ah, and I was so annoyed. There's
a thing, there's a thing online on YouTube called the
Angriest Guitarist. He's a he's a scouse guy and he
goes mental and smash his guitar. That was me at fourteen,

(18:01):
but I had to do it quietly so my parents
couldn't hear so ill and I'd hit the guitar for sake,
and I'd hold it down again until now. And the
more you held it down, the more your fingers hurt,
so you could so I had six months of that
and then I could sort of play again, no revelation.

(18:22):
You know, if you try your hardest at something, you'd
probably get good at it, you know. And did you
join a band then? Not straight away. It was a
very it was a very sort of secret pursue. I
don't think I even played to anyone because I knew
I wasn't good enough and and I know the songs
weren't good enough. I remember buying the guitar, went down

(18:45):
to red An Arcade with my mum. I think it
was five pounds again, which was more money than yeah,
it was the cheap's guitar, but so what you know,
I remember the e string when it didn't actually go
die because it was like the lowest quality. I remember

(19:10):
I de tuned it at one point to make it easier.
I discovered that if you make it a bit looser,
your little, my stupid little hands could And it was
a classical guitar, so the you know, the net was
really wide and the strings were high off of it.

Speaker 1 (19:27):
So yeah, but then you then you did get into
a band and you you actually had success.

Speaker 4 (19:31):
I know, beginner's luck. That was.

Speaker 3 (19:34):
Yeah, we did a few songs. I don't think we
I don't think we gigged. I think we did one
live pa at the Camden Palace. But again, all over
as quickly as it started, I think that the whole
thing was two singles and that's it, We're out.

Speaker 2 (19:48):
And then it was did you want to be a
pop star?

Speaker 3 (19:52):
I did, and that was my I realized in retrospect
when it all went away, that that was my mistake.
I should have wanted to be a musician, not a
pop star. And then when I came to do this,
the second bite of the cherry, so to speak, I
knew that I wanted to be a I want to
be a writer, director. I didn't just want to be

(20:13):
I didn't want to be a celebrity. It's that the
word still embarrasses me. I still say I'm not because
I think it's charged with something else. I know, I
know I'm a known person. I know I'm a famous person,
but I'm famous for something and the word celebrity still
embarrasses me.

Speaker 1 (20:32):
So that left me wondering what's it like for Ricky
to be on the other side of that coin now,
especially as host of one of the biggest celebrity events
there is the Golden Globes.

Speaker 2 (20:41):
How does that sit with him?

Speaker 3 (20:42):
I think this year particular, people were really tired of
virtue signaling people telling them how to live when they
were still flying around the world in private jets. And
you know, I've never done a day's work life or
any you know what I mean. If one of the

(21:02):
early jokes was the people in the room, they're they're
they're woke. So it's a bit ironic that this is
the only three hours that your poorly paid house staff
will get to sleep this week. So straight away I
laid out, I laid out the wares right, and then
it built to a crescendo to you are in no
position to lecture the public about anything. You've spent less

(21:24):
time in school than Greta Thunburg. There's still jokes, there's
still jokes, but it's it's disguised as a rant, and
I think people reacted to it.

Speaker 4 (21:35):
It was a you know a lot of what was.

Speaker 2 (21:38):
It like in the room? Ricky?

Speaker 1 (21:39):
Okay, so we're watching it on TV? What's it like
in that little room?

Speaker 3 (21:43):
Well, you can sort of the tension you feel is
is is you know, it's two sort of waves. One is,
oh my god, am I allowed to laugh at that?
Because I don't want that guy to see me laughing,
because you know what I mean, because they're worried about

(22:05):
their jobs and stuff, right, And the other one is,
even though that's a funny joke, I might be next,
so they can't truly relax until my monologue is over.

Speaker 2 (22:17):
But just like a hostage situation. Yeah, but so.

Speaker 3 (22:21):
They're nervous that no one wants to be the butt
of the joke. But depending what is having said that,
nothing I say is that bad. You know, I only
go after their behaviors, their public behaviors, you know, and
I still say it's a gentle roast. I could say
a lot worse things about them. I could honestly say
a lot worse things about them, but I know I

(22:43):
don't want it to get really nasty. And for no reason,
it's still have to be jokes, you know. I suppose
it depends. But like when I said about you're in
no position to let sure, you know that already started
getting cheers.

Speaker 4 (22:58):
But around the room, so I think around the room.

Speaker 3 (23:01):
Where they're sort of like their agents and their lawyers,
who thought, yeah that I'm tired of them as well.

Speaker 4 (23:09):
They treat me like dirt.

Speaker 3 (23:13):
But also what came out of it is this right.
The big meme was Tom Hanks going, why is he
saying that?

Speaker 4 (23:21):
Right?

Speaker 3 (23:22):
And people were going, you know, oh, lot, he's on
his high horse. But when Leo DiCaprio laughed, people loved
him for it, you know.

Speaker 2 (23:30):
Oh yeah, it was one of my favorite bits.

Speaker 1 (23:31):
He laughed is so hard de Niro's pointing at him
when you were talking about the age of his girlfriend's
going but you do.

Speaker 3 (23:37):
That, yeah, you know, I think people who laugh at
a joke again, it's what I said, they get a
round of applause.

Speaker 4 (23:43):
People go, well, that's good. They can take it. They
can take it.

Speaker 3 (23:46):
And I think it's it's in us that we want
people to We don't want people to be above it
if we think people are talking down to us or
they think, you know, we even let people be privilege
as long as they say, you know, and I'm privileged
and you know, but I'm nothing. Really, we don't like

(24:06):
people to go, I deserve it. How dare you are
wedd talking me that? And if we sense that, if
we really think these people start believing their own hype,
we want to bring them down a peg or two.
And I think that's totally natural because it's sort of luck.

Speaker 4 (24:23):
It's luck.

Speaker 3 (24:24):
The actors get paid hundreds of thousands of times the
wages of a nurse. That's just luck. That's crazy, really,
isn't it. Why do we pay someone who pretends to
save lives more than someone who actually saves lives.

Speaker 2 (24:43):
There's a cruel, horrible irony about that. You're right, it's strange, wrong.

Speaker 3 (24:47):
And when people think about it, they go, okay, you can.
You can have your money just entertain us, you know,
run around in your rubber suits. We like that but
don't start telling us about the real world. Don't start
really really fit. Do you think you are You're not.
You know, A lot of it is an act. I
have to be the outsider to remain I think a

(25:11):
good comic voice. I have to not be beholden to them.

Speaker 2 (25:14):
Don't have to.

Speaker 3 (25:15):
I mustn't be scared of anyone in particular because they
give me a job, which i'm not because I create
my own labor. So on paper, I'm a pretty good
guy to be in that room of the richest, most
privileged people in the world. I go out with a
beer on purpose. You know, some of its marketing, but

(25:36):
I want the people at home to go I'm on
your side. I'm closer to you for this night. I'm
a lot more in your camp than these guys.

Speaker 2 (25:47):
For Ricky, he's never forgotten where he came from.

Speaker 1 (25:49):
Despite huge global success and fame, there's still a part
of him in that coal bunker.

Speaker 3 (25:54):
I remember when I was sort of newly famous. You know,
the check came through for the Office DVD, and it
was and I remember it was like more than my
dad used to earn a year, and for a split
second it ruined it for me. I thought, oh, that's
not why, that's not why I did this. I got

(26:17):
over it, and uh.

Speaker 2 (26:26):
That was half a second. Yeah, but do.

Speaker 4 (26:29):
You know what I mean? It's odd because you do
go through all those things and you look.

Speaker 2 (26:32):
Back and you feel they feel it, feel guilty you do?

Speaker 3 (26:36):
Do you know?

Speaker 4 (26:36):
You still do?

Speaker 2 (26:37):
Everyone?

Speaker 4 (26:38):
Yeah, and you can't you can't.

Speaker 3 (26:40):
You know, it's not virtual signaling when you look around
and go, I can't quite enjoy this, and I've got
and and and even though I take the piss out
of it.

Speaker 4 (26:50):
Uh, philanthropy does does work. It is a it does.

Speaker 3 (26:57):
It does work on so it makes you sleep at night.
You know, you can't take it with you, but you
can you can give it away, you know. So that
that that's very important to me as well, that you
you know, you do giving it back, but just you've
sort of got to keep it quiet, which is it's
a real it's a real dilemma there because when you

(27:22):
do stuff for charity you shouldn't boast about it. But
letting people know that it's there and that you feel
good about it is infectious.

Speaker 4 (27:32):
Do you know what I mean?

Speaker 3 (27:33):
So people, I bet that must be so hard. Yeah,
because you go look at this. You know, people want
to be part of it, and you want to tell them.
You want to tell them that it made you feel
really good when you gave a tenor you know. So
it's it's it's a slippery slope. It's it's hard. It's

(27:54):
hard to juggle, whether it's showing off and virtual signaling
or but you can help this charity. So I just
do it when I can. I just do it because
it's no skin off my nose. And I'd rather I'd
rather do it and feel bad than not do it
and feel bad.

Speaker 4 (28:12):
Do you know what I mean?

Speaker 2 (28:13):
That's the right side the equation to be on exactly.

Speaker 3 (28:15):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I remember, right, I was like on
the doll and we had no money at all. Right,
there was a lot of there was a lot of
rice and beans there. And they took down the curtains
in this horrible old flat and I said, oh, don't
throw them away. And I tried to make myself a

(28:37):
suit out of them, these curtains. I remember, I sat
on the curtains and drew around my legs, right, and
then I sewed it up. And of course I couldn't
get them on because I can be you gotta leave
a bit with the stitches, right, And I looked at
the other curtain.

Speaker 4 (28:56):
I'm not going to do a jacket. I do a cape.
So I thought I've made the cape.

Speaker 2 (29:02):
There it is.

Speaker 3 (29:02):
It's a cape and some fucking leggings, right, and I
shoved them under the chair right. And Jane came in
and went, what's that under the chair?

Speaker 2 (29:12):
Right?

Speaker 3 (29:12):
She found it, and I honestly she really died laughing
at my.

Speaker 4 (29:20):
Again.

Speaker 3 (29:21):
I remember that now and again. I remember that now
and again, and I think I've come a long way.

Speaker 2 (29:26):
This is making my own cape. Now.

Speaker 1 (29:33):
Oh that to be a headlined for the Daily Mail.
Rickichi bas my cape.

Speaker 2 (29:37):
Shame.

Speaker 3 (29:38):
Yeah, the dandy highwayman flowers he's got gold.

Speaker 4 (29:44):
Lame leave.

Speaker 2 (29:49):
After three years of university education. That leaves you with us.
You can't even make a cake.

Speaker 3 (29:55):
Well, poverty plays tricks with the mind. You survive, you go,
I don't. I don't need money. I'm beating the system.
My cape cut to me walking around King's Grass in
a loin cloth from a tea towel town. His sandals

(30:19):
are two old tennis rackets from Walworth's.

Speaker 1 (30:28):
A big thank you to today's legend, Ricky Jervase. Thank
you will never be enough. I never expected to hear
stories like that. It shows that these objects the stuff,
they really are, the stuff of legends.

Speaker 2 (30:39):
Look at how open Ricky Gervase up.

Speaker 1 (30:41):
I felt myself opening up too, like you do when
someone shares themselves with you. Thank you, Ricky Jervas for
giving me and us a second chance. Make sure you
don't miss out on any of our upcoming legends. You
can follow the show for free on iHeartRadio or whatever
podcast app you're listening on. If you want to get
in touch with me, check out Stuff of Legends podcast

(31:02):
dot com and say hello, I'm Christian O'Connell and until
the next time. This is the stuff of Legends. Ricky,
thank you so much for doing this. It's always uh,
it's always a joy to uh to chat to you.
And I've loved hearing these stories that I've never heard
you shared before.

Speaker 2 (31:20):
It's been brilliant. Thank you so much, mate for doing this.

Speaker 4 (31:22):
Cheers my pleasure. Oh we forgot to record it.