Naughty and Saucy
The Graham Norton Show is a tonight show with a difference. Graham Norton, the host (how do they come up with the names of these shows?), is a naughty, saucy little man with a devilish smile, whose wicked sense of humour pushes the boundaries of good taste without ever going over the line. He’s in the Kenneth Williams tradition of English comics; he will chat with disarming honesty and self-deprecation to celebrities, relaxing his guests to the point that they reveal something about themselves that other chat shows have never managed to elicit.
Norton’s monologues are brief, and lampoon sacred cows and indulge in scandalous celebrity gossip. He uses the Internet (he has a computer next to him for the whole show) to trawl through outrageous websites that may, for example, show why baboons are evil, or exhibit hideous bridesmaids dresses or even cats that look like Hitler. The guests are always included in the discussions of the weird and wonderful world of the web, but it’s Norton’s use of the studio audience that sets him apart. He doesn’t pander to his live audience; rather, he abuses and berates them, but gets away with it because of his wicked charm. When Kevin Bacon was a guest on the show, the host made the audience perform the dance moves from Footloose and then belittled them for their incompetent choreography.
Norton’s unique use of a live audience is best illustrated by one episode when he asked if anyone wanted to go to Glastonbury, a massive English rock festival that’s in the Woodstock tradition. A young couple volunteered for this and he told them to leave the studio. Once they had, he explained that the man wanted to propose to his girlfriend on the show. With a shrug of his shoulders and a look that said ‘He asked for it’, Norton introduced the couple, from a shoddily constructed set made to look like Glastonbury.
He then told the man to go ahead with the proposal, but before the stooge could finish even a sentence, hippies invaded the scene. The audience member tried again to propose, but a drunken slag interrupted him. Norton explained to the by-now-ruffled man that it often rained at Glastonbury, which cued a huge deluge of water to be tipped on him. ‘Rain at Glastonbury always leads to mud,’ Norton pointed out and then a crapload of mud descended on the hapless proposer. Finally, the man, soaking wet and dripping sludge, proposed to his girlfriend, who replied in the positive. Any other show would have milked this scenario of every syrupy drop, but Norton made it hilarious without diffusing the sentiment.
The inimitable The Graham Norton Show is shown sporadically on the ABC late on Fridays and on ABC2, so it’s well worth keeping an eye out for it, as it has some top-drawer guests and laughs.
Matt Quartermaine is a Melbourne-based writer and comedian. With Matt Parkinson, Tim Smith and Andrew Goodone, he produces ‘The Chat’, a weekly podcast in which ‘four grown men in comfortable chairs spill their guts’. Click here to download it for free at iTunes.
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