Million Pound Drop

The Million Pound Drop

I struggle to cope with life let alone answer questions. I did not realise but when Hursty and I were watching the Million Pound Drop a week ago I made a completely innocuous remark to Hursty that was to haunt me for the rest of my life. “We should go on this show, we’d do ok I reckon” I said.

Hursty has many, many flaws. He has the mental age of an 11 year old, not literally. He asked me to buy him a supersoaker for his birthday. He lives at home with his ageing parents and doesn’t contribute to rent, cook meals, do washing, doesn’t dare consider ironing and barely washes himself. He is living in his own welfare state with his mum acting as the role of ‘The State’. He hasn’t had a job for 4 years. How can he survive on no job I hear you scream? The answer is simple. He won £250,000 on Who Wants to Be a Millionaire 4 years ago.

Despite the picture I am painting, Hursty is surprisingly intelligent. He is incredibly strong across the board. He loves his sport, he knows when the wars were and he knows his Periodic Table. He has no clue about anything Technology related. He is still using Bebo and when I asked him if he wanted to Skype me when he was away he said he would but didn’t have my home address and couldn’t find anywhere that sold stamps.

Million Pound Drop is an intense live quiz show. You start with a Million pounds and there are eight questions. Each question has four possible answers and you always have to leave on of the answer boxes blank. In other words, you can’t put £250,000 on each answer. The final question you have only two answers and you have to put all the money you have that is remaining on just one of the two answers. Turns out Hursty applied on the Monday and here we were four days later at Elstree Studios.

 

I was absolutely shitting my pants. We’d been asked to bring in as many clothes as possible because the ‘stylist’ would dress us. We had to look ‘Saturday night glam’. What the hell does that mean? Saturday night glam? I was so concerned that I was going to end up looking like Travolta. I’d taken the ‘bring in as many clothes as possible’ too far.

Eve, the stylist, said “You didn’t need to bring in all your boxer shorts and pants” much to the amusement of all the other contestants. It turned out I couldn’t wear shorts or my ‘Sandy Balls’ t-shirt either. In fact I didn’t have a single appropriate item of clothing. Eve was fuming. She looked like a bulldog that had been caged for a considerable amount of time. She asked me did I not bother reading the clothing email that was sent out? Course I didn’t read the bloody email Eve. It’s clothes for a quiz show, who gives a shit. “Oh no sorry Eve, I don’t think I received the email.” Pathetic. She knows I got the email. Eve now wanted me to lose the million on question one.

Hursty was busily reading “1001 facts about the world” whilst I was eating a petit falous yoghurt. I couldn’t get over the spread they’d put on. I couldn’t be arsed to brush up on my quiz knowledge. There were three other couples in the room who were all due to go on that night and who were firing questions at each other. I felt that Nikki, the hairdresser from Swansea, may struggle. Not because she was a hairdresser, or because she was from Swansea, but she had asked Hursty if Asia was in Africa. I felt for her partner Gary who was meant to be the brains of the outfit and promptly corrected her “Don’t be silly Nic, Africa ain’t in Asia. Africa’s its own continent and big Nelson is the president”. Big Nelson. I struggled not to choke on my petis fallous.

“Makeup”. To be fair Nikki needed it. Amazingly Gary stood up and started walking towards the door and shouted “You boys coming”. What? Hursty also stood up.

“Hursty what you doing?” I said

“It’s standard for TV mate. You’ve got to have hair and makeup done.” I forgot I was in the company of a game show veteran.

Up to the make up room I went. What I, obviously, didn’t like about this whole thing was how pally we all were. They were 4 couples. Hursty and I, although I hope people didn’t think we were a full blown couple. Gary and Brains. Then there was the standard gay couple – it was Channel 4 remember. The gay couple were nice guys, Jeremy and John. I think if a parent names their son Jeremy they have to accept he will be gay. What was interesting about Jeremy and John was that you would have no idea at all that John would be gay. Jeremy on the other hand…as we walked into the Makeup room Jeremy had a hairbrush in his hand and was using it as a microphone whilst singing ‘The winner takes it all’ by Abba. The other couple was the token ‘Hot’ couple. Luke and Laura. Luke was beautiful. If I was a gay man, such as Jeremy, I’d of been all over him. Laura was decent but she was on of those that fitted the body from Baywatch, face from Crimewatch description.

Everyone was getting on like a house on fire. Jeremy was clearly making a play for Luke. John and Hursty were getting on, a little too well for my liking. Brains was coming up with some belters that were really making Laura laugh “So is Peter Andre is his real name?” I obviously hated her. And where was I in all of this? I was in the chair, being ‘gunned’.

Not sure if you’ve ever had makeup on? Feels awful. It also makes you so incredibly pale. I looked ill as it was but after half hour with Trudy (the makeup artist) I looked like I was an extra from Philadelphia. Being gunned is basically where they load up the makeup in some sort of air gun and then spray it all over your face. I don’t know what was worse, being gunned or listening to Trudy tell me it was all over with her husband Brian.

“He just wasn’t the man I thought he was when I married him” she said.

Trudy I only met you five minutes ago. Just focus on the job in hand “Well hopefully he’ll come his senses” what a nothing comment from me.

Makeup done, marriage advice handed out I was now ready to play the Million Pound Drop. We were third on. That meant we needed one of the couples before us to muck it up and get knocked out early otherwise we wouldn’t get on.

Jeremy and John were first on. We all huddled round a TV watching them. What I couldn’t understand was why everyone was cheering them on, willing them to get the right answer. John stupidly thought the capital city of Latvia was Diga. A Million went down the trap door and Hursty and I jumped up in joy – this meant we were getting on the show after all. This was a very bad move. Brains turned on us and Luke looked like he’d just found out I’d killed his mother. The atmosphere turned from one of happiness and joy to one of anger and disbelief. Still I wasn’t going to see these people again, I didn’t care. I was so confident Brains was going to screw it all up that we’d be on in a matter of minutes. She managed to get up on to the podium, thereby successfully negotiating the stairs and that was enough to surprise me.

My prediction was right. When was the Second World War? Brains was adamant that it was in the 1400s. She may have negotiated the stairs but that was as good as things were going to get for her.

This was it. We were up.

“Good luck mate, we can do this” said Hursty.

I was relieved Hursty was along side me. I needed him. I knew I was going to freeze and he was the confident, good looking, and funny one. I was his bald mess. We walked up the stairs and were hit by the audience, not literally. They were so loud. There were cameras everywhere and Davina McCall came in to hug me. I had absolutely nothing. I went for the kiss of the cheek, got it all wrong, and ended up looking like a massive tit. Davina explained the rules and off we went. This was it. Live in front of a nation, in front of Emma. This was my ticket out of work.

“Question 1 – Technology. On Facebook, which of these can you not do?

Poke, Stroke, Like, Chat”

Davina “You’re time has started”

“This is all you mate. You’re the technology man”. Hursty said.

“Ok, I know this. You can like someone’s status. You can chat on that instant chat thing they have and you can stroke. It’s this little thing button that says stroke and then you get alerted when someone has stroked you. They’ve just put poke in there to confuse you, cos it sounds like stroke.” I was amazed as to how confident I was. I knew this. I had turned up, in a big big way. Hursty didn’t know and I assumed the position of ‘The Man’.

“You sure?” Hursty said

“100%” I replied

“Let’s move the money then” Hursty said with a sense of urgency. We moved our money, and I had the audacity to shout “stop the clock” such was my level of confidence.

Davina read the question again, and then ran through the options. She said we’d put our money on ‘stroked’ and left the others blank. It’s at this point that everything became like slow motion. A wave of nausea swept my body. Was the answer ‘poked’? Had I got it wrong? Why would you ‘stroke’ someone on Facebook I suddenly thought? Oh no, surely not.

“Let’s see what drops” said Davina

‘Like’ disappeared, ‘Chat disappeared’. It was now between ‘Poke’ and ‘Stroke’. Hursty was looking so confident. He’d placed his trust in me and I’d even stopped the clock. I would’ve even of believed me.

Then the moment came that will live with me forever. A million pounds down the gutter…

 

“Oh no. The answer was poke. I’m so sorry guys. You’ve been great, thanks for coming on the show” said Davina.

Hursty looked at me. I looked at the floor.

“Stroke? Stroke? Who the fuck strokes someone on Facebook? They’re not fucking animals” Hursty was fuming.

I’d just monumentally embarrassed myself, again. This time though it was in front of the nation.

We walked back into the green room.

“I even knew that” said Brains.