The Ricky Gervais Show

Announcer: For the past few years ricky gervais,

Stephen merchant, and karl pilkington

Have been meeting regularly

For a series of pointless conversations.

This is one of them.

- Testing. - Is that all right?

Hello and welcome to "the ricky gervais show"

With me, ricky gervais, stephen merchant...

Hello. -...And the little round-headed buffoon

That is karl pilkington.

Hi.

Karl, joe from bradford asks,

"what body parts can you live without? " he wants to know.

He's obviously having sleepless nights thinking about this.

- What, so-- - ( both groaning )

- The brain. - He's coped this far.

I did a bit of an experiment on this.

Brilliant.

It's my job at home to wash up.

Suzanne does-- - she gives you all the really big responsible ones.

She pays the bills and wires the house.

And you go, "what can I do?"

"well, you can go and play with the worms in the garden."

Yeah. - So anyway, it's my job to wash up and that.

And I thought to make it interesting and stuff--

I thought, "I wonder if I can do it

If I didn't have any thumbs."

- And so what did you do? - So I just sort of--

You sliced off your thumbs.

I just sort of held them in,

And it's amazing how it took me ages

Just having that one thing gone.

Well, it's part of our evolution- the opposable thumb.

Basically, that's when we sought--

These are milestones in human evolution:

The opposable thumb,

The forward-facing eyes, the upright--

These are massive things in taking us

Out of the animal kingdom.

And one day, karl, you'll walk upright.

What do you mean about eyes facing forward?

You mean before we got here there was people

Whose eyes were looking in their head?

So when you were doing this experiment, washing up,

You say that you found it difficult.

So you didn't just give up

Once you realized how essential thumbs were.

You actually washed up everything.

I just think of suzanne walking in and karl's there

Just covered in water and fairy liquid suds,

Standing on a pile of broken crockery.

Yeah, plunging his face into the sink every 30 seconds

And just swishing his head around.

But we talked about the washing up thing before

When I look out of the window.

So the sink's in front of the window. - Yeah.

And that's why I quite like washing up

Because I can just look out onto the street, see people going past.

There's a local homeless fella called franco.

You know, I look out-- that he's all right and everything.

But I was looking across the way, right?

And there's some- there's some chinese people

Who live on-- in a flat, a really small flat.

And they're up till all hours.

- I don't know what they're doing. - ( stephen laughs )

But they decide to vac up

At about half 3:00 in the morning

And it was really noisy and that.

But above them there was some woman who--

The bedroom is on par

- To our kitchen. - Yeah.

- So I'm washing up... - Yeah.

...And I look across and see this woman

With no pants on and that,

No bra on and that.

Naked. - That's the word you're looking for.

Yeah yeah. She's just wandering about with nothing on.

So I was like, "oh, that's all right."

So I carried on washing up and that

And kept looking.

And then I was looking and she looked at me.

- So we made eye contact. - Stephen: Sure.

So I was like, "oh god."

So what I thought the best thing to do was--

Was sort of drop my pants a little bit...

Just a little bit. I had boxer shorts on.

I thought if I just show a little bit of--

A little bit of ass cheek,

Then it's kind of like we're quits.

I don't understand the thinking.

So suzanne's watching the telly.

I think she's watching "sex and the city" or something.

She turns around to see how I'm getting on with the washing up.

She sees me with my pants down a little bit with my ass out.

She said, "what are you doing?"

I said, "don't look now,

But there's a woman over the road

With no pants on and that.

She caught me looking.

I'm just giving her a bit back."

I love the fact that he explains the rules

And suzanne's gonna go, "okay. " - "that makes sense."

But I don't-- so hang on.

You showed a bit of your ass.

You turned presumably to show the ass.

I had to lift it up a little bit

On the draining board.

What-- hang on though.

What did she do? Did you register her reaction?

When she saw a bit of your ass, what happened?

- When she saw my ass? - Yeah.

Well, then I wasn't looking because I thought

In a way I don't want ito look like,

"well, I've seen a bit of your stuff. Here's a bit of mine."

Just thought, "at the end of the day I caught a glance of you."

- It's only fair. - "you've had a bit back."

- You know, I'm not-- - you see, I genuinely think

James stewart missed a trick here in "rear window." - yeah.

This would have been a much better film

Had james stewart just popped his pants down.

It would have given a whole new meaning to the title "rear window."

- Yeah, exactly. - It's tricky though.

I seem to be surrounded by people like that.

Remember that film? That "slither" or something. - Okay, right.

The one where they've got video cameras.

I'm just looking onto everybody's world

And just seeing what people are getting up to.

- There's nothing wrong with that. - Ricky: Brilliant.

That's why I like washing up.

We were talking about famous mantras

- And sayings and things. - Yeah.

"never has a manc said so much to so many that means so little."

Brilliant. - So you can have that on your headstone.

Stephen: Rupert-- - riy: Your little round headstone.

Rupert's in the isle of man.

He says, "I don't know if you knew this, karl,

But apparently octopuses' testicles are located in their heads."

Yeah.

But then to me that isn't that amazing

Because at the end of the day an octopus--

Really, all it is is an head, isn't it?

So everything it's got has to be in the head? - It has to be in the head.

It'd look daft if it dangled down below.

- ( ricky laughing ) - karl: Right?

So all it is-- I mean, there's a lot of facts-- - stephen: Hang on.

It'd look daft it they dangled down below?

I'm wondering, but that could almost be the b side to...

b side to " I could eat a nob at night."

James round says, "karl, if you could be

Anyone in the world, who would it be?"

Uh...

Dead or alive?

Why would you choose to be a dead person?

No, but sometimes there's people who are now dead,

But everybody raves about them.

What I mean is-- - oh, just answer the question. Who would you be and why?

It's someone you admire or you think had a good life.

But what I mean is he's got to be remembered--

Like winston churchill is remembered as being a decent bloke,

But I wouldn't want the hassle that he had.

So I don't wanna live his life. - Right.

- But he's got to be- - - you'd like to be winston churchill,

But you'd like to have a paper round instead of... - ( glass shatters )

- Saving the world. - Yeah.

Well, that's what I mean.

But is he saying who uld I wanna- whose job would I take on?

- It's not that complicated. - The question is this:

"if he could be anyone in the world, who would karl be?"

That's the question. That's all the information I've got.

Whew, a lot of responsibility on a lot of jobs, isn't there?

Some of the names flowing through your head now?

Um, I was thinking bruce willis.

I never expected that. I never expected that.

So what-- so his responsibility in your mind is what?

Saving people who are trapped in a building with terrorists?

Well, yeah, maybe.

You know, his worries are different worries.

With people who have a lot of money

Come other worries.

- Yeah. - Do you know what I mean?

So bruce willis, he's always going on these marches,

Saying "stop war" and all that...

...Mainly because he's got--

He's got more to lose if there's a war.

He's got loads of houses. One of them's gonna get damaged.

Whereas if you're poor,you'.

If there's a war, it's like, "oh, just hand it off for me then.

I'm sick of it anyway."

- Do you know at I mean? - Whereas bruce-- yeah.

With successful life and happy life,

There's more for you to lose is what I'm saying. - Right.

Like, at the moment, because I've finished the job that's--

That I've been at for 10 years...

I've finished working there, so suddenly I've got--

My timetable's a bit out and I haven't got enough of a routine.

And I'm a man who likes to know what I'm doing. - Stephen: Yeah.

So now suddenly, I-- - 5 until 7: 00: Washing up with no thumbs.

I like-- I've sort of turned into an old person

Where the little jobs that you shouldn't enjoy are now the main event.

Hold on. How old are you?