Mindhowyougrow
COMIC IS QUIZ SHOW SURPRISEY MAN Stand-up stuns punters at garden centre by leaping out of water feature for new bbC programme
BY RICK FULTON r.fulton@dailyrecord/co.uk foR most of us, the biggest surprise we might get at a garden centre is finding that one of our purple primulas is yellow.
Or picking up a gnome that looks like Alan Titchmarsh.
So imagine the surprise of the green-fingered shoppers when someone jumped out of a water feature in a Gourock garden centre and asked them silly questions.
Stand-up comic Matthew Crosby has become Surprisey Man for Ready or Not, a new BBC pop-up quiz show.
Tomorrow night, he’ll be seen trying his luck at the Cardwell Garden Centre in Gourock.
Matthew said: “I wasn’t worried I’d get a Glasgow kiss. How aggressive can a garden centre really get?
“In fact, the first punter was a big, scary-looking 6ft-something guy. I leapt out and shouted, ‘Game on!’ and he was so surprised that he just bolted off through the garden centre.
“Luckily his ‘fight or flight’ instinct was set on ‘flight’ mode. His poor mum was just stood there, completely nonplussed.”
Matthew hid in a large wooden box wearing a “hat” that was made to look like a stone fountain.
He said: “I spent a very happy day hiding inside a water feature. When an unsuspecting member of the public walked past, I would leap out and try to convince them to play a game with me. I did all of this with about 3ft of fountain attached to the top of my head.”
While a few ran off, there were others who played the game and were interested in Matthew’s elaborate headgear.
He laughed: “The main thing people asked was whether or not the fountain I was wearing on my head was made of concrete.
“I don’t know how strong they think my neck muscles are but no, it was plastic. Sorry to spoil the magic, guys.”
Cardwell Garden Centre were thrilled to be chosen by the BBC and they even gave one of the crew their own surprise.
Paul Carmichael, the centre’s retail general manager, said: “While there were surprises on camera, we were involved in giving one of the show’s crew a surprise behind the scenes.
“It was the set designer’s birthday and our Patio Restaurant staff made a birthday cake.
“Everybody sang Happy Birthday when I presented it to him.”
Ready or Not is on BBC1 tomorrow at 6.20pm.
MATTHEW CROSBY ON FOUNTAIN FUN