‘Me and daddy are obsessed with GREGG wallace’
Jack Whitehall and his father Michael are delighted to have the Masterchef maestro on board for their new show
Anyone familiar with Jack Whitehall’s hilarious show Travels With My Father will know all about his unique relationship with his dad Michael. The pair have bantered their way across the world together, shared their anecdotes on stage and are now treating us to a Father’s Day one-off special.
Jack will be setting up on the pavement outside his parents’ house so he can spend some quality time with his grumpy dad during lockdown. They’ll reminisce over old times and awkward moments, catch up with some famous faces, take part in a special edition of Masterchef and surprise key workers who can’t be with their loved ones this Father’s Day.
Here, jolly Jack, 31, and deadpan Michael, 80, tell us all about it.…
So, guys, what can we expect from the show?
Jack: It’s our attempt at some Father’s Day fun, but from the comfort of our own homes.
We’ll have some surprises for Michael and a few things that we’ll film in advance, like our lockdown version of Masterchef, which we’re doing because
I’ve been doing a lot of cooking and it’s a show we both love. Ooh, tell us about that…
Jack: Me and Daddy are obsessed with Gregg Wallace and on our family Whatsapp group we always send each other Gregg Wallace memes and Gregg Wallace quotes. I love Gregg Wallace innuendos – he’s one of my favourite people on television. When we came up with the idea of this show, my first thought was that perhaps we could do something with Masterchef and thankfully they were very up for it. So we’re going to do Lockdown Masterchef with Gregg and John Torode. Food packages are going to be dropped on our doorstep and we’re going to cook a meal and bike them over to Gregg and John for them to decide who wins. Michael: The slight problem is that I can’t cook anything except scrambled eggs. Give me a steak and it will come back to you black and completely tasteless. And if you cut it open it will be pale grey inside. Jack: Which is why you should definitely watch him doing Masterchef !
Will this show be the first time you see each other in person? Jack: I have jogged past Mummy and Daddy’s house a couple of times, but this will be the closest we’ve been in a while.
Have you missed each other? Jack: Yes. We’re a very close family and spend a lot of time together, so it’s been quite weird to adjust. But we’ve found a way – we’ve done lots of Zoom calls and the family Whatsapp group has been really up and running.
Michael: What’s amazing is all this technology, which obviously I don’t understand, but you can keep in touch with anyone, anywhere, at any time, which is just extraordinary.
Do you have fond memories of Father’s Day growing up? Jack: I do. Because I was at boarding school, Father’s Day would be one of the weekends you always came home for and you got to spend time with your mum and dad. They had no excuse not to come and collect us – there was no getting out of it! We’d have a Sunday roast. That will be the sad thing about this year – not having one of my mum’s Sunday roasts. It just isn’t the same when you make it yourself. I reckon you can recreate any restaurant dish, but not your mum’s roast.
Michael: Can I just nail something down about Jack and boarding school?
Jack: Oh, here we go!
Michael: The truth is we wanted our children to go to London day schools, so we could see them every day of the week. But the problem is, those schools are academic and it’s quite difficult to get into a London day school unless you’re very academically gifted. I say no more.
Jack: I did actually see a lot of them. Most weekends I would come home, because when I was 13 I told Daddy that every weekend you came home they would take a percentage off the school fees, so he thought that would drive the price down! He’s so tight and wanted to get some sort of bargain basement deal on my education.
Jack, have you taken any parenting tips from your dad for the future?
Jack: Yes. Get them to boarding school as soon as possible. Nannies first, then boarding school, then university. Keep them at arm’s length!
Michael: University worked well, didn’t it, Jack? We were so proud of him when he got his degree and had his gown and mortar board.
Jack: Two metres from
Daddy is fine, because as a child the distance between us was 66 miles. Not that anyone’s counting!
Jack Whitehall’s Father’s Day is on BBC One on Friday 19 June at 8.30pm