If this was the only thing I did on telly for the rest of my career, I’d be happy
HUMPHREYS GEORGIA
John Bishop might be famous for telling jokes, but in recent years he’s taken on a more serious TV role. He tells about making his talk show a success, plus his emotional interview with Paddy Mcguinness
JOHN BISHOP is deducing why people like being interviewed by him. After all, with a stellar line up for the fourth series of John Bishop: In Conversation With... the Liverpudlian comedian, 51, must be doing something right.
He even managed to secure an interview with David Walliams after he’d turned down appearing on Piers Morgan’s “more established” (as John puts it) show.
“There might be an argument to say, ‘Well, that’s because you’re softer on them, or you’re nicer on them’,” remarks John, who worked in sales until he found fame in middle age with stand-up.
“But I don’t think, if you watch the show, that that’s the case. I just think that people don’t think they’re going to get stitched up.”
The amiable TV personality adds: “Piers is good at loads of things and his show’s been a great success and, you know, fair play to him.
“But I wouldn’t want our show to be in competition because I just think we’re a very different beast.”
The UK TV original series, which airs on W, sees John focus on just one guest each episode, resulting in revealing and intimate chats with a range of people in the public eye (memorable past guests include Jeremy Corbyn, Lindsay Lohan and Katie Price).
This time round, the likes of Paddy Mcguinness, Professor Green, Will Young, Ruth Jones and Gabby Logan will be opening up to the comic, about everything from their careers to their childhoods to their mental health.
It was the interview with his “good mate” Paddy that John found particularly emotional watching back in the edit recently.
The Take Me Out presenter has discussed his twins’ autism in the past. But, as he
THE SECRET LIFE OF PUPPIES
Tonight, Channel 5, 5pm
MORE extraordinary stories starring puppies great and small. Hungarian vizsla pup Gilbert needs regular physio and hydrotherapy, but now he must move out of his birth home.
Luckily, Gilbert has been found new owners who will devote a lot of time to him.
Meanwhile, Barley is a 20kg Newfoundland pup. Newfies were originally bred to be water rescue dogs. However, Barley doesn’t seem keen on training – or water.
FORMULA 1 AUSTRIAN GRAND PRIX LIVE
Tomorrow, Channel 4, 1.40pm Spielberg, Austria, for the ninth round of the season. Mercedes’ Valtteri Bottas dominated the race here last year to take his second victory of 2017 ahead of Sebastian Vettel, Daniel Ricciardo and Lewis Hamilton, who recovered to fourth, after starting in eighth on the grid. With this season starting to look like another two-horse race between Vettel and Hamilton for the title, the points up for grabs in this race could be key.
DAVID WALLIAMS PRESENTS – RETURN OF ALRIGHT ON THE NIGHT:
Monday, ITV, 9.15pm
NOW that clips of on-camera mishaps can be shared around the world online, is there still a place for It’ll be Alright on the Night on TV? Well, if anyone can told his interviewer, he’d never talked about his feelings in as much detail as we will see him do in episode three.
“I watched this show and cried, and said to him, ‘Mate, it’s really strong’,” recalls John. “And it’s not because somebody’s cried, it’s because you’ve got somebody revealing a part of themselves that I don’t think they would ever do anywhere else.” Professor Green, meanwhile, is known for being a very open celebrity, but still surprised John with how much detail he
persuade us there’s still life in the format, it’s David Walliams. He will bring us a selection of classic outtakes, as well as new clips. And if that doesn’t sate your appetite for watching TV presenters get it wrong, there’s a second edition on Tuesday.
BRIDE & PREJUDICE
Tuesday, Channel 4, 9pm
THE last episode of this frequently thought-provoking series features 37-year-old Elaine from Warrenpoint, Northern Ireland, and her 20-year-old boyfriend Shane who are hoping an engagement party will help overcome her family’s objections to their age gap. In south London, Junior, who was raised in a devout Christian family, wants to get his went into about the past.
“Everyone knows he got stabbed in the neck with a bottle. But how that affected his view of mortality, of what he should do with his life, about his own mental health and then how that fed into his understanding of his father’s mental health... all of those things you don’t see when you read the newspaper headline, ‘He was stabbed in the neck’.”
When it comes to his interview approach, down-to-earth John, who got his big break after appearing on the Jonathan Ross show in 2010, thinks it’s important he doesn’t have, say, an earpiece in with someone telling him what to say next.
“This show is predicated on the fact that my second question is based on your answer to the first question,” he explains matter-of-factly.