by Rik Mayall
Non-gay and gay condoms.
So, what do you reckon, Dickie?
I know, I know, you’re probably trying to scoop your bowels back in, but just hang in there (I’m talking metaphorically). So here’s the deal: your non-gay condoms won’t work on arses (apart from birds’ arses of course – I’m all inclusive) and your gay condoms won’t work on birds’ front bottoms. Now you’re probably thinking, “Yeah yeah yeah, Rikster – love your idea (and everything else you do) but the whole gay/ non-gay concept is unenforceable.” And this is where I’m going to turn around (not literally because I’m sitting down although I could maybe swivel if I had a swivel chair) and hit you with the double whammy because not only have I developed this radical new contraceptive formula but I’ve also thought of how you could ensure that gays don’t use non-gay condoms and non-gays don’t use gay condoms. I don’t want to come over all authoritarian and I know we all like to go crazy and writhe like rabid beasts in a warm drizzle of blood and semen when we’re sinking giant boreholes of nob gristle, but there have to be rules. You and I know that Dickie, we’re civilised men of the world – but the younger people, well, don’t get me started on them – apart from the young female jugged up ones in which case do get me started on them (that’s another little joke for you there. Let’s not make anything of it.) What you need to do is install a small bleeper like a modified car alarm on the teet that you squeeze between thumb and forefinger as you roll it down your shaft*. Now I’m no product designer (although I probably could have been one if I hadn’t gone and failed my bloody Art “O” level – that was a travesty if ever there was one. Aren’t some people just felchers of the Devil’s ringpiece, eh Dickie?) but a small selflubing micro-chip might work for the alarm or failing that, a small backpack could be provided with the condoms which would contain the alarm and have a wire that runs around the man’s arse crack (in a small length of coving perhaps), bissecting the testicles and running in tandem with the blue vein along the old todger. As you can see, this isn’t just some off the wrist idea that I’ve scribbled down but a fully operational solution that could revolutionise contraception throughout the world. And not only will it ensure that rules are enforced but the alarm will also act as a warning to blokes who might be a bit drunk and end up with one of those lady boys in Bangkok. I’ve got a very long and painful anecdote about that.
Jesus, I’m on fire here, Dickie! Because another idea has just popped into my head like an exocet missile of pure crystalline genius. We could develop a special “genocide” version of the Maximum Warrior which could be sold to terrorists. And instead of the modified car alarm on the teet (that you squeeze between thumb and forefinger) you could have a small explosive charge that would explode as the wearer reached climax thereby killing the nasty bastard and whichever loser was curtseying on his toolkit. It’s hot – this is counter over-the-counter counter terrorism. Terrorism that works for us, the good guys. Terrorism-nice. Got a ring to it, hasn’t it? (Possibly a ringtone too – I’ll dance around with that one for a while and get back to you.) I’ve always fancied myself. As a UN ambassador. Anyway, that’s another memo.
So, Dickie, that just about raps it up. I look forward to hearing from you soon and keep up the good work.
Yours etc,
The Rik.
PS: I’ve copywrote all my great ideas and concepts herein and patents are pending and applied for or whatever the expression is, so don’t think you can take them and use them with some other Hollywood star instead of me. I have lawyers. I have my “people” and they are everywhere. No man is in Ireland.
DROP DEAD FRED
Hello again, viewer. Here’s a living fact that I want to share with you. Breakthruogh movies don’t just come along like that. They’re not just ten-a-penny. And Drop Dead Fred was another one just not like that. I remember it well which must mean something because remembering things well doesn’t always happen to remarkably unusual special people who are soon to have profoundly shocking life-threatening beyond death other side type experiences, like meeting God and learning things about stuff – so it matters. I remember it so well…
It was Christmas Eve and the rain was falling in that grim London way that only London rain can. It fell outside the sash windowpanes of my comfortable well-furnished enviable (actually) London home. I could smell chestnuts roasting. I was sitting a bit too close to the fire*. I wasn’t actually, I was sitting broodily by the fire like in a film, an art film, because I don’t do shit films. Some people call me Rik “doesn’t do shit films” Mayall. Anyway, the fire crackled warmly casting its Christmas lines on my children playing on the latest-styled carpet. My wife and friends were all laughing and were happy. But something was wrong. I just knew it. I concealed a tear from those I had paid for and cared for and given most of my money to and gazed out intelligently at the rain. What was it? What was this unnamed emotion that whispered at my sensitivity? Charity work? Another best-selling blockbuster smash hit West End play with lots of serious acting in it? Which one of these many things could it be I pondered as they wrestled together in my skull.
Ring.
I jerked*. The phone! Just leave it Rik Mayall, I thought, don’t let your cared-for-ones see that lonely tear. Just think what it would do to them you fool. Keep your emotions to yourself man†.
It was as if it was an instant later – which it was – that there was a tugging at my cardigan. It was one of my many children. I won’t say which one. It’s not because I can’t remember his name, it’s because I respect the privacy of people within my rarefied orbit.
“Daddy,” said the little tot, “there are two hugely successful Hollywood film screenwriters on the phone for you who want you to make a smash hit film for them. Shall I fuck them off?”
“What are their names, baby [fill in name]?” I interrogated.
“It’s Carlos Davis and Tony Fingleton, the hugely respected movie industry titans with countless blockbusters to their names. Shall I say that you’re whacked out on methadone as usual and why don’t they try Harry Enfield?”
“No, not this time, baby,” and a piece of well-honed stagecraft had that tear gone in the whisper of an eyelash. “You’d better tell them Daddy’s home. This might be something to give the nineteen nineties some meaning.”
I turned to the light.
“God I love you Daddy,” said baby as I strode purposefully towards the telephone which I snatched up like a power drill.
“Rik Mayall here, what’s the problem?”
“Rik Mayall, I can’t believe it. Rik Mayall whoah – this shit is coming down big time man! We got a situ-fuckin-ation here man – it’s one motherfucker of a scene! We’re like out of our arseeating minds here, Rik Mayall – we need someone who can act!”
“I think you’ve got the right number,” I breathed using one of my trademark top drawer knife-edge English accents that in Hollywood they call Saville Row. “If it’s a top screen acter you’re looking for then you obviously know the right place to look.”
“But Rik Mayall, it’s like, you know, like now man!”
“Relax gentlemen. All you need to do is give me a script with all the words and the other acters’ names in it and I’ll give you a smash. Like what you Americans say, I can act it up like a shiteating motherfucker of a bitch.”
“Like wow man, we love you,” they said.
“And if this is going to be a Rik Mayall film then you’d better start writing your award acceptance speeches.”
I turned to the wife like a nuclear warhead.
“Get my chopper out Belinda [check name] and give it a wipe because I’m going to L.A. and the rest is history yet to be written.”
She dropped to her knees.
“No, no, the helicopter,” I smiled forgivingly.
“Oh Rik Mayall, you and your top quality cock puns,” she laughed happily with tears rolling down her face. “So you’re really going to Hollywood?”
“Yes.”
“Is there time fo
r a…”
“No babe, let it wait. Besides, the children are in the room and I’ve got to go.” I scooped her into my arms in a top-lit two-shot. Our lips met again and again.
“I’ll be back in the spring,” I breathed huskily.
“Your helmet, Rik Mayall!” urged Hilary [really must check name].
I didn’t take the bait. Self control Rik Mayall, I thought.
I looked back at her and purred, “Keep it warm, baby.”
And in the blur of a flash I was away like a speeding bullet, roaring away on my hog*. Then I set off. Straight around the corner, down Carnaby Street, over the Kings Road, full throttle jumping the gap across Tower Bridge as it opened, screaming past the Houses of Parliament, twice around the dome, up Whitehall, over Westminster Bridge, round St Pauls, past Westminster Abbey, collar up down Fleet Street – I didn’t want any journalists to smell my intention on this breakthruogh movie – roaring along the Embankment avoiding pedestrians coming out of the National Theatre shouting, “Cor blimey, God bless the Queen Mum, apples and pears, it’s the Rik Mayall phenomenon! Now I’ve seen it all. You’re one of Britain’s top light entertainers. Stop your motorbike, we want to tell you how much we respec your work.” I slalomed around them signing autographs.
Three chords of action music and there I was in extreme close up at the desk at Heathrow.
“Passport please,” said the woman behind the desk.
“My face is my passport,” I growled. Her huge innocent blue eyes lifted up from the desk and puckered.
“I’m so sorry, Mr The Rik Mayall,” she blanched, clutching for support as she fouled herself. Her life was ruined.
“It’s all the same to me, bird,” I said kissing her on the face cheek. (Careful viewer – always get your cheeks right.)
I gave her a wink and boarded the plane like an exocet.
An air hostess who looked like that BBC weather girl who looks like she might be a bit dirty – you know the one – met me at the door to the plane and said, “This way please, Mr The Rik Mayall. Straight into First Class.”
“First Class? But I’m a socialist.”
“We know that and we love you for it but this situation must override your heartfelt beliefs in humanity’s equality and your lifelong championing of human rights. Added to which, the captain of the plane loves your work (as do we all),” she bracketed, “so you’ve got your own First Class Showbusiness The Rik Mayall Suite.”
I cupped her chin in my hand and whispered, “I respect women as well.”
“Oh I knew that a long time ago,” she heaved, her breasts engorging. She struggled to maintain consciousness such was the electro-static charge of attraction between us. I did one of my smouldering eye looks and breathed past her in one of my great suits.
She showed me into the Rik Mayall suite and unbuttoned her blouse.
“I’ve got something here for you,” she said.
I did that enigmatic thing that I do with my forehead.
“Jesus Christ, you’re enigmatic,” she intoned.
“There are three types of people in this life. There’s you, there’s me and there’s everyone else and I like your attitude young lady.” There was a moment and then it was gone. “Now, what have you got for me?”
“This,” she said and there it was. She unbuttoned another button on her blouse and she pulled out a big one. WHAP! And there it was in my lap, fat heavy and thick – the Drop Dead Fred script.
“Thanks Candice,” I said intuitively.
“That’s all right, The Rik Mayall. I’m just doing my job. If there’s anything else you need, I’m here for you. Maybe you’d like to join the Mile High Club?”
“I’m already a member. In fact, I’m the chairman. In fact again, even more factually, I’m the founder member.”
She turned to go and then she turned back. “Oh, and the captain loves your work,” she said. “Did I say that already?”
“Yeah baby.”
“I beg your pardon.”
“I mean, yes dear.”
“Oh right, sorry.”
And with that, my head hit the back of the seat. The government had obviously authorised an emergency take off for me. This was serious. The country, it’s people and showbusiness itself were at steak.
A voice came over the intercom: “Would all passengers please fasten their safety belts, unless you’re Rik Mayall, you can make up your own mind because you’re a free spirit roaming the globe like a high planes drifter.”
I allowed myself a wry smile.
“Thanks very much,” I said.
“That’s all right. You can have as many wry smiles as you like. Have one on me.”
“I am me.”
Safety belt or no safety belt, I was going to America.
Once I had changed my mind about Candice and the hot toilet action and then sunk a large one, I settled down to read the Drop Dead Fred script. The words quite literally jumped off the page and into my head where I memorialised them, verbatim, word for word. I finished it in the twinkling of an eye. I must get that looked at when we land, I thought. And I did. And it wasn’t. So I shouldn’t have. Forget it. Move on.
The plane screeched in with a howl of brakes leaving a trail of burning rubber and screaming ground crew in its wake.
Candice said, “This way Mr The Rik Mayall, good luck with the film.”
“No,” I said. “I’ll never leave a plane first. I insist, orphans first.”
“No, Rik Mayall,” said the orphans, “you go first. You are the man.”
“Thanks Orphans,” I said, “love your work.”
I threw – no not threw, tossed careingly – a fistful of autographed cash to them and I was out of there like a mushroom cloud.
“Clear the area! Incoming!” someone shouted as I strode like an inter-continental ballistic missile across the tarmac towards the airport. Only slimmer.
Whoah! I thought as I entered the building. What are all these flashing lights and sounds? I must have changed movie. This is America.
“Shit my Grandmother’s shit out of my own ass!” yelled an American voice as I approached. “It’s Rik fuckin’ Mayall! Hey guy, I love your motherfuckin’ work, man. I mean, are you for real? I’m like whoah! Hot shit diggety doo, my eyes is seeing you in unison man. I’m going out of my goddamn mind. You’re killing me bro.”
“Hello,” I exhaled with typical British restraint.
“May I see your passport please motherfucker?” said the customs man with a smile.
“Certainly,” I said.
“Maximum apology for this Rik-baby, you internationally acclaimed globe-trotting showbusiness phenomenon, but I got to ask you a question, man. What is the purpose of your visit?”
“I’m here to save the global entertainment industry with a breakthruogh new pre-award winning movie called Drop Dead Fred,” I said not immodestly.
“That’s some seriously dangerous shit Rik Mayall man. No popular light entertainer from the U-motherfuckin’-K has ever survived out here. Are you crazy or what?”
“Stand aside, I’m goin’ in or rather, excuse me, stand aside, I’m going in.”
“Eat my fatherfuckin’ ass breasts. Hold it there Rik fuckin’ Mayall, this is America man, it will eat you up and spit you out in little bits. You is gonna die boy! You can’t make the film Drop Dead Fred and put Working Title films back into the black by playing an invisible character. Nobody can. You’re out of your goddamn mind. You is a crazy motherfucker. You is gonna die screamin’. I don’t know where you think you English guys come from.”
“I’m not one of the English guys, I am THE English guy. Now, that’s enough chit chat extra, I’m a man on a mission.”
He looked a bit frightened of me.
“Okay, you mad mother.”
“Do you even know where England is?”
“No I don’t.”
“Well that’s why I’m making this film, friend, I need to put it on the map.” I span around and looked h
im in the eye. There was a beat. “Where do I go for the anal search?”
“No need man, I can see you’re clean.”
“No, I insist. I want to keep America safe. One day you will thank me for this when the war on terror is invented and everyone wants to kill all you Americans. Anyway, I’ve brought my own torch and Anusalve.”
Four hours later, I was allowed out of the cubicle. They used everything they had on me but I was as clean as a whistle. I walked out a proud man. Well, waddled a bit. No, not waddled, limped, but only a bit, although I leaked rather a lot. Even so, because I’m hard, I still think that four hours of fisting is a sensible security procedure.
Victory. I was through customs. My foot touched the good earth of the land of the free. This was America.
Someone shouted, “Eat lead and die, motherfucker!” as I walked across the airport concourse. A shot rang out and a body fell four blocks from a window and landed at my feet. I gave it an autograph and moved on.
SLAM! It was straight into the limo. There were lights flashing, motorcycle outriders, drive-by shootings, hi-velocity snipers’ bullets pinging off the bullet-proof windscreen of President Bush’s limo, and it was straight ahead to wherever these good people were needing me.
