Weaver's Week 2025-01-19

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Never know what you've got till it's gone.

Contents 1 Tony Slattery 2 The Tony Slattery Game Show Marathon 3 Watch along 3.1 Trivial Pursuit 3.2 The Music Game 3.3 Going for a Song 3.4 Tibs and Fibs 3.5 Who am I? 4 In other news 4.1 Quiz digest

Tony Slattery

At one point in the early 1990s, Tony Slattery was ab-so-blimmin-lutely everywhere. He'd be on the observation round on The Krypton Factor. He'd host The Music Game for Channel 4. He'd be in about fifteen adverts in every commercial break, and probably did the voiceover for the rest.

And then, all of a sudden, Tony Slattery had vanished. We didn't know that he had huge struggles with his mental health, which caused some terrible self-destructive behaviour. Let's go through his life and career, with a warning that the story gets very dark at points.

We first bumped into Tony Slattery on Whose Line is it Anyway?, the improvisation entertainment where comedy's young whippersnappers were given silly scenes to do. The show's ensemble cast – folk like Josie Lawrence, Jeremy Hardy, Kit Hollerbach, Fry and Laurie, and Richard Vranch at the piano – lifted each other to greater heights of absurdity and good-natured silliness. And, in Tony's case, barely-suppressed foulmouthery. The host Clive Anderson had his hand on the buzzer, and made sure each sketchette stopped before we'd finished laughing.

Clive remembered his co-star this week. "With quick wit and stunning good looks, Tony was unfailingly funny and even more unfailingly outrageous. He would not use two words if a ruder one would do – the naughtiest kid in the class, adored by the studio audience and those watching on tv."

By the time this column caught up with him, Tony Slattery had been born the youngest of five children, to Irish emigrants who settled in London and ran a loving and volatile household. He went through Gunnersbury Boys' School, and to Cambridge University, where he learned about mediaeval and modern languages. Tony also spent time in the Cambridge Footlights, an illustrious drama and comedy group, where he was quick to make a mark and eventually elected president. His television breakthrough, we think, was on children's magazine show TX in 1985; then he bugged the producers to make him a regular on Radio 4's Whose Line, and the subsequent Channel 4 television show.

Quick wits, good looks, and an innate ability to match the tone to the show: the perfect host for any programme. Producers and commissioners opened their doors to him – Tony hosted The Music Game on Channel 4, and Trivial Pursuit on The Family Channel. He did Who am I? and Clipjoint on regional ITV, and manners quiz Ps and Qs on BBC2. Then there were adverts for teabags, a spot on every series of Have I Got News for You, observation skits for The Krypton Factor, radio's Just a Minute, daytime charades Give Us a Clue, antiques botheration Going for a Song, and many many more. Channel 5 opened and Tony hadn't presented a show on it, so he signed up for Tibs and Fibs.

Television commissioners have a habit of glomming on to a handful of familiar faces, who are invited to host every show under the sun. Tony Slattery is the most obvious example of this: throughout the nineties he did a near-constant stream of quizzes, sketch shows, films, sitcoms, chat shows to plug his films, stage plays, and commercials. Subsequent stars have learned from this ubiquity – the likes of Ore Oduba and Alan Carr do their best to keep a decent balance between their work and their life.

Tony Slattery didn't get that balance right. He made films – Peter's Friends alongside his Cambridge Footlights pals, The Crying Game, How to Get Ahead in Advertising. He did stage shows – his first big gig was the mid-80s revival for Me and My Girl in the West End, later starring in the musical Radio Times, and comedy Neville's Island. And there were telly sitcoms, most notably Just a Gigolo.

But Tony never took a break, and found himself exhausted and irritable. He'd always come across as a vaudeville clown, using humour and bonhomie to hide darkness in his heart. An awards ceremony was once shocked when he picked up a gong and delivered a personal attack on leading theatre critics. Tony's performance on Whose Line became so poor that even the producers noticed and they stopped inviting him.

Off-stage, Tony was spending thousands of pounds on cocaine, and drinking heavily. A mental health crisis filled much of 1996: he ignored phone calls, left letters unread. It took a friend breaking into his flat to force Tony to seek help; a bipolar disorder was diagnosed. He'd later recall this part of life as "I had a very happy time until I went slightly barmy."

Tony went back to showbiz for a few years, but his career never quite recovered. He held down a steady role on ITV drama Kingdom from 2007-09, made considered guest roles on long-running shows like Casualty, and had toured a theatre comedy show last autumn, with further dates planned for the next few months. He made What's the Matter with Tony Slattery?, a documentary about his mental health, shown on BBC2 in 2020. That doc sparked a wave of public fondness; it also introduced us to his long-time partner Mark Michael Hutchinson, who survives Tony.

Paul Merton, another star from Whose Line, paid tribute, "There was a sadness inside of him. From the outside Tony was one of those people who appeared to have everything going for him. Everything but inner stability. He should have been one of our biggest stars. He had the world at his feet."

The Tony Slattery Game Show Marathon

We've picked out five shows from Tony's long list of credits.

Trivial Pursuit

Action Time made this programme for The Family Channel in 1993 and 1994. It's an early example of an American format owner not quite getting the British market, and the result is a poor show.

Three players join Tony in "The Family Channel Studios", and that studio has been decorated in a full-sized replica of the Trivial Pursuit board. A brief introductory chat with all the players, and then we're into the game proper. The aim is for the players to collect 12 correct answers, two in each of the coloured categories.

The traditional set of Trivial Pursuit categories appears on a computer screen. The player to the left picks a category, and hears a question. Right answer earns one of the correct wedges; wrong answer – or no answer in three seconds – puts the question on the buzzers for the other players. The next player along takes their pick of the remaining categories – there's just one question per category – and so on.

There's another round of questions, starting with the player in the middle, and asking just one per person. Then we're into some unusual categories, with media clips – a photo or a film clip. Although the categories have changed, the colours remain the same, and what was a "Geography" question might now be "Musicals", but still Blue. Some questions come in two parts: the first part for the wedge, the second to remove a wedge from another player's pie.

Trivia Tactics is the next round. Another set of categories, and the rightmost player picks a category for the leftmost player. The hope is that the nominated player will get the question wrong, allowing the others to pilfer it on the buzzer. Three rounds of questions, with an advert break in the middle.

Then there's a final round to fill up the pie. "Control" questions are asked, could be anything. Then the player who gets that right can nominate any one of the subjects on the traditional card. Get the question right, win a wedge; get it wrong, the question's thrown open to the others. And if nobody gets the question right, they have to start over with another control question. A sharp bell sounds at 60 seconds to go, and Tony gives a long explanation of how there's 60 seconds to go, and how if nobody gets all twelve wedges then whoever's ahead at the end of time will win. And, yes, there will be a tie-break if needed.

Losers get a Family Channel t-shirt and a reference book; winner adds a video of news from a memorable year, and can go for the holiday. It's a break in somewhere like Lisbon or Guernsey: not a zillion miles away, but very pleasant. This final is simple: six right in 60 seconds, no categories, questions from anywhere thrown about.

It's a low-budget show, and production values are not particularly high. Fluffs are left in – on the opening episode, Tony asks a contestant about his favourite comic book, and was met with "pass" ^{see footnote 1}. Another episode gave the answer "Christopher Dean and James Torvill" to much hilarity. For the second series, some of the more irritating things were removed – a loud bell to indicate when each question ran out of time was replaced by a pleasant buzz, they stopped using beeps to select the category, and took the selected categories off the computer display board.

Trivial Pursuit wasn't a brilliant show, it's the definition of watch it because it's on. And, for The Family Channel, which subsisted on a diet of old TVS game shows and syndicated American sitcoms, it's good enough. Tony Slattery was a competent host, he was on top of the rules – they're somewhat more complex than they need to be – and made sure the show stayed on the rails. But he could do better.

The Music Game

Two series of this entertainment went out on Channel 4 during 1992 and 1993. Mike Mansfield TV made this, HTV ensured it was fit to broadcast and presented it to Channel 4. Our sample episode comes from 21 October 1993, opened by a virtuoso performance from violinist Katherine Rodgers. Our other panellists are entertainer and skateboarder Tony Hawks, and singer Sandie Shaw.

It's a fun-packed half hour. Contestants see a video clip and answer questions on it, as happens on all panel shows. Then they hear two songs being played at once, and are to identify both tracks and answer a question about them.

"What's that snatch?" is next, a typical slice of Tony Slattery's near-the-knuckle humour. The "snatch" is a brief extract of a familiar tune, played on the piano by Richard Vranch – who we remembered from Whose Line Is It Anyway?. One snatch each, and a bonus mark to spot the link between the Penguin Café Orchestra, that song from Robin Hood Prince of Thieves, and "I was Kaiser Bill's bat man". RuPaul's idea was decades away.

After the break, the players are quizzed on their specialist subjects, ones they've nominated for the show. Three tracks, identify them and there's a further question to follow. Next comes a tribute to Joseph Cooper's Face the Music, but rather than the dummy keyboard which didn't play a note, Richard brings out the "plummy" keyboard full of posh people saying "ah". A quickfire buzzer round ends the show.

The Music Game was an entertainment, Tony played fast and loose with the scores and dished out bonus points as he felt fit. Yes, they do declare a winner, and both Tony Hawks and Sandie Shaw wanted to be that winner. When we talk about the show tomorrow, we'll remember the fun rather than who won. And it's clear that Tony Slattery was in his element, he had a lifelong love of musicals and music in all its forms – in retrospect, it would have been lovely if he'd been able to make some programmes sharing that passion with us.

In the greater scheme of music quizzes, The Music Game marks a watershed. It's the first time classical and pop music were treated as equals. Cooper's Face the Music had been resolutely classical; at this time Radio 4's Counterpoint was primarily classical and might deign to ask a few questions about pop but didn't expect to hear a correct answer. Phil Swern wrote the questions for The Music Game, and the show was fun and laughter from start to finish; it's a shame that they chose to go down a more dour route when Popmaster came to telly.

Going for a Song

This was a Maverick production for BBC Pebble Mill, and our sample episode comes from September 1995. It went out at 12.20, after TalkAbout (a phone-in topical debate which had a short pilot series) and before the regional news. Michael Parkinson hosted, with Eric Knowles the resident antiques expert. This was a revival of a series that had originally gone out on BBC1 at Sunday teatimes in the 1960s and 70s.

The game is played by two teams of two, a celebrity and an antiques expert. The bulk of the contest involves the pairs handling and looking at an object from the past. Their aim is to answer three questions: what is this thing, how old is it, and how much would it fetch at auction? Marks out of three are awarded for each object, and formalities require them to declare a winner at the end. There's also an interlude where Eric Knowles examines a large piece of furniture, and he whips out a mystery object for both teams at the end.

Through the show, we see Tony's excitement at rootling through the past: a cigarette case signed by stars of the 1940s, beer mats that turn over to reveal drinking songs, a device for pressing corks together so you can pop them in the top of the bottle and they'll expand a bit further. He proves very adept at the challenges, able to identify the items and give a good valuation – if at times slightly generous.

Back in 1995, Going for a Song will have found its audience amongst the pensioners who watched daytime BBC1: it's a show you don't have to watch with full attention, if one item bores you there will be another along in a moment. Michael Parkinson kept the show running at pace, perhaps a little too fast to allow the celebrity guests to shine. On this episode, Tony Slattery was competitive, and knowledgeable, but he didn't contribute much of himself – they could have booked Josie Lawrence or Hugh Laurie and got a similar result.

Tibs and Fibs

From the opening titles, we reckon this is going to be Have I Got Bodily Functions For You – fast plinky-plonky music, animated titles. The set is a bit like an operating theatre, with a large circle of spotlights hovering above the host's head.

Tony Slattery is the host, with somewhat shorter hair than we've seen before. The team captains are Tony Gardner and Dr. Phil Hammond of comedy troupe Struck Off and Die, joined this week by Craig Charles and Margi Clarke. Dr. Hilary Jones is the resident expert in the corner of the studio; this is something of a revelation, a 1997 show, we've not previously seen another timedmunds between 1981's Runaround and 2004's Beat the Nation. ^{see footnote 2}

The opening round is questions about medicine, and quickly degenerates into renaming politicians after body parts – "Toe Knee Benn" one of the few we can repeat. The next round involves the guests indicating parts of the anatomy by drawing on a barely-clothed model. Ah, welcome to late night Channel 5 circa 1997, when every show was about football, films, or this sort of thing.

After the break, it's an "educational film" that the teams can mock and ridicule. And Dr. Phil Hammond has a mini-tantrumette, suggesting that if the scores are irrelevant then what the f' are they doing anyway? Good question, and the discussion goes into exactly how Dr. Hammond swallowed the f-word in his passion, which explains why he's a broadcasting professional even at this young age. For the next round, guests Craig and Margi are asked to be speechless.

Craig Charles. Speechless.

Yeah, right. Anyway, the players are asked to mime various hospitally things to their doctor partner. Turns out that Craig cannot keep quiet, but is absolutely ace at miming with the use of his voice. Next, it's Name That Tool: the panel don white gloves and handle ancient surgeon's tools, and try to determine what it might have been used for and where on the body it might best be used.

Any panel quiz requires a quickfire buzzer round, and this panel quiz will end with a quickfire buzzer round. The show ends in a draw, which feels entirely fitting. Late night humour at its late night funniest.

Who am I?

This little curio went out on a warm Wednesday evening in summer 1996, in a strand on Meridian called Take 7, which suggests it may have been a series of pilot episodes. It's a celebrity panel game, filmed in front of a studio audience, and a very decent panel – raconteur Ned Sherrin and comedian Helen Lederer versus punk artist Janet Street-Porter and comedian Jim Sweeney.

The opening round asks players to identify a famous person from a punning sentence: for instance, "I sometimes blow, but I never inhale" should suggest the well-known saxophonist Bill Clinton. Four points for each correct answer and no conferring.

Next round invites the teams to identify someone from briefly hearing them; four for a quick answer, two for hearing a longer clip, and one if it goes over to the other side. Then there's a list round, Tony reads out the cast list of a film or tv show, and teams buzz in when they think they know. Ten points if someone can guess from a single name, a point off for each extra name, and the teams lose a point if they buzz in and get it wrong. Rather like this idea, both as something to play and as a scoring mechanism.

After the break, it's identify the source of some quotes. Perhaps goes on a bit long, there was a risk of turning into the television version of Quote... Unquote, and nobody wants to see that. Then it's a Talkabout round – Tony's got five facts about someone on his card, the teams get 45 seconds to talk about that person, and two points if the team mentions a fact on the card. Gets quite heated, especially when Janet Street-Porter gets to talk about amateur theologian and qualified chemist Margaret Thatcher. The final round: Tony names places, expects to hear people associated with that place. For instance, "Metropolis" – Superman.

It's a very competitive show, perhaps too competitive to be thoroughly entertaining. Tony keeps the energy up, keeps the battle charged. Looking back, we now know where this unstoppable energy came from, this dark competition stemmed from the host's own anger and trauma, and the substances he abused to mask the pain. And, in the months between this programme being recorded and transmitted, the unstoppable energy had stopped, Tony's internal flywheel had ground to a halt.

Who Am I? contained something we might take as a laconic summary of Tony Slattery's life.

In other news

We've rather covered the original Going for a Song and Face the Music, and a review here would be unnecessary; half-a-dozen episodes of each show were repeated on BBC4 last autumn, and are still on the I-player.

Laurie Holloway died last week. The bandleader and composer wrote the music for so many shows, including Punchlines and Blind Date, and Game for a Laugh and Beadle's About. He was also the bandleader on Parkinson the chat show, and led the orchestra for the first three series of Strictly Come Dancing. Laurie Holloway was 86.

Another series of Picture Slam has been ordered by BBC1. Last year's new episodes averaged just under 3 million viewers at Saturday teatimes, which can't entirely be people tuning in early for Strictly. Such is the novelty and innovation shown by this "Name That Thing" series that the commission has been extended from 10 episodes to 6. ^{see footnote 3}

Just one point in the Only Connect quarter-final, where the Cat Cows beat the Sprouters 20-19. Captain Max McGenity overcame an error to get three inscriptions from around the edge of a £2 coin. Perhaps the most important development came in the first question: on the Sprouters' serve, neither team could identify people who shared their forenames with the Cambridge spy ring. Cat Cows scored two on each link in that first round, and wouldn't be headed until the quickfire buzzer finale.

Speaking of connections, we left one earlier in The Music Game. The link is Batman: the comic where Robin, Penguin, and Batman are all characters. The writers on Only Connect know that this question needs work.

What do this year's Imperial College team know? It is quicker to list the holes in their knowledge: poetry of Sylvia Plath, the music career of Robert Fripp, early 20th century composers other than Shostakovitch. And, er, that's about it. Imperial absolutely bossed University Challenge, beating Wadham Oxford by 345-25.

Seas of green on our stats sheet: that 345 is the highest score of the year, they got 54/70 (77%) right, all of those stats are season highs. 38/48 on the bonuses, more right than any other team; the 79% rate is the second-top this year. Only the penalty for one incorrect interruption is anything like average.

Quiz digest

This week, we learned:

• The first recipe for tomato ketchup was published in 1812. Listen carefully to the singers in Tchaikovsky's famous Overture and they'll screech it to you. (House of Games)
• How long is France's land border with Luxembourg? 69 kilometres; Nice is about 900km away. (Topper's Quizzical Evening)
• The literary term "cliffhanger" takes its name from a Thomas Hardy serial novel. Following the fashion of the 19th century, A Pair of Blue Eyes was originally published one chapter at a time. At the end of one instalment Henry slips over the edge of a precipice. He cannot ascend because the ground above is slippery, cannot go down because there's a sheer drop beneath. How will he escape? We'll tell you next time. (briefly mentioned on University Challenge)

Phweep! Just a Minute returns (Radio 4, Mon). Paint! Landscape Artist of the Year starts (Artsworld, Wed). Friday gives us the finals of Junior Bake Off (C4) and The Traitors (BBC1). Legend plays mind games on Gladiators (BBC1, Sat), and we have a new run of The 1% Club (ITV).

We're not publishing next week, so watch out for Yankee The Traitors (The One In The Scottish Castle); on the I-player from next weekend, and BBC3 nightly from Monday 27th. Great Local Menu starts its new series (BBC2, Tuesday 28th). When we come back on 2 February, we plan to cover Bullseye and Pictionary, with The Traitors pencilled in for 9 February.

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Footnotes:

1. This column says: never be without a Beano.
2. The "timedmunds" later evolved into the "richardosman".
3. One episode of Picture Slam is stuck on a BBC shelf, and wasn't transmitted in series 2.

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