The latest topical insight from Aberdeen musical sketch comedy team, The Flying Pigs.
Shelly Shingles, showbiz correspondent and Miss Fetteresso 1983
OM actual G! I was so so excited to hear that dreamboat star Harrison Ford was in Scotland filming a new Indiana Jones movie. And then I remembered the last one, which made me sad face emoji.
But I was still totes shocked and emoshe to hear that the poor bloke had been injured whilst rehearsing a fight scene. And this coming not long after a Millennium Falcon door fell on him while making Star Wars, to a man who’s already crashed his own plane. His insurance premiums must be mental!
But what were they thinking, letting him do fight scenes at his age? My mum is younger than him and we don’t let her open tricky jars of beetroot.
Of course, me and Harrison go way back. We first met in 1992 when he was in London filming Patriot Games with Sean Bean and I was just getting my big break in movies. I was cast in my first featured supporting role of “woman at bus stop” (uncredited).
Tragically, our big scene ended up on the cutting room floor but I’ll never forget what Harrison said to me on my first day on set: “What are you doing in my trailer?”
Wise words from a true gent.
J Fergus Lamont, arts correspondent
Having foolhardily travelled to London last week, in fruitless anticipation of the reopening of West End theatres, I found myself in Leicester Square where I stumbled upon a musical phenomenon.
You may not have heard of them, for they have received little or no publicity, but choral group The Tartan Army were there, staging a marathon impromptu open-air concert. The choir has many hundreds of members, making it a sight to behold, though evidently tricky to work out the harmonies.
Clad in tartan, like latter-day Bay City Rollers, but with the rough-hewn braggadocio of the Gallagher brothers, what they lack in musicality they make up for in sheer red-faced commitment.
Though I was unable to pick out many of their tunes, their eclectic set list contained some recognisable cover versions of artists like the Corries, Baccara and Rod Stewart, alongside acapella renditions of works by Elgar, Richard Rogers and Billy Ray Cyrus.
I was particularly taken by this last piece; a lilting ballad telling the tale of “Super John McGinn” who had been been “got” in some unspecified way.
Truly, it was joyous, and I was unexpectedly moved when the group underlined the close feelings of friendship and camaraderie between them and our English cousins by comparing and contrasting the oeuvres of our nations’ two greatest authors; serenading the Leicester Square statue of William Shakespeare with a hymn to both their differences and their similarities entitled You’re Just A Shy Rabbie Burns.
I wept.
Tanya Souter, lifestyle correspondent
I da ken aboot youse, but I wiz delighted fan I heard they’re gan tae ban junk food ads on the TV afore 9pm. Then I wiz shocked tae hear that the ban includes adverts for breakfast cereal, yoghurt, chicken nuggets and battered fish. Eh? At’s nae junk food, at’s jist food food, is it?
Surely junk food is the stuff wi’ nae nutritional value at a’, like pop-corn, Haribos Starmix and celery?
If ye pit on McDonald’s adverts late at night, a’ that will happen is that folk like me will order a Deliveroo in the middle o’ Vera
The hale point o’ this is tae stop kids being exposed tae adverts for things fit is bad for yer health. Happily, my kids his never been obese. I pit it doon tae a fast metabolism. That and a’ the running they dae, fae shopkeepers, truant officers and bobbies.
But I dinna ken fit difference they think it’ll mak keeping the ads ’til efter nine at night. It’s a’ streaming these days, is it? Kids dinna watch cooncil telly, so they niver see TV adverts onywye. If they wint kids tae nae see junk food adverts, nae pitting them on the telly isnae the answer, they should nae pit them on the internet instead, should they?
Fa’s watching commercial TV after nine at night? I’ll tell ye, folk like me. I dinna ‘hink they’ve thocht through the potential negative public health effects o’ the move. ‘Cause if ye pit on McDonald’s adverts late at night, a’ that will happen is that folk like me will order a Deliveroo in the middle o’ Vera.
My pal Big Sonya will be happy enough though, she’s cut oot a’ junk food fae her diet and says she’s feeling 10 feet tall. Just as well, ‘cause gan by her Body Mass Index, she’d need tae be.