Book: Jonathan Ross - Why Do I Say These Things?
This is the very reason he joined Russell Brand on his show -- to publicise his first... well, autobiography isn't quite the right term. I'm not exactly sure what it is.
"Maybe one day when I'm winding things down on the career front, I will write that book," he says. Oh there's plenty more unplanned howlers like that.
It's part life story, part aimless ramblings about his life and opinions that work a great deal better on his (excellent) Radio 2 show. I for one will miss that. I can't say the same for Brand whose popularity has always baffled me. Talking of which: "Russell Brand is another person I love having on (my TV talk show) because the to-ing and fro-ing that goes on between us is great." Arf!
The title suggests it's more of the sort of verbal gaffs that landed him on this week's front pages but it's misleading.
He opens with a tale of an excruciating food poisoning episode in Mexico, then winds back to what sounds like an average childhood in Leytonstone, losing his virginity, being a clumsy yoof, punk gigs, early jobs, the missus, the kids, the pets...
"I've won awards, met the Queen and had dinner with David Bowie," he says, explaining why he's satisfied with his career (up until recently at least). But there are great holes filled with babble that could have so easily been witty anecdotes of his experiences over the past 25 years in broadcasting. He's interviewed a phenomenal number of international showbiz names and is famously a buddy of Ricky Gervais and Jimmy Carr. But aside from a passing reference to each there are no hilarious yarns to encourage you to turn the page.
He drops in that Morrissey came round for dinner once. And....? Nothing. If one of the most quotable men on the planet pops over for some snap and you can't regurgitate one of his funnies then -- in his own closing words -- "I'm giving up on you."
Why Do I Say These Things? by Jonathan Ross, Bantam Press, £18.99, out now
SIMON WILSON
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