Shafted!

WTF: Weekly Trivia File

• Sean Lock has a very good reason for not paying arenas: ‘They’re the places people get tortured in banana republics.’

• When Samuel L Jackson asks you to do something, you do it. The Hollywood legend invited Stephen K Amos to perform at a fundraiser for his charity foundation on Sunday. And not only that, he had a special request: do the Shaft joke. Amos duly obliged – the gag being that when people shouted ‘Shaft!’ at him in the street, he assumed it was a mildly racist reference to the movie private investigator – until he looked down and found that his dick was hanging out. And the reason for Mr L Jackson’s request? Richard Roundtree, Shaft himself, was in the audience, as our picture shows...

• When David Walliams met David Cameron as part of a UNICEF campaign this month, the PM told him not to flick his hair like his Little Britain character Sebastian, the flirtatious aide. ‘And, of course, I immediately did it,’ he said. ‘It’s almost like I’ve got Tourette’s. When I’m told not to do something, I have to do it.’

• Bernie Sahlins, founder of Chicago’s Second City comedy troupe who died this week, had a long rivalry with improv guru Del Close. Close believed improv was a pure art form, while Sahlins insisted it was juts a technique to develop scripted work, Only on Close’s deathbed did Sahlins concede that improv was a valid art form – for that day only.

• Australian comic John Robertson married Jo Marsh, the artistic director of the Perth International Comedy Festival, last weekend. And as the prepared for their bridal waltz, this happened:

• Terry Wogan is set to make a cameo appearance in the third series of Moone Boy.

• Nothing exceptional about this local newspaper headline: ‘Essex comedian Phill Jupitus tells James Rampton about his character based new show which comes to Colchester next month’ … except Chortle read in on HispanicBusiness.com, a California-based website that ‘focuses on growth developments in the US Hispanic market’. Who knew Essex comedy was so important there?

• Cabaret artiste Miss Behave wants to have unusual guests for her Game Show at the Edinburgh festival – doesn’t everyone? – and has gone as far as thinking about getting a pigeon off the streets. ‘What is refreshing in Edinburgh?’ she asked blogger John Fleming rhetorically. ‘Someone who is not plugging their show.’

• Russell Brand wrote a few notes on his hand for his work-in-progress shows at Soho Theatre this week. Hardly the stuff of a big news story, but that’s not going to stop Mail Online getting itself into convoluted knots trying to make it one. Fans of straw clutching can read it here.

• Tweets of the week
Dave Gorman (@DaveGorman): Think I might start a rumour that Lorraine Kelly is "highly litigious". She's not. But what's she going to do about it?
Lil Lemon (@Electrolemon): can't seem 2 find an uncensored copy of 2001: a space odyssey. anybody know what's behind those big ol' black censor bars? i'm thinkin dicks
Neil ‘Enanem’ (@_Enanem_): The menu at Michael Stipe's restaurant's quite unusual. That's ghee in the korma, and that's Brie in the pot right, fusing with the pigeon.
Moose Allain (@ MooseAllain ): If time travel was possible I would go back and rewrite this tweet without the typo