'Then I started crying on stage...'

WTF: Weekly trivia file

• 'When people go to a comedy show, there's an expectation that they wanna forget about things, but fuck that, you've got cats on YouTube now, you can watch that you lazy pricks. If you wanna see a bloke down the pub, go down the fucking pub.' Australian comedian Hannah Gadsby on tackling serious issues in stand-up.

Moose • Some of the comedy hopefuls entering the Amused Moose competition were left baffled this week after getting a burst of up to seven emails saying they both had and hadn't got through to a heat. To add to the confusion, some were told to 'ignore the previous email' which could have meant either the offer of the place – or the one rescinding it. One of the comics affected, Rosie Holt, said: 'This rollercoaster of emotions is almost as thrilling as the competition itself.' The competition is notorious for offering competitors just 90 seconds stage time to impress in its first round. We don't think this one, from 2012, was successful:

• In E4's new comedy-drama gap year, Tim Key plays an older traveller who inflicts himself on a group of younger backpackers touring Asia. And this week he revealed it had echoes of an hilarious incident that happened to him when travelling at the age of 26. He told 6Music's Shan Keavney that he'd failed to make any friends while in Singapore, so went to a travel agent and said: 'I want to go to Thailand.' The agent replied: 'You should go to Ko Samui. I always go there, there's this amazing beach.' 'OK, I'll go there,' Key responded. Then the travel agent said: 'Right. I think I'm going to come.' And he did. 'The next day I went to see him at the travel agency and he came with me.'Key said he knew the experience would make a great story later, but was painfully awkward at the time…

• That wasn't the only story revealed to Shaun Keavney this week, as Sara Pascoe spoke for the first time about how she auditioned for Michael Barrymore's My Kind of People when she was 14 years old – and ended up crying in front of hundreds of people. The try-outs took place in Whiteley's Shopping Centre in West London, and she said: 'I'd practised this song, Extreme's More Than Words. I'd practised it with a backing tape but you had to do it with piano in the shopping centre in front of everyone. The pianist started but I didn't know when to come in, as I'd never done it without my backing track. I started to come in twice. Didn't. Then I started crying on stage and tried to sing through it.' She said she got through the whole song though the tears, before making her way back through the shopping centre crowds, full of embarrassment. 'My entire life, that has haunted me,' she said.

• Mrs Brown got her name because Brendan O'Carroll heard the news that it was the 18th birthday of Louise Brown, the world's first test tube baby, while he was creating his feck-fuelled alter-ego.

• The alt-right's favourite 'news' source is being funded by young British comic Rhys James. Well, at least indirectly, and in a very small way. Some of the advertising money spent on James's forthcoming Soho Theatre run has ended up going to Brietbart, the website that gave us White House Bruiser Steve Bannon and paedophile apologist Milo Yiannopoulos. Ads appearing on the site, like his, had been booked via Google's network which serves thousands of publishers, rather than with Brietbart direct, but still…

Charlie Brooker was so depressed by Donald Trump's victory that he couldn't make it into work, Screen Wipe writers Jason Hazeley and Joel Morris claimed on Radio 4 Extra last week. They even alleged that his on-screen complaints that he didn't want to do the show wasn't a joke, with Hazeley saying: 'He tried to cancel 2016 Wipe but he was told you've already signed. He just said "I can't do it"'. Happily, Brooker had a change of heart, telling Chortle: 'I did indeed briefly wonder whether I could actually do 2016 Wipe because 2016 itself was so relentlessly depressing, but after four or five seconds of intense internal debate I chose to soldier on, like a big brave hero, along the lines of a firefighter, or perhaps Superman - whichever you admire most. Fortunately, 2017 is already looking really rosy, so 2017 Wipe should be a doddle.'

• Storm Doris did some damage to the Chorley Little Theatre's sign last night… could Chortle stage a takeover?

Hi @chortle Doris has taken 2 letters. Sponsorship opportunity if we put R and T back up instead. Up for it? pic.twitter.com/MoREaPUq1e
— Chorley L Theatre (@ChorleyTheatre) February 24, 2017

• Bob's Burgers is releasing a compilation album. The release contains a mammoth 112 tracks from throughout the animated show's seven seasons including original songs from the likes of St. Vincent and The National. And there are also short numbers by cast members including Kristen Schaal, H. Jon Benjamin and Eugene Mirman and guest stars such as Aziz Ansari, Sarah Silverman and Megan Mullally.

• We yesterday received a press release from someone/thing called 'BUILD' breathlessly exclaiming: 'EXCLUSIVE: Katherine Ryan says she despises Jeremy Clarkson'. I think we'd be very busy if we were reporting every time someone didn't like Jeremy Clarkson.