11th and 25th February 2000

That red headed lad Chris Evans bought Withnail’s coat at the Withnail for Waterford auction for £5000 and then wore it on his show the week after. REG couldn’t appear on the show because he was in Swaziland location scouting and visiting the Waterford Kamhlaba school, but he recorded snippets of voiceovers so Chris could essentially have the coat speaking classic “Withnail” lines.

Then a few weeks later, Richard postponed his trip to Prague (to start work on Pimpernel round 2) because Chris offered to donate another £4000 to the Waterford charity if he did. What a good chap, ended up paying £9000 for “the” coat. Worth every penny!

Nikki told us REG appeared on the show, with a poorly thumb as he’s just moved house and shut it in some windows!!!!! Blood everywhere by all accounts. REG then read this and found it terribly amusing. The truth of it was that he was filming The Scarlet Pimpernel outside Stratford and had to slam some 18 foot double doors behind him, wearing thick leather gloves. On the 15th take, his left thumb got crushed, blood spurting from all sides of the nail. Gruesome, and being a big girl’s blouse, thought it would require amputation. Mercifully not, but it’s the colour of Frankenfurter’s favourite shade of deadly nightshade, but recovering well now we’re happy to report.

Needless to say we’ve had Nikki taken out and flogged!

Neil also spotted a familiar signature on the famous desk (see it below). It’s on Chris’s side towards, the audience and says:

‘Richard E Grant’
‘You terrible cunt’

Well spotted Neil!

Thanks to Jenny for these screen shots.