No Such Thing As A Fish

Brighton Dome Corn Exchange, Church Street, Sunday, October 18

AS he presides over the popular BBC panel show QI one would be forgiven for thinking Stephen Fry’s brain contains the knowledge of all the universe.

But working frantically behind the scenes are the QI elves, who bring together the fascinating facts and anecdotes, as well as supply up to the minute information to their bent-nosed master.

Now four of those elves are escaping their workshop of knowledge to recreate a live version of the cult podcast No Such Thing As A Fish.

“The conversations we have on the podcast are the same as the ones we have in the QI office,” says Bolton-born elf James Harkin, who is joined on the Corn Exchange stage by Dan Schreiber, Anna Ptaszynski and Andrew Hunter Murray.

“Someone will say something like: Did you know that sock comes from the Old English for a light shoe? We will talk about it for 15 minutes and get no work done.

“What we are aiming to do is find things we find interesting, and hope that the viewers at home will too.”

The elves are assisted in their quest for unusual knowledge with a library of several hundred reference books, and the internet, which Hunter Murray says is good for specific things, such as reproductions of 15th century medical papers.

“Anna looks into old newspaper archives, I will try to find etymological things, James looks at specific details...”

“...And Dan will put together whatever we are researching plus yetis,” interjects Harkin. “We all have very different ideas and personalities. Dan will always come up with stuff we have never heard of from the Fortean Times.”

Becoming an elf is simple according to Hunter Murray – simply buy creator John Lloyd a drink, or two if you want a more senior position.

Harkin’s method was to bombard the office over the first two series.

“I had a lot of spare time in my job so I would go on the internet and send QI ideas for questions,” he says. “Finally my work got busy, and I wasn’t able to do it anymore. Then QI got in touch with me, and offered me the chance to come to London.”

The essence of QI and the podcast is the interesting fact which sticks in the mind and demands to be shared.

“Lots of pub conversations start with something someone heard on QI,” says Hunter Murray.

“We have made a couple of hundred episodes of QI and at least 80 podcasts, but if you take any area – be it moths, the stomach or The Philippines you will find out dozens of new facts you had no idea about before.”

“We always start the podcast saying last week we didn’t know any of this stuff,” adds Harkin. “It’s all new to us, and we hope the listeners enjoy the time we have spent finding something out.”

The advantage of the podcast is it allows more time to go into a subject in further depth than the few minutes allowed on QI. A new podcast is released every week, as oppose to the 12 to 16 week runs of QI.

As well as putting together ideas for the QI scripts both Harkin and Hunter Murray spend the two hour filming sessions crouched over laptops ensuring the shows are as accurate as possible.

“Stephen has an earpiece and a screen where we can send him little notes, or say where things have gone wrong,” says Harkin.

“It’s preserving Stephen’s infallibility,” adds Hunter Murray. “I suspect it’s how the Pope does it as well.”

With so many old QIs repeated on Dave the emphasis is on making sure the broadcasts are as accurate as possible – otherwise the elves never hear the end of it.

“People will report something that was wrong on the C series because it has been repeated,” says Hunter Murray. “It’s a big incentive to get everything as correct as possible.”

“We sometimes take retrospective points off people,” adds Harkin, pointing out a certain Mr Clarkson will get a surprise in the forthcoming M series for an error he made in the past.

The live show is based around four headline facts brought to the stage by each elf, which naturally leads on to further discussions and additional facts.

“It’s pretty freewheeling,” says Hunter Murray. “There’s not too much structure – one of us will get distracted and start to say something about sharks, and then we will get lost in other facts until Dan drags us back.”

And as for quite interesting facts about Brighton, Harkin has at his fingertips that the city was home to Sake Dean Mahomed, the man who opened the first Indian restaurant in the UK.

“Brighton was also home to the largest simultaneous whoopee cushion event,” he adds.

“At the 2003 Brighton Comedy Festival 1,372 people sat on whoopee cushions at the same time.”

From early curry houses to simulated flatulence – is there anything the elves can’t uncover?

Starts 5pm, tickets £13/£11. Call 01273 709709.