The plan for the ladies’ toilets
Scott wanted to repeat Monday’s grooming questions with women, but getting Chris into the ladies’ toilets required an accomplice. Sara Cox agreed to check that nobody was inside, guide him into a cubicle and help him leave safely. Chris admitted that he had entered a women’s toilet once before but refused to explain the circumstances beyond saying that it had happened in a bar.
He remained worried about whether the plan was allowed and whether every person using the toilets would need to consent. Scott’s solution was that Chris would see nothing from inside a locked cubicle. Sara could put on her make-up nearby and intervene if the situation became difficult.
Scott Talks to Men in the Toilet, with a twist
Sara announced that the coast was clear and Chris ran into the middle cubicle. Despite Sara advising him to keep his trousers on, he prepared in the same way as the men’s edition and waited for somebody to enter. The first woman was startled to hear a male voice asking whether her partner should fake tan and whether she liked him tidy downstairs, but she eventually answered yes to grooming.
Another group arrived and began the sort of extended conversation that Scott and Chris had not encountered in the men’s toilets. Chris tried to disguise himself with a higher voice and claimed to be a woman. He asked whether they liked men to use face masks, fake tan and other grooming products, but the growing number of voices made it hard to know who had answered.
At one point, four women were in the room. Chris felt outnumbered and claustrophobic, while Sara attempted to keep the situation under control from the mirrors. He told her that he would be a while and urged her not to wait, but she checked the route and then instructed him to run.
The experiment produced fewer definite answers than Monday’s edition, but considerably more panic. Sara confirmed afterwards that the women had been fine with what happened. A listener suggested Chris should have burst from the cubicle shouting, “For ’tis I, the mystery lady,” although Chris was relieved simply to have reached a safe place without being discovered.
BBC Introducing and terrible band names
The programme marked the BBC Introducing masterclasses with music from artists who had come through the scheme. Scott took some of the credit for Gabrielle Aplin’s success because he had played her stripped-back covers on the show, but accepted that Introducing had helped her first.
Radio 1’s band-name generator combined a birth month with the first letters of a person’s first and last names. It made Chris the frontman of Three Sugar Munchers and Scott a member of Three Chicken Sauces. The results sounded more like tribute acts than future chart stars, but listeners supplied an even stranger collection of names from the same system.
Learning to cry on demand
Scott realised that he had never seen Chris cry, despite knowing him for about six years. Chris remembered becoming emotional about football after a night out, but Scott was unsure whether it counted. He then admitted that he could fake tears when a situation required them, although he could not perform on demand in the studio.
Listeners described techniques involving controlled breathing and pressure behind the eyes. Drama students used the ability for acting, while other people admitted deploying it to manipulate friends or partners. The most memorable existing example was Rylan Clark’s barely intelligible reaction to being put through on The X Factor.
Laura said she cried whenever she spent her wages and needed her boyfriend to send more money. She began by sounding worried, increased the performance to hysterical sobbing and recovered as soon as he agreed to make a transfer. The same technique had persuaded him to pay for a £100 hair appointment. Scott regarded the deception as appalling, while Laura intended to continue until karma finally caught her.
The team considered asking Chris to fake a breakdown in front of their boss, perhaps by claiming he could no longer cope with the new studio. Its glass walls meant the boss might already be watching, so they postponed the experiment rather than test his sympathy immediately.
Real or No Real with Sara Cox
Sara returned for a BBC Introducing edition of Real or No Real. Yorkshire band Wet Nuns really were holding their own festival, Detestival, with acts including Wolf People, Bo Ningen and Hookworms. A whistling collective called Wrap Your Lips Around This was not booked for a Huw Stephens Live Lounge, despite the name and the possibility of a whistled cover of “Whistle”.
German deathcore band We Butter the Bread with Butter did exist and had inspired a tribute act called I Can’t Believe It’s Not We Butter the Bread with Butter. Harry Styles had also been a member of White Eskimo before One Direction, and the band was managed by Most Haunted presenter Yvette Fielding because her son played in it.
The Hugh Grant Experience was not a wheelchair trio performing in silver Lycra as a tribute to Dale Winton’s Hole in the Wall. The false story gave Chris another excuse to find Scott’s old appearance online, despite Scott insisting the costume and the rest of the programme had been burned with his other career low points. Sara won by 40 points to Scott’s 20.
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