This was my first time at the BAFTAs,
although I was at the Royal Television Society Awards
a couple of months ago and that was basically the same
set up (at the same venue) but a bit more glitzy. We
arrived ("we" being Gordon, CT Show director
and Josie, Catherine's mum) at about 5.30pm to have
the glorious embarrassment of people craning their necks
to see past you in case anyone they recognise is walking
behind you on the red carpet. They had a section of
stadium seating, like at the Oscars, where people sit
for half an hour and watch people walk down a red carpet,
just in front of the entrance to the hotel. Two people
shouted "Derren, Derren!" but I knew if I
waved or acknowledged them in any way I would look an
idiot as they looked past me trying to get a peek at
Derren Brown (or god forbid I had misheard them and
I had Darren Day lurking behind me… never a thought
to relish). The one thing which was slightly bizarre
during the ceremony was just how much noise everyone
made 'The Great Room' in the Grosvenor House Hotel is
indeed that with well over a hundred tables and about
8-10 people on each table. Consequently when Davina
made her entrance and began reading her autocue we couldn't
really hear much so just carried on talking anyway.
I'll have to watch a bit of it on the telly on Monday
night just so I can see if they managed to 'cancel out'
the noise on the soundtrack somehow. The Little Britain
table was next to ours and it was nice to be able to
meet Matt Lucas for the first time; I've known David
for some years and often used to bump into him and chat
in Camden town when I lived near there but I'd never
met Matt and he was rather lovely and very complimentary
about the show (CT Show, not the BAFTAs which wasn't
much of a show at all to be honest). The presenters
of the awards (or 'citation readers' as they call them)
weren't that exciting; the gardener out of Desperate
Housewives, Anna Ford, Patsy Kensit…oh God, I'm
really selling this as a TV show aren't I?... Anyway,
the party after was hilarious, Catherine, Geoffrey (our
producer), Gordon (director) etc all had to go home
because they were filming on location the next day so
it was left to Ash Ditta (co-writer for CT Show) and
myself to embarrass ourselves by talking to as many
obscure and hilarious 'celebs' as possible. Having absolutely
no shame I, of course, took my camera and have several
pictures of myself and Ash with such TV luminaries as
Trisha, Carole Vorderman, Bradley Walsh and none other
than the man of the moment Noel Edmonds. I got Bradley
Walsh to take the Noel Edmonds shot and after about
2 attempts I could sense that Mr Edmonds was about to
walk… not a chance sunshine, I just told him I
was a competition winner and had been guaranteed a photo
with him - he wasn't impressed but it bought a few more
seconds of valuable time as Bradley worked out the complexities
of a point and shoot digital camera. So now I have to
work out how to upload these pictures onto my website…
Don't worry, I know my hardcore website blog followers
(that's Alan and Noel) will give me a hand. The world
should not have to wait for pictures as damming and
shameless as these.
