Page 162 - James Caan - The Real Deal

The Real Deal

‘I don’t know.’
‘We’re bright people. We must be able to come up with
something.’
‘Well, maybe we could do a sketch.’
‘A sketch of what?’
‘How about Blind Date? Someone could be Cilla Black, we
could have Our Graham making the announcements, get three
people to be the dates and someone else to be the contestant.’
I liked the idea, and on the way back to the office we planned
it all. We asked one guy on the team who had a fantastic sense of
humour to write out all the questions, but we didn’t tell anyone
else what we were planning. On the Friday morning I told the rest
of them.
‘I thought we’d wrap up at 5 p.m. again today, and, just so as
you know, we’re going to do a sketch.’
‘Oh, no!’
‘There’s no debate, you’re all coming. It’sa Blind Date sketch
and I’ve taken the liberty of allocating the roles. You’re going to
be Our Graham, you’re the contestant, and you’re Cilla.’ I handed
the participants cards with their lines on. ‘I want you to take an
hour at lunchtime, go and sit in the park, learn your lines, and at
five o’clock we’re doing the sketch.’
‘I can’t do that!’
‘I don’t want to!’
‘Listen, there’s no debate. Five o’clock. We’re doing it. We’re all
doing it.’
Come five o’clock, the atmosphere was just unbelievable, and
we had such a good time that night that the team insisted on doing
it the following week, too. At five the next Friday, the theme tune
to This Is Your Life blared out and the sales rep who was being
Eamonn Andrews said: ‘James Caan, this is your life!’ The staff
then paraded dressed up as people from my past – my mum, the
first girl I kissed, the bank manager – it was hilarious.

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