Late comedian Sean Lock mocked Jonathan Ross to his face at a Comedy Roast for Bruce Forsyth, bringing up the 2008 Sachsgate scandal in front of the live audience.
Lock, known for his work on 8 Out of 10 Cats, was on stage alongside Jimmy Carr at the event, with Ross seated in the audience near Forsyth. Turning to Ross, Lock said: “Roasting Bruce Forsyth when we’ve got Jonathan Ross in the room. It’s like roasting a chestnut when you’ve got a big turkey sitting there. Imagine the juice and the gravy we’d get off that!”
Reference to the 2008 answerphone scandal
Lock also alluded to Sachsgate, the controversy over offensive answerphone messages Ross and Russell Brand left for actor Andrew Sachs in 2008. The pair had phoned Sachs during the BBC radio show The Russell Brand Show and, failing to reach him, left four voicemails. Brand joked about Fawlty Towers before Ross interjected with: “He f***ed your granddaughter!”
Brand had briefly dated Sachs’ granddaughter Georgina Baillie. Brand later sang into the answerphone: “It was consensual and she wasn’t menstrual”, before proposing marriage to Ross.
Ross's statement on Walliams and Brand
Lock did not hold back on the scandal, joking at the Comedy Roast: “I’m surprised you turned up in person, Jonathan, because normally if you’re going to insult an elderly national treasure, you do it on the phone!”
The clip resurfaced after Ross issued a statement about his friendships with Brand and David Walliams, who is under investigation for sexual offences. Ross said: “I am as horrified by the revelations about David Walliams and the crimes of Russell Brand as the rest of the nation. There was a time in my life when I was on friendly terms with both men, and during that period I was genuinely unaware of their conduct. My thoughts are with the many, many women who have bravely come forward.”
Ross also clarified that a joke he delivered at a 2004 awards ceremony, referencing Walliams “going home with 15-year-olds”, had been written by someone else. He said: “I recognise how deeply shocking it is to revisit footage of a joke delivered by me at the Comedy Awards in 2004, in which I make light of the notion of Walliams going home with a 15-year-old. This joke was submitted to me by the Comedy Awards script writing team and I believed that the punchline was a reference to the fact he had publicly dated younger women, exaggerated for comic effect. It is also a tasteless joke that I would not dream of making today about anyone, but that is beside the point. Had I had any reason to suspect that it might be referring to actual events, I would not only have refused to use it, but I would not have felt comfortable continuing a personal or professional relationship with him.” He added: “I also like to think that I would have acted upon that knowledge.”
