Sunday 4 January 2015

Sleb Mastermind Show 8


No, it’s not Jester Bolofski’s Medieval Torture Hour, it is in fact another edition of Sleb Mastermind. I think that there may be a couple still to go after this one.

First up was former Blue Peter presenter Gethin Jones. Poor old Gethin presented the awful 21 Questions last year, so at least it will have been nice for him to have got to participate in a proper quiz show for once. Miaow. He was answering on International Welsh rugby 2000 – 2010. As an Englishman who has been living in Wales since 1900 and frozen to death you’ll probably appreciate that this wasn’t necessarily my favourite subject of all time. For all that, though, I managed 9 points on this round, which was one more than Gethin’s 8.

Second up was Ben Bailey Smith. Ben is another of those actors whose face you’d have recognised immediately without necessarily having been able to put a name to it. He’s made appearences in many TV shows – some serious, others, like the Inbetweeners, less so. Ben was answering on The Films of the Marx Brothers, and shame though it is to admit it, my own knowledge of their oeuvre is somewhat limited. Ben too managed 8 points, and in the context of this sleb series that ain’t at all bad.

Aasmah Mir on the surface appeared to be this show’s sacrificial BBC radio presenter. I can’t say that I was very familiar with her work before the show. Aasmah was answering on the novels of Hanif Kureishi. I’m afraid that my own knowledge of these begins and ends with the BBC adaptation of The Buddha of Suburbia. Aasmah though wasn’t the least but shaken by what looked like some fairly complicated in depth questions, and only just missed out on double figures, scoring 9.

I’ll be honest, it must be quite a few years since I saw Mark Little on TV – in the interim he’s gone grey and grown a beard, although not necessarily in that order. As was highlighted by John in the half time chat, Mark was first known in the UK in his role of Joe Mangel in Neighbours, and I’m not entirely sure that he’s ever quite shaken it off – although a few years ago he was a pretty well known face on the celebrity panel game circuit. He was answering on Hunter S. Thompson – and he too faced his own barrage of what seemed to be quite complicated stuff. He didn’t do quite so well with these, and ended with 6.

No real pyrotechnics followed from any of the slebs on the GK rounds. Mark Little managed to double his score to 12. Gethin started quite well on his, but the gears ground to a halt some time before the halfway stage, and in the end he couldn’t do more than increase the bar to 13, with 5 points on general. After claiming not to have any general knowledge at all Ben Bailey- Smith gave the lie to this suggestion by picking off another 8 points to add to his own title. Yes, it’s not spectacular, but it’s a perfectly respectable sleb score. All of which left Aasmah requiring 8 points for an outright win. It never looked like she was going to smash this target over the boundary rope, but to be fair it never looked like she wouldn’t get there either. She duly did, with a couple of points daylight between herself and the chasing pack, finishing with 18. Well done.


The Details

Gethin JonesRenewable WorldWales International Rugby 2000 – 20108 – 1 5 - 313 - 4
Ben Bailey SmithSt. Stephen’s CanonburyThe films of the Marx Brothers8 - 28 - 316 - 5
Aasmah MirCarerslink East DunbartonshireThe Novels of Hanif Jureishi9 - 29 - 218 - 4
Mark LittleHaringey Foodbank at the Trussell TrustHunter S. Thompson6 - 16 - 112 – 2


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