Crooked Billet (Leigh-on-Sea)

The Fly (The Fly)

Who was it who told the unemployed they should get on their bikes? ….

Ah…….Norman Tebbit you say

……Oh….it’s Lord Tebbit now is it?...right.

Christ, doesn’t time fly…..particularly when you’re a fly. That was two recessions ago wasn't it? And here I am back on the old pedal-pusher.

Truth is though, I’ve never been off the trusty two-wheeler. Through boom and bust, times have been pretty tough for this multi-eyed thespian.

Sure, I got a big break alongside Jeff Goldblum in my eponymous epic, but since then things have gone back to the same-old on the acting front. Not a bit of film work.

There was a guest appearance on Eastenders when Peggy raised her drawers. But filming in her briefs was all too brief - even if it was a masterly bit of flying (for which I won an award).

I’ve had some other work. Like so many unemployed winged-actors I spend time on the exhibitions circuit, defecating on the cars at motor show, vomiting into the tea at the Ideal Home show. And, of course, laying lots of eggs at Crufts.

But it’s not regular. And it’s hardly suitable for a trained actor, a fly whose CV includes writing a script for an arial version of Hamlet (ITV 4 showed interest).

That’s why today, the bicycle is taking me down an entirely new road - literally and metaphorically - to a pub in Leigh-on-Sea. I’m about to participate in one of those reality TV shows for washed-up celebs.

If I’m being honest, I’m doing it mainly for the exposure. But that’s not my only motivation. Most actors are keen to support the arts and I’m no exception.

This particular programme is helping raise the profile of an activity that’s very dear to us flies. Arial Khasi Choreography – AKC for short.

When the outside pub privy reigned, flies used to be at it all the time. But now it’s a dying art.

Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten fellas? Tell me you don't yearn for those heady days when a trip to the boozer involved pissing in a trough with your ball bag freezing off, while a coupla my lot danced the tango round your swede?

Ah, now you remember….T’was heady days for heady lice.

All hail the Crooked Billet. It’s one of the few pubs with a disgusting outside bog replete with single hanging light-bulb. A throwback to the eighties and the perfect place to host Fly TV’s Celebrity Shitter Danceathon.

If there’s enough interest I reckon AKC will get the same treatment ballroom dancing got for you guys, what with cash-strapped landlords cutting corners on the bog cleaning front.

Well I’m outside the entrance and the nerves are jangling. It’s been a wee while (wee in the Scottish sense, not the piss sense) since I did the old flying two-step in a pub shitter. But I’ll give it my best shot. Like riding a bike, I suppose you never forget!

So who’s my partner you ask?

Nah……I shouldn’t tell you until it's broadcast….no really I can’t …….oh go on then…

Tonight, I’m going to be dancing the tango with the last surviving beauty that ever lived off turds laid by Schnorbitz the Dog. Her name is Maureen, she smells of excrement and she’s got a blue sheen to die for.


The Fly’s rating for the Crooked Billet – 9 / 10

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