Pretty much what we said. Our favourite bit: James Randi is so unfamiliar with the show in question he pronounces it as "No-well's House Party". "It's a television network... BBC... whatever..."
For the record (and we're not having a go at Randi here, his segments on Channel Four's The Secret Cabaret were consistently great), we can't figure out which part of House Party was being filmed here. If it was meant to be a Gotcha segment, where's the gag, considering this wasn't a conscious attempt by Noel & Co to expose Geller? And given the whole mysticism angle played up by Noel on Is It A Deal Or Isn't It A Deal, surely he wouldn't be looking to do such a thing. If it was an NTV segment, it could only have been from the circling-the-drain final series of House Party (and as such would probably have had Mr Blobby crashing into the restaurant), so what gives? Any Noel's House Party completists out there who know what's going on there?
After linking part two of the lecture, it would be remiss of us not to include the previous segment. James Randi teams up with the great Johnny Carson to debunk Uri Geller more directly on The Tonight Show:
For the record (and we're not having a go at Randi here, his segments on Channel Four's The Secret Cabaret were consistently great), we can't figure out which part of House Party was being filmed here. If it was meant to be a Gotcha segment, where's the gag, considering this wasn't a conscious attempt by Noel & Co to expose Geller? And given the whole mysticism angle played up by Noel on Is It A Deal Or Isn't It A Deal, surely he wouldn't be looking to do such a thing. If it was an NTV segment, it could only have been from the circling-the-drain final series of House Party (and as such would probably have had Mr Blobby crashing into the restaurant), so what gives? Any Noel's House Party completists out there who know what's going on there?
After linking part two of the lecture, it would be remiss of us not to include the previous segment. James Randi teams up with the great Johnny Carson to debunk Uri Geller more directly on The Tonight Show:
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I'm pretty sure it's as part of a Gotcha, that woman is one of the contestants on the Richard Whiteley Countdown one.
I agree with Brig, the 'gag' in the Gotcha was that things would go wrong in the restaurant (plates off shelves, etc), and everyone would blame Uri's psychic powers
This has nothing to do with anything, but I remember you guys linking to my Christmas thing that I did and I've done the same to ITV if you want to look at it or whatever.
And I am so talented that I can't even link to the right video.
Applemask - another great series of videos. New update added mentioning them.
As for James and Brig, indeed, it seemed like the clip could only have fitted in with a Gotcha segment, which made me puzzled as to what the actual 'Gotcha' was meant to be. It sounds like a good bit, and it's a bit of a shame Randi didn't include it in his lecture. It might have seemed a little unprofessional, but hey, any excuse for seeing one of the reasons why House Party became so popular in the first place.
The Uri footage has been in something else, though. Objective made a program for Channel 5 in which one of the guys from Monkey Magic (Alistair?) was presented as a psychic in a 'special' demonstrating his powers. At the very end, he revealed he was 'just' a magician, and the rest of the series went on to expose all the tricks he used. The first was spoon bending, and they used that self same clip to highlight the misdirection. If I were a betting man, I'd say that Randi became aware of the footage through that special.
I would also be remiss in my duty to not point out the obvious collapsing shelves set up in the beginning of that clip, which no doubt play a role in the real hilarity of the clip
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