The "Absolutely Worst" studio - South Africa
 

Concept: Where famous personalities are asked about their "Absolutely Worst" experiences etcetera. They are then given the opportunity to 'flush' them away forever.
  
Venue: Abovementioned studio in Johannesburg. Broadcast - 28th March 1998
  
Host: Roving reporter, Allan Swerdler. (AS)
  
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AS - Vanessa-Mae, thank you so much for joining us here in the studio. Let's start off with a nice easy one. What's the worst meal you have ever had in your life?
  
VM - In my whole, whole life, let me think .... I pretty much enjoy most kinds of food, but probably when I was little, when I was about six years old, I went to the Maldives and they had this HUGE selection of shellfish and seafood , but in a hot climate they don't produce very tasty seafood, it's very big but very rubbery and that put me off lobster for life. That's a real shame. That always sticks in my memory and my parents always blame that Maldives holiday for putting me off shellfish .... I love seafood, but shellfish... (Ed. A word that sounds like a combination of 'Yuk' and 'Euch').
  
AS - Right - lobsters, into the loo they go!
We've all got it - a garment that hangs in our cupboard, we bought it at the time we thought it looked ABSOLUTELY FABULOUS. It was going to be the greatest thing, but it has been hanging in the cupboard ever since!
  
VM - Okay, now, I know, but I didn't buy it for myself. In fact, my mother bought it for me. Does that count?
  
AS - That counts - that counts!
  
VM - Okay - she bought me this H O R R I B L E reversible, two-way-jacket, but one (side) was greeeeeeen and red and purple tartan, sorta silk tartan and the other side was this horrible purple rabbit-fur - yeuch - disgusting - absolutely hideous! And I insisted that she wear it, ever since ye know, she bought it for me when I was about ten, and still I refuse to wear it - absolutely not! And you know, I have dogs and I love my dogs - and they had rabbits in the park, so I could not wear something like that!
  
AS - Right - okay, that goes into the toilet bowl too. You do a lot of travelling during the course of the year. What's the worst form of transport you can think of?
  
VM - That's easy for me to remember. I remember I had an ear-infection just before Christmas and what happened was; with an ear-infection obviously meaning a virus it would be pretty dangerous if I flew and my eardrum or ear-canal or something burst, and er - it sounds disgusting, sorry about this, but what happened was; I had to go to Poland on a promotional visit from London. We couldn't fly, we couldn't cancel obviously because everybody was looking forward for me to go. So I went on a train, a Polish train - twenty-hour journey - in a Polish train, without any food - can you imagine?! There was a mini-bar, but with really dodgy food and we had no Polish money. Well, we had English cash, but when we asked to pay by VISA, they just laughed at us. A credit card! They just said "A credit card on a polish train - you must be joking!" So we were miserable.
  
AS - I can imagine, and even if there had been a dining-car you would have been getting your cabbages and potatoes I suppose.
  
VM - Yes
  
AS - No, no - we will discard that immediately.
The worst experience you have ever had during a performance?
  
VM - Oooh, well, — Okay, a lot depends on when I have fallen off stage, but I quite like that, because I have a big - not gash anymore - but I did have lots of blood on my leg; because I fell off stage and I landed on these poor teenagers in the audience, because I was dancing around a lot with my dancers at the time. This was two years ago and I'm still sort of really adventurous out there, as I am, as I will be in March, but even more so adventurous - (Ed. two words I can't hear!) - leaping off stages, but that was fun.
  
I think another time, what was really embarrassing was when I fell on stage, not off stage. What happened was that there's one bit in my original 'Red Hot Violin Player' world tour where the guitar has a solo. I had to interact with him. I hop back on one leg, as some guitarists do, but this time I landed flat on my .... bum. That was embarrassing, but at least if you're a lady artist who is wearing stilettos or high-heels it's understandable, but I was wearing DOC MARTENS and they are the most comfortable shoes. How could anybody fall in them - but I fell flat on my back! Luckily nobody was sort of annoyed. My band carried on playing and the audience just started applauding, which was in Scandinavia, they thought it was just part of the show. So that was cool, they saved me from my disgrace.
  
If you make it a habit of falling off the stage, what is the first thing you save? Is it the violin, right up THERE, you know - as you go down - do you immediately hold it up into the air?
  
VM - Yes, sometimes I do that, but with my electric it's not such a problem because I have a few backup electric violins behind stage, so we just get a substitute, but with my acoustic obviously, made in 1761, my classical violin, I would die if anything happened to that.
  
AS - We sometimes hear bits of music on the radio, in an elevator or wherever we might be, that makes us want to run screaming from the room - what is it in your case?
  
VM - Ummmmm, I think I'm pretty open to most kings of music. If there's something I don't like initially or a style of music, I ask myself "Why" and try to learn from it, or try to understand it, but if it's good music, but badly performed or played, then I can't stand that. So I can't give you an example, but there have been examples when you are sitting at a dinner table and there's piped music, or live music and it's just not quite 'there' and you sort of have to .... leave.
  
AS - What's the worst film you have ever seen?
  
VM - I walked out from one film in my life......... Normally I'm a big fan of Nick Nolte, but he was in it. I don't want to say anything rude about the film, but it was just a really boring film. It wasn't his acting, it was just the film in general that was really dull. I saw it when I was like eight or nine.
  
AS - Well, it doesn't matter - you were BORED, so into the loo it goes. The worst book you have ever read?
  
VM - Uuummmmm... (laughs), the worst book I have ever ever read! I think the most disgusting was "Perfume", that's really disgusting. I'm not squeamish, I love horror films, but anything that's a bit disgusting - especially books that scare you witless and things. (Ed. Not a complete sentence, but she makes her point).
  
AS - Great! Vanessa-Mae, thank you SO much for joining us here in the 'Absolute Worst' studio and here's the ceremonial loo-chain. You can flush away to your heart's content.
  
VM - Thank you......
  
(Sound of flushing) ...
  
Fade in to "Bach Street Prelude"

Thanks to Denis Millar for this article!