Forbidden Fruit

Day time television viewers were left shocked this week after popular gardening expert Adam Tithead appeared to suffer an on air breakdown. Throughout Monday’s edition of his show Green Fingers, forty three year old Tithead repeatedly squeezed a pair of large ripe melons, much to the discomfort of their owner, amateur horticulturalist Jane Wabbs, a guest on that morning’s programme. Finally, after having spent the entire programme casting lustful glances at the pair, whilst stroking his prize marrow, Tithead dropped his trousers as the end credits rolled and masturbated furiously over the big melons, ejaculating spectacularly just as transmission ended. Tithead’s latest antics should, perhaps, come as no surprise. His anchoring of Green Fingers marked the climax of a remarkable comeback for the gardener – fifteen years earlier he had been spectacularly sacked by the BBC from his high-profile role as resident horticulture expert on flagship children’s programme Blue Peter. He originally got the job on the recommendation of his gardening idol, veteran Gardener’s World presenter Percy Thrower. His dismissal came after it emerged that, amongst other unsavoury practices, had used his own excreta to fertilise the Blue Peter garden at BBC Television Centre.

Even more disturbingly, it was discovered that after Percy Thrower’s death, a distraught Tithead had, using pruning shears, taken ‘cuttings’ from the body and planted them in the programme’s Italian sunken garden in the hope that he could somehow re-grow the great gardener. Millions of children were severely traumatised when, during a live transmission, presenter John Noakes came across seven of Thrower’s mouldering fingers amongst the lupins in a flower bed. The other missing digits have never been found, leading to fears that Tithead might try once more to grow a new Percy Thrower. Furious at being sacked, Tithead wrecked the Blue Peter garden. Presenter Peter Purves was initially mistakenly blamed for this outrage, leading to his sudden resignation from the programme and relegation to darts commentating duties. It is believed that Tithead’s latest breakdown could be linked to the recent collapse of his marriage. His wife is currently filing for divorce on the grounds of adultery after finding Tithead naked in bed, fumbling with a large bush. He later claimed that he was merely pruning it.

Tithead’s apparent inability to handle the pressures of stardom the second time around has raised doubts as to the stability of other celebrities who have staged spectacular comebacks after earlier, well-publicised breakdowns. “Press and public alike will be closely watching their every TV appearance from now on, just waiting for them to suddenly get their cocks out, or star defecating all over the set,” says Top psychologist Eddie Hawick, who has been studying celebrity insanity for several years on behalf of a number of tabloids. “Mind you, from the TV companies’ point of view that wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing – it would certainly boost viewing figures for some shows.” Indeed, Hawick is convinced that this phenomena is the only credible explanation for the rise in viewing figures enjoyed by the BBC’s One Show every Friday, when it is co-hosted by Chris Evans. Despite his current success as a presenter of the One Show and Radio Two’s Breakfast Show, in the dark days after the cancellation of his TFI Friday show by Channel Four and his sacking from Virgin Radio, former madcap ginger DJ Chris Evans allegedly took to fantasising that he was legendary stereotypical oriental villain Fu Manchu, growing a long droopy moustache and dressing in flowing oriental robes. “He even took to taping back the corners of his eyes so they looked slitty,” claims Dave Tronker, who once bought cigarettes in the same corner shop as Evans. “He dyed his skin yellow too – either that or his liver was packing up with all that boozing he was doing.” The one-time zany prankster also reportedly converted the cellar of his Surrey mansion into a laboratory cum torture chamber, from where he plotted bizarre revenges against the media executives who cancelled his shows.

His schemes allegedly included replacing top TV and radio executives with surgically created doubles who proceed to destroy their reputations by wrecking their stations’ ratings, whilst the originals were horribly tortured in the Evans’ cellar – their eyes pinned open whilst they were forced to watch endless reruns of Evans fawning over celebrity guests on his TV show. Several media pundits believe that this could explain Virgin Radio’s plummeting audience share. Perhaps the most fiendish weapon in Evans’ armoury was his child bride Billie Piper. Following an overdose of botox during a cosmetic procedure to enhance her lips, it is alleged that the former teen singing sensation’s kiss is became truly venomous. “Apparently he used to send her out to seduce and tantalise his enemies before giving them her kiss of death,” says Arnie Ripwick, who worked as a clerk at the solicitors that represented Piper during her divorce, before he was sacked for selling confidential information about high profile clients to the tabloids. DJ Steve Penk – who replaced Evans at Virgin – was reportedly left gasping and semi-paralysed after a full-on snog from the sex siren of death. Although doctors were able to treat him with anti-venom in the nick of time, Penk never fully recovered and was forced to step down from his Virgin show.

Hawick believes that Evans’ Fu Manchu delusion is the most extreme case of celebrity madness the media has completely made up since they reported that1980’s pop sensation Adam Ant had flipped his lid and terrorised London in the guise of an outlaw. He was finally apprehended, it was alleged, when, wearing a tri-cornered hat, thigh-length riding boots, a mask and brandishing a flintlock pistol, he burst into a London pub and attempted to rob startled drinkers. Declaring that he was “a dandy highwayman”, he proceeded to tell astonished customers to “stand and deliver – your money or your life” before taking their valuables. Only two weeks earlier, tabloids reported, the former Adam and the Ants front man – dressed as a pirate – had terrorised a Thames pleasure cruiser full of sightseers – forcing two Japanese tourists to walk the plank at sword point. “The reality is that instances of actual celebrity madness, with a star going completely bonkers and being sectioned under the Mental Health Act, are actually quite rare,” opines Hawick. “However, ‘Minor celebrity gets drunk and throws up before sleeping it off on a park bench’, isn’t the kind of sensational headline which boosts circulation, whereas ‘Meths drinking binge sends top star mental – found sleeping rough in own filth’ probably will. Craziness sells papers.” Hawick has no doubt that, despite the recent vilification of much of the UK press’s treatment of celebrities’ private lives in the wake of the phone hacking scandal, we haven’t seen the end of celebrity insanity stories. “It’s just a matter of time before they succumb to temptation,” he says. “My money is on Adrian Chiles being their next victim, following his high-profile sacking from Daybreak – I’ve no doubt we’ll soon be seeing headlines about him exposing himself in public parks and stealing women’s underwear.”