David Morrissey

Liverpool-born son of a cobbler, British actor, occasional contributor and stand-in host for Simon Mayo.

Morrissey (not that Morrissey) first appeared on Wittertainment in 2007 to talk about his film The Reaping. As Mark put it: "He thought it was great; I told him it was tosh." Despite this, Morrissey revealed that he was a frequent listener to the programme, which earned him a place on the Hello to.... list.

Morrissey famously played Gordon Brown opposite Michael Sheen's Tony Blair in the television programme The Deal (which spawned a sort-of sequel in The Queen). This meant that when Morrissey appeared as the co-star of Basic Instinct 2, various newspaper critics quipped they had found it hard to take Morrissey seriously in a sex crime drama, as they kept thinking about him talking about post-neo-classical endogenous growth theory.

Mark thought this was a cheap jibe, and told Simon off for referencing it.

(Incidentally, it was the discussion of the word Lacanian in Basic Instinct 2 that would ultimately lead to the coining of the word Kermodian, although the meaning of "Lacanian" itself would first be dissected to such an extent that Morrissey ultimately emailed Simon, saying "there is one joke in Basic Instinct 2, and I think you have killed it.")

Morrissey reappeared on the programme alongside Stephen Fry in 2009 where he heartbreakingly revealed that, having made his name in the TV series State Of Play, he could not bring himself to watch the film version - because "it would be like going to the wedding of an ex-girlfriend you were still in love with." (Indeed, so heartbreaking were these words that Mark resisted the temptation to point out that he should have said "ex-girlfriend with whom you were still in love.")