The Thick of It (TV Series)

Episode #2.3 (2005)

Chris Addison: Oliver Reeder

Quotes 

• Oliver Reeder : Who wants to go and watch bollockvision?

  Hugh Abbott : Bollockvision?

  Oliver Reeder : Mr. Malcolm Tucker, turning it all the way up to eleven down in the lobby. Come and have a look.

  [cut to them all watching Tucker shouting at another minister on an adjacent floor from a balcony] 

  Hugh Abbott : Poor Keith. Malcolm must fucking love this place, four ministers in one building. It's his dream, a one-stop bollock shop.

  Glenn Cullen : Trouble is we're going to be getting some of that in about an hour.

  Hugh Abbott : Yeah. I don't know which is worse, watching him slowly rumble towards you like a prostate cancer or him appearing suddenly out of nowhere like a severe stroke.

  [Terri, whose father just died, looks at him] 

  Hugh Abbott : Oh. How's your sister coping?

• Oliver Reeder : [to Terri]  Apparently The Sun are running a cartoon with you being arrested by a cunt-stable.

• Hugh Abbott : So, citizenshit. What we need to do to knock together some nice, touchy-feely, fondle-y, sneaky, hand-in-the-bra sort of policies.

  Glenn Cullen : New bicycles for special constables, that sort of thing?

  Hugh Abbott : Yeah. Yeah.

  Oliver Reeder : Making special needs kids clean up graffiti.

  Hugh Abbott : Yeah, that's just very mean.

  Oliver Reeder : Well, yes. Not, of course, as mean as making them spell graffiti. That genuinely is very mean.

  Glenn Cullen : [gets up and leaves]  I'll go and have a word with Malcolm.

  Oliver Reeder : OK.

  Hugh Abbott : You just took a shit with your clothes on, Olly.

  Oliver Reeder : Why?

  Hugh Abbott : Glenn's boy, Peter, he went to a special needs school.

  Oliver Reeder : Oh.

  Hugh Abbott : Yep.

  Oliver Reeder : Glenn's had sex.

  Hugh Abbott : God, you are such a prick, Olly. There's more to life, you know, than drinks parties at the Foreign Office and having Nick Robinson's mobile number on your fucking Blackberry.

  Oliver Reeder : All right, all right, fine. Sorry, Hugh. I feel for the guy, I had a girlfriend with special needs once, so I know.

  [with a smile] 

  Oliver Reeder : Luckily I was able to fulfil them.

  Hugh Abbott : Oh, God, you're such a...

• Hugh Abbott : [looking at a 7 foot pot plant in his office]  Where did that come from?

  Oliver Reeder : Oh, Malcolm sent it.

  Hugh Abbott : It's far too big. Why did he send it?

  Oliver Reeder : Er, office warming present.

  Hugh Abbott : So why did he send us a present?

  Oliver Reeder : I dunno.

  Hugh Abbott : Has security checked this?

  Oliver Reeder : What for? Tiny little terrorists?

  Hugh Abbott : Yes.

  Oliver Reeder : It's a plant! "Yes"?

• Terri Coverley : Did you send an e-mail this morning, about me, calling me a cunt?

  Oliver Reeder : No! No, I never use that word, let alone about you, no, absolutely, I won't use it until, you know, it's been fully normalized and has no further assosiation with the... female twat.

• Hugh Abbott : Is Tucker in the building?

  Oliver Reeder : Malcolm in the Middle.

  Hugh Abbott : Huh?

  Oliver Reeder : It's what they're calling him, 'cause he can stand in the middle of the atrium and just shout at all the departments.

  Hugh Abbott : Well, I don't want to see him, not at the moment.I can't take one of his scenes from The Exorcist just now.

• Malcolm Tucker : Right. How're you doing, in sorting out whether he lied or not, you doing ok?

  Oliver Reeder : Pretty well, yeah.

  Malcolm Tucker : Is that a lie?

  Oliver Reeder : Yeah.

  Malcolm Tucker : That is not fucking funny, you retard!... I'm sorry about that, Glenn, the situation's just...

• Oliver Reeder : [standing several floors up in the atrium of their new building, looking down]  Good spot for a suicide, this, I would think. Good long drop, appreciate audience.

  Robyn Murdoch : What if you just broke your back? You know... you'd be paralysed for life and you'd still be depressed about the thing that was depressing you in the first place.

  Terri Coverley : What are these, erm, hangy-down things?

  Oliver Reeder : Oh, they're acoustic baffles. They stop it get too echoey, innit.

  Robyn Murdoch : So when you're breaking your back, nobody can hear you screaming?

  Oliver Reeder : Well, that is the kind of attention to detail that you get in a PFI building

  Malcolm Tucker : [shouting up from the lobby]  HEY! GET BACK TO WORK, ALL OF YOU!