Paul Merton in Europe (2010)

Actor:

Paul Merton

Time for a rare and eccentric picture of a fascinating continent. Europe will never look the same again.

Episode 1

Beginning in Germany, Paul meets the leader of a political movement known as the Apple Front, before enjoying a ‘chess boxing’ match in a Berlin sports hall. Next, he meets a former truck driver who practises the dying art of giant bunny breeding, and samples the delights of naked bowling. The first leg of Paul’s tour ends with a bizarre spa treatment in a hotel on the Austrian border.

Episode 2

Still in Germany, Paul visits an American Indian Club in the former German Democratic Republic (Communist East Germany) before exploring the Wunderland miniature railway in the affluent city of Hamburg. His last stop in Germany is a visit to a family who make wooden sex toys! The next leg of the journey is the Republic of Ireland, starting in the ‘rebel’ county of Cork. Paul meets a solicitor called Colin who dreams of competing as a female synchronised swimmer, and an Irish monk who has opened an alternative sculpture park…

Episode 3

Paul resumes his travels in Ireland with a stop to witness the unusual sport of road bowling. Near the lunar landscape of the Burren, he drops in on Father Ted’s house, before visiting a remarkable Brazilian enclave. In Dublin, Paul meets an enterprising pair who are selling Irish dirt to America, and an artist who lives in a 1930s house.

Episode 4

Paul’s European tour continues with a trip to Italy. His first stop is the elegant northern city of Milan, famed for two things – football and fashion. Paul’s guide, Genevieve, shows him how a local department store has gone one better by fusing the two together. While being dragged around the shops, Paul is surprised to stumble across a semi-naked footballer, Andrea Vasa, living in a department store. Andrea eats, sleeps and showers in the aisles for passers-by to see. This living, breathing bit of window dressing even parks his Porsche on the shop floor. The idea is the brainchild of the store owner, who believes that football is the language of the 21st century.

Episode 5

Ever since his teachers forced him to learn metal work instead of French, Paul Merton has never really had the chance to learn about France… until now. There, he meets show jumpers who perform without horses, hears from a playwright who lived in a zoo with a panda, and learns the bittersweet story of a heartbroken graffiti artist. In Champagne, Paul discovers that boundary changes could make some locals very rich indeed. The intrepid explorer also visits a macabre museum devoted to the horrors of the world, and catches up with the man who has invented the world’s first full-body rollerblading suit…

Episode 6

Paul decides it time to finish his European tour in style, in Spain, and he soon discovers the country has much more to offer than just paella, sun and sangria. He encounters a former monk who has spent the last half-century building a gigantic church singlehandedly. At a bullfight, he witness a spectacular display of acrobatics that leaves the animal in one piece. Elsewhere, Paul takes part in a gigantic human tower, learns about the legacy of the Civil War and tries his hand at flamenco.