Why prank calls are the kind of mischief we need in 2018

In the past few weeks, the BBC One show Saturday Kitchen has been hit by a series of puerile prank phone calls – and it’s the best thing to happen since sliced bread was grilled and turned into toast. “What are the best herbs to go with a Camberwell carrot?” Kylie from London (our first hero) innocently asked, much to host Matt Tebbutt’s confusion. Last week, Rachel from Sunbury-on-Thames asked for some advice regarding horse chestnuts. “Every time I bite one, I get a prick in my mouth. Any tips?” (It’s the “tips” that gets me with that one. Superb.) More direct was Doug from Hastings, who called up to announce: “I’ve got crabs. Looking for a recipe to cure it.” Legendary stuff. (It’s funny because you don’t cure crabmeat. The curing process is better suited to the making of European coldcuts such as saucisson d’arles and head cheese.)

Forget leopard print and midcentury furniture, prank phone calls are the only retro trend I’m interested in. In our world of direct messages, curated feeds and remote sniping over social media, the premise of a phone-in – in which humans speak to each other – feels weirdly exotic. The idea of subverting this outdated medium into the even older service of making bifter and knob gags feels as nostalgic as Rupert Bear opening a tuck shop at the bottom of Big Ben. Prank calls hark back to a more innocent time, somewhere in the 90s, perhaps. They put one in mind of Bart Simpson tormenting Moe the barkeeper, asking if he can get hold of a Jacques Strap. This was harmless mischief, a concept that has undergone a lethal inflation in recent years. Mischief used to invoke the Just William stories of Richmal Crompton, in which the errant schoolboy would dress a dog as a parson, then throw a bag of bacon inside a church or something. I don’t know, I’ve not actually read them, but I think I might start. Because when you think of a prank in 2018, you picture a psychopathic teen hacker deep-faking footage of someone’s grandmother at a Klan rally, then blackmailing her into transferring all her personal savings via Bitcoin. On her birthday.

Many people believe the resurrection of Christ is the only story that will save us. Yet for this specific, confused moment, I think it’s this story, about pranksters making rude food jokes on Saturday Kitchen, that does the job. It is a story that reminds us who we really are. People who can’t take anything seriously, people who absorb dad-jokes in our amniotic fluid. British identity isn’t based around doing well in a sports tournament, or having nice weather, or disintegrating into a xenophobic, dystopian vacuum. Who’s got the energy for that? No, it’s about making the effort to call up a flagship show, and waste everyone’s time playing silly buggers.

Look at Tebbutt’s face, as the calls turn, revealing their true nature. The man for whom they are a segment-derailing inconvenience at best, a personal attack at worst, whose job could be on the line if the situation is mismanaged. He’s wobbly-faced as a busted schoolboy, trying not to laugh. One nation, united under childishness, but the good kind.

So, here’s to more prank callers on Saturday Kitchen, the only competitive event at which we could be world beaters. Here’s to more scamps asking about exciting new ways to have it oeuf, or whether plums and buns would go well together, or the best use for a French stick. For once the people have spoken, in their own words, and it’s glorious.