John Humphrys entertains Radio 4 listeners with alternative Trainspotting monologue

Humphrys tweaked the expletives and offered an alternative ending
Iconic: The cast of the original 1996 film
Channel Four Films
Emma Powell25 January 2017
The Weekender

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John Humphrys entertained BBC Radio 4 listeners with his own take on Ewan McGregor's Choose Life monologue from Trainspotting.

Humphrys paid tribute to the opening lines of Danny Boyle's 1996 film as he marked the release of the much anticipated sequel, T2.

The Mastermind presenter, 73, tweaked the expletives and replaced “choose a f****** big television” with “choose a big telly” and “f*****-up brats” to “screwed-up brats”.

But he did leave one in, telling listeners: “Choose DIY and wonder who the f*** you are on Sunday morning”.

He also offered up an alternative ending by replacing “Who needs reasons when you've got heroin”, with “Who needs reasons when you've got Radio 4”.

McGregor (Renton), Robert Carlyle (Begbie), Jonny Lee Miller (Sick Boy) and Ewen Bremner (Spud) were reunited for the new film which is loosely-based on Irvine Welsh’s Porno.

A recent trailer showed a twist on McGregor’s iconic ‘Choose Life’ speech, which has been updated to include ‘Instagram’, ‘Facebook’ and ‘zero-hour contracts’.

Welsh recently admitted that much of his book had to be altered to fit in with the later time-frame of the story in order to ‘take reality into account’.

Despite the film still yet to be released, Carlyle has hinted at a third instalment.

Speaking at the film’s premiere in Edinburugh, he said: “We’ve been talking about that, I am up for doing it,” he said. “So maybe we ain’t seen the end of Begbie just yet.”

T2 Trainspotting is set for UK cinema release on January 27.

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