Sir David Jason’s favourite Del Boy insult is “dipstick”.
The 84-year-old actor’s Only Fools and Horses alter ego Derek Trotter is famous for his creative putdowns of his dopey younger brother Rodney who he called a “plonker”, “wally” and “dipstick”. Sir David has told how he loved all of the terms writer John Sullivan put in the sitcom, but his favourite was dipstick. However, he also admitted he didn’t think it would get past the BBC censors because of its double meaning.
Appearing on the Plot Twist podcast, he said: “John Sullivan, who was the writer, he knew all of these local expressions, so he peppered the script with them.
(Image: Getty Images)
“I can remember when I first read dipstick, that was the one that got me. I said, ‘Rodney, you are a dipstick!’ It was at rehearsals, I remember, I said, ‘We can’t say that.’
“So John said, ‘Yes you can. Why not?’ I said, ‘Do people know what that means.’ So he said, ‘No, I didn’t discuss it with them.’ It’s just what he would use.”
David says John was very clever in his use of Del Boy’s Cockney rhyming slang and insults because he knew BBC bosses would not cut them from the show, like they would actual swear words.
Dipstick is often thought of as the rod to check oil in a car, but – along with ‘plonker’ – it can also refer to a bloke’s private parts. Sir David added: “Plonker is a wonderful London expression and I grew up with it when I was a lad.
“Like all of those expressions that are in there like wally. A wally was the thing you used to get in the chip shop, it was a pickled gherkin, that was a wally.
“When you used to go to the fish and chip shop, can I have cod and chips please and can I have a wally please.
“When you used to say ‘you are a wally’, that meant you were a pickled gherkin, it was a rude interpretation, it was just a funny word. That’s how it came about.”
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Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk
