Comedian and Hollywood star, Ricky Gervais, has put prostate cancer on top of the news agenda again by insisting his comedy partner Karl Pilkington have his bottom examined while being filmed in ‘An Idiot Abroad 2’
The comic duo entered into light hearted banter about the digital rectal examination (DRE) during the sketch which is due to be due aired tonight on Sky2 at 11pm.
The pair were joined by Dr Frank Chinegwundoh, Lead Urology Consultant and Project Lead at Newham University Hospital Trust, who explained to them about the most common cancer in men in the UK, and gave a reluctant Pilkington an internal inspection.
More than 10,000 people have viewed the comic sketch, which has since been uploaded onto You Tube.
Ricky said: “Karl is the typical ‘bloke’ who would rather take his chances with prostate cancer than have another human being put a finger where a finger shouldn’t go. I knew men everywhere would reconsider and say, ‘if Karl can do it so can I’.”
Ricky’s support of raising awareness of prostate cancer first hit the headlines in 2005 when a radio advert he scripted and recorded for The Prostate Cancer Charity was banned by the Radio Advertising Clearance Centre, although the ban was later overturned.
Owen Sharp, Chief Executive of The Prostate Cancer Charity, said: “We are extremely grateful to Ricky, Stephen, Karl, and Dr Chinegwundoh for using comedy to raise awareness of prostate cancer and the diagnostic process to literally thousands of people. Through his comedy Ricky has once again broken down some of the misconceptions about the disease and helped to raise awareness of it.
“We know men can be reluctant to go and see their doctor if they have problems ‘down below’ and so to script a sketch that questions this embarrassment in a non-threatening way is just brilliant.”
Gervais later urged his 714,856 Twitter followers to support The Prostate Cancer Charity to continue it’s work by donating money to the cause.
You can view Ricky’s prostate cancer chat on ‘An Idiot Abroad’ here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypphWN1eKVU