Comic Dom Joly slags off Clifford's Tower on visit to York

TOP TV comic and legendary prankster Dom Joly spent two days in York this week - and didn't hold back on his verdict.

Joly, 56, built a career from being a TV prankster and had a hit with his Channel 4 show Trigger Happy TV in the early noughties.

His trademark skit was going round with a giant mobile phone in his hand, shouting at the top of his voice in quiet locations.

In 2001, the show came to York, where Joly was filmed sitting on a bench outside the Kings Arms pub with his giant phone announcing loudly that the city was rubbish.

Our video still of Dom Joly with his trademark giant mobile phone outside the Kings Arms in 2001, telling the caller that York was rubbish.

This week, he was back in York during a two-day break from his current UK show The Conspiracy Tour, which played at The Stephen Joseph Theatre in Scarborough on Friday night.

There was no gig in York, however, that didn't deter Joly from stopping off in the city over Sunday and Monday.

Did he still think York was "rubbish"?

Well - one part certainly was.

Ahead of his visit, Joly had appealed to his 174,000 followers on Facebook for "cool" ideas of what to do while in York.

His post read: "I've got Sunday/Monday off in #York. Good cool bars, nice restaurants, things to do apart from the obvious please".

More than 320 comments were posted under the appeal within hours of it being uploaded.

On arrival in York, Joly posted several videos and photos of his two-day break.

In one, he criticises Clifford's Tower - one of the city's best-known landmarks and visitor attractions, which is owned by English Heritage.

Joly has a video series on social media called 'Dom Joly Castle Slagger' where he visits castles in the UK and gives them an amusing review.

Clifford's Tower makes it to episode 5 of Joly's series on slagging off castles

Clifford's Tower - the last remaining part of York Castle - was singled out for episode 5 of Joly's series.

In the video, Joly joked: "Today I am going to be slagging off Clifford's Tower. I think it's a tower owned by Clifford, the big red dog, but I'm not sure!"

Joly's first gripe was access. As he climbed the stairs up towards the tower, he said: "Well, they could have put in a lift or an escalator."

And he took offence at the entry price: "£10.50 - just for a tower? I'm not paying £10.50 for a tower." He said "I can get to New York for that!" and decided to go to the pub instead. His next stop was Brew York in Walmgate.

Earlier, he posted a video of him going for brunch in York - at the award-winning Robinsons in Bishopthorpe Road.

The video shows Joly joining the queue for a table, then sitting at the counter to eat his meal.

Unlike Clifford's Tower, this experience was a winner for the comic.

He said: "That was one of the joys of asking people online where to go because that was amazing. Highly recommend."

Joly enjoyed a meal at Robinsons in York

Joly also revealed he'd visited the Walmgate restaurant Yemen Heaven and taken in a film, The Apprentice, a bio-pic about Donald Trump, which also won his approval.

He also posted a photo of a woman walking on the bar walls - with her cat on a lead, and commented: "Just a girl jogging with her cat".

Joly's post from York Bar Walls

Readers might remember Joly's earlier amusing riffs on the city and North Yorkshire in a 2001 episode of Trigger Happy TV. Beside visiting King's Staith, he called at Goathland, famous as the location for top TV show Heartbeat, and Castle Howard.

The show started with Joly roaring into a ridiculously large mobile phone outside Castle Howard. He told the "caller" that he was looking for a stately home to buy, but that this one was "too small".

He also targeted Channel Four Racing star John McCririck at York Races by feigning to pass out by collapsing to the ground while interviewing him.

Mr McCririck, after a few seconds of stunned silence, apparently picked up on what was going on, saying in a rather peeved tone of voice: "I don't know what kind of programme this is".

After hosting Trigger Happy TV on Channel 4 from 2000-2003, Joly then moved to BBC3 for his spoof chat show This is Dom Joly, and World Shut Your Mouth on Friday nights on BBC One, where, again, he used a hidden camera to prank folks.

His other TV credits include, Dom Joly's Happy Hour, on BBC One in 2006, where he went on a global pub crawl with Peter Wilkins, trying drinks from all parts of the world.

In 2009, he hosted Made in Britain, shown on the Blighty channel in the UK, and between 2012-13, Joly returned to pranking and made two series of Fool Britannia, a hidden camera show for ITV on Saturday evenings.

In 2016, he spent two weeks with Bear Grylls on a desert island for Celebrity Island with Bear Grylls.