Coffee With Kaz: Czech TV, Teen Horror and Life Before Streaming (Bonus Brew 2)

Get your coffee machines ready, boil that kettle, get yourself a cup and sit down, because it's Television Times Podcast, but a bonus.

And this week, we're here with Karen Vranuch.

Now, this is Coffee with Karen, and this, my friends, is Brew Number 2.

I should say that Karen is omnipresent in the local area, but I live in the...

She's so omnipresent that I can think of her.

And she watched it the other day.

I am like The Truman Show, like, I will just be a character everywhere on this road.

You know, you gotta do the day jobs if you want to do an art thing.

Like, that's just the cruel reality of it.

Someone did that in a show recently.

I should mention Juice.

He's the guy who does Juice.

Mawaan Rizwan plays this guy called Jammer.

He's really funny.

He was on Taskmaster a couple of years ago.

And in that, there's this character that is just doing every job.

So if they go in a shoe shop, they're there.

They go in a cafe, they're there.

They're the waiter in everything they go in.

That person is there.

That's literally me.

It's really funny.

That's me in each.

You should watch it just for that reason.

I don't need to watch it.

It's very funny.

It is very funny because I keep seeing people that I know and then my mind goes, where do I know them from?

It's like always sunny.

The waiter guy.

You remember me?

Yeah, but they're, yeah, I do the opposite.

I'm like, I know no one recognizes me, but then they do.

I'm like, oh shit.

Or people now, because I work at the local corner shop, people like, I walk down those street, right?

And people smile at me.

I'm like, who the fuck was that?

Maybe I sort of left the corner shop.

But sometimes people just, no offense, people just blend into one.

Like if you're like a generic looking boy, you'll blend into one.

You get a vape, nothing original.

Definitely will blend into one, but like.

There are a lot of dudes that walk around this area who look, I mean, I'm gonna say this blatantly, right?

I was in the cafe.

Peep, peep.

Really great, except you need to sort your kitchen out because you don't know what you're fucking doing with those omelets.

But I went in there recently, you're like this, I can cut it if you want.

Blah, blah, blah, something about the coffee.

That's how I feel.

Even though I know they're not thinking that because everyone here is lovely, but I suddenly am aware that I'm a sovereign.

No, I fully understand that because I sound like a Yankee here.

And I just feel like, Jesus Christ, they think I'm fucking stupid and I'm sending things back because it's different in America.

No, no, no, people think I've never worked a day in my life and I'm like, I worked since I was 15, but they think I'm like from the US and I've got all this money.

So I'm just like, I'm just like, wow, accents really change how you're seeing it.

The perception is very different.

Yeah.

And I do think like she might think that I'm like a Southerner who's come up here and bought a house.

I literally lived on our council estate twice in my life.

I never owned my own home and I've never had more than 15 grand at one point in my life.

And that was twice.

And that was just that went very fast.

But I've never had more than that.

And you know, and people do judge you on the accent.

And anyway, go back to the coffee.

And I said back and she said, I'm sorry, I can't really do anything about that.

And I said, why not?

She goes, you just press the button.

I was like, you must be pressing the button differently because it's not the same as when the other one made it.

Or you don't.

Or you don't.

This is one my co-workers.

You will need to bleep this out.

This is real first world problems, isn't it?

I was speaking to someone yesterday and they were talking to me about this subject and it was like, well, you shouldn't really worry about what kids watch because they're going to see it anyway and you can't really keep them from it.

So if they see stuff, it's fine, just explain it.

And it was described to me very blatantly recently when someone said, even if you keep them off this, this, this, and you don't show them that, that, and that, all it takes is one kid at school with a phone when they're 11 and they show them the most graphic thing in the world.

Then it's all undone.

So there's nothing you can do about it.

You can't keep it from anybody.

But I am worried about what that is going to do.

Yeah, I feel like at that school age, you as a parent, like, obviously I don't have kids, but I feel like you as a parent lose control because it's up to other people.

But what you can do is just plan some kind of values.

So even if they see that thing, they're like, oh, like, that's not right.

Or like they would like maybe not join in.

Like you can do little things that change how they at least see it.

It's very difficult.

Yeah, but then it's up to them to decide kind of.

Well, there's also accents as well.

Like my kids, this isn't about kids, so we'll get off this thing.

My kids come home from school and they'll like, you know, put on an accent or something.

A lot of YouTubers are Asian and they will do it.

Like one of them will do an Asian accent.

You know?

But then I did accents all the time.

In fact, I wasn't known for it.

You know, I tried to learn every accent and do any.

I used to like, there was a time in, I think, I don't know, 2004 or something like that, where I did a Ragga song in a voice like Shaggy with my brother and I called myself Ragga Steve.

And I did-

No, you will never hear this song.

Yeah, like, yeah.

I mean, of course, Shaggy doesn't talk like that either, but the point is, I shouldn't have been doing that.

Do you know what I mean?

That is problematic, as you were saying that.

I would not put that out.

It is the is verbal blackface, but you know, that sounds like something that could be a thing.

Oh my God, he's like a dumb verbal blackface.

Yeah, my dad sometimes does things like that when he would like speak of like, oh, like they're from there.

And they would he would like try to make that.

So I'm like, Dad, you can't do that.

And it's always in public.

So it's so embarrassing.

But it's just like, don't do that, Dad.

Like you can't do that.

But he never realizes that it's wrong.

He's just like, oh, I'm just joking.

If someone did my accent, be fine.

But I'm like, yeah, but there's all sorts of issues that go into that, like with racism.

And obviously, if you're a white man, you can't be skidding off like Indian sounding, like East Asian woman.

Do you know what I mean?

Like it's so like there's other things that you clearly have not thought about.

I absolutely love it when Ramesh Ranganathan takes a piss out of his mom and does it.

It makes me laugh my head off, but he can do it.

He's got license too, you know what I mean?

I feel like I can do the Irish accent because I'm half, so that's mine to fuck with, right?

And any English one, for now, as we talked before, I think regional accents are going to be probably something in about 20 years' time that people might have issue with, but I don't know.

There's so much of that, like in Telly in the film, people pretended to be from somewhere else.

I think if they're too famous, you don't buy it.

Liam Neeson's constantly trying to be American.

It's just like, mate, you're slipping dude again.

Yeah, like we know how you sound.

He's like, hey man, I'm off to work and he's going out there and ain't going to shit him in the head.

What?

Did he just?

It's so funny when you see someone that you know, this is just like the worst thing ever.

You might as well hire someone American.

Just do that, right?

As if there's not so many actors and actresses out there wanting a job and you're hiring the same 10 people.

I think I get it sometimes.

There's a lot of British people in Marvel movies, right?

But they film them here.

So I think that's probably part of that, right?

Because all this stuff is filmed here.

But when there's an Aussie pretending to be a Brit or an American, they really often pretend to be British because there's only a couple that can do it, like Anne Hathaway and people like that.

But the other way around, there's so many Brits in American movies.

Sometimes I'll watch something and there's no Americans in it, but it's a big American film with everyone speaking in an American accent.

I'm like, well, that's an Irish guy, that's an English guy, that's an Australian and she's from New Zealand.

If that movie was in the original accents instead of American, because I feel like I can't imagine a Marvel movie with like British accents.

That would be hilarious.

Yeah, I guess so.

I love it when like if I see like Chris O'Dowd turn up in something in America and he's in his Irish accent, it makes me happy.

Yeah, he could be.

It's fine.

There are Irish people like living in America.

He can be Irish.

You don't have to.

I guess it depends on the story.

I feel like the superhero like I can't imagine Marvel movies being British because British people would just be like kind of real, whereas Marvel movies are very like, well, save the day.

It's very like jolly American.

Yeah, you can do it.

Whereas British people probably can't do it.

Yeah, that's what British people do.

I'm sure there's 50-50 at this point.

Yeah, I just can't imagine that because I feel like the accents also mean you have this British way of dealing with things.

So maybe that's why it's all American, because Americans are very jolly.

Meanwhile, my wife and I are watching the Squid Game Challenge just because we've watched that.

It's filmed here, but it's full of Americans, which is very confusing because I was watching it going, that's very big, massive sound stages.

And I know they film a lot of stuff in America as well, of course, but they don't do that kind of stuff there.

So I was thinking, is that made here?

Have they flown in like 300 Americans?

They did.

It's filmed in London.

But it's like full of teams where like the guy's going, you got this, no one's going home today, no one's going home today, you got this, I love you.

And I'm thinking, you don't know that.

And they're so disappointed because they believe they're going to be the one.

Like one guy even said like, God chose me to be here, chose me to be on this, God chose me.

Yeah, because if there's a God, I'll tell you what he's busy with, sorting out who goes on a fucking Netflix game show.

Fucking moron.

And he lost anyway, of course.

Good, good riddance.

I met someone in Granger Market and this was a lady from Florida and she started arguing with me about like, oh, I think women have all the rights we need.

Like in the Western developer world, I think we're good.

I think we're pushy if we ask her more.

And I'm like, what?

What a weird thing to say.

Yeah, and she was a woman in like maybe her like mid thirties.

Like she's not like old and I was like wow.

Florida though, they're fucking nuts down there.

Yeah, that's what I mean.

Like that's how you think like, oh, we're being pushy if we want more rights.

I mean, they should build a wall there.

Yeah.

Please, don't let anyone from Florida go anywhere.

I won't go there because of the fucking, I've been told the weather is something that I would immediately just scope, nope, and get back on the phone.

It's also the way of thinking.

I just think people there are nuts.

Like if you ever go through like Florida news, it's always like man eaten by crocodile, man walking crocodile.

Oh yeah, the Florida man thing was a thing for a while, wasn't it?

Well, yeah, because they're crazy.

But she was just arguing and I, whenever I argue with someone and I know I'm right, I'm very calm because I'm like, I got this.

Like I know I'm right that even another lady joined in and was like agreeing with me because she worked for the BBC.

Maybe you need to block this out, but she worked for the BBC and she was one of the first female.

Yeah, I don't know her.

She was just at this food place.

And she said she worked for the BBC and she was one of the first like women in that department, but she still had men telling her what to say.

She was just like the puppet on TV to be like, we have women, but it was still the words of the man.

So yeah, so she was saying, no, it's true.

We still don't have enough rights and a lot of things like that.

You've seen the Barbie movie.

It's so funny, but it's so political.

Yeah, this is really fun because I could say anything you don't know.

You could be doing bar art stuff right now.

Yeah, so, yeah, well, let's see.

You know the questions.

You've heard some episodes.

Let's try one of the newer ones that you might not know.

And it might be, yeah, let's go with this one because it might be Czech because people have actually told me about creepy Czech children's TV shows.

So maybe you'll have one.

I don't know.

Oh, you're asking me about creepy ones.

Well, I might do.

Disturbing ones.

Yeah, so here's the question.

So, Karen, what is something you saw on television as a child that scared the shit out of you?

I feel bad because it's not a Slovak thing.

It doesn't matter.

Oh no, but no one's going to understand it.

It's fine.

Good for the plot.

There was a movie that I saw as a child, and it wasn't from Czech or Slovak, but it was a horror movie that at first I didn't know what would happen, but it was that children kill their parents.

And it was called Children of the Corn by Stephen King.

Children of the Corn, the TV serialization of the book.

Yeah.

Yeah, by Stephen King.

That was one of the first things that I saw on TV.

And I just said in Slovak, like, oh, it's not Czech or Slovak, but this horror like scared the shit out of me basically because I didn't know where I was heading.

And then suddenly it was just these kids, spoiler alert, if you've not seen it, but like it's been on for years.

It's your fault if you've not seen it.

Yeah, it's your fault if you've not seen it.

So these kids go out and like, they're kind of like possessed by something in the corn.

And then they go and murder the parents and like the adults of the town.

What age were you watching this?

Far too young, I think.

I don't know, maybe when I was 10, maybe when I was like at the age of those kids killing the parents.

And I was like, should I be doing this?

I was like, should I be doing this?

I was like, for a second, I was like, what is this?

And then I realized like this is obviously just a movie.

But I was just like, who thought of this?

But then Stephen King is just very dark like and loves his horror.

But I was just like, that was the first thing I was like.

And it really scared me because then the way I even saw kids was like, are they going to like turn into this now?

I was far too young to watch this.

So they basically demonized other children for it.

Yeah.

And I was just like, what's happening?

Because then I looked at kids when they were like kind of fighting, like the parents, you know how kids are like, oh, mom, I want to go there.

I want this.

I was like, are they going to kill them now?

I was far too young for this.

Because they put things in your head that you didn't even know.

I'm paranoid about every kid that rebels.

I didn't know they could do that.

I was just like, oh my God, what is happening?

Or like when I was a bit older, it was all horror.

I used to love horror movies.

That's why whenever I see anything, it just brings back such, like it's so nostalgic for me.

But it was Scream, because I remember being at a sleepover at my then best friend's house.

And if you don't know Scream, like you've never seen it, which is very hard.

The original first one.

If you've not seen anything, no ads, no nothing, which is really hard to imagine in this world.

But at that point, this was when I was like 13 maybe.

We just, you know, your kids, you want to watch a horror movie.

You don't know anything about it.

You just see the genre on like the TV that shows you.

And it doesn't even show you the description, it just shows you the genre in the year.

And you're like, oh sick, let's watch that.

Because it's like, oh, it's kind of like, I don't know, for some reason, it's cool to watch this because you're probably not allowed.

Yeah, you're not allowed.

So now you're kind of like, oh, let's do this.

Our parents don't know.

So we have no idea what's going to happen.

So I was like, one monster is going to come out in that first scene with Drew Derrimore.

And I was like, oh, I'm kind of scared.

And then we just kind of laughed because it was ridiculous.

It was this guy in like just the costume, like the ghost face.

But before that, and I think I'll never have that feeling again because as a kid, horror movies just hit a different level because...

Yes, at my friend's house.

So you're basically watching this in a house?

Yeah, at a house.

Another setting that I'm like, oh my God, that could be us.

And because when I watch horror now, I'm kind of like, yes, I know this can happen.

Someone can go crazy and just kill people.

That's very, unfortunately, that's what happens.

But as a kid, you're not exposed to that.

So I was really terrified.

And we're home alone at this person's house, a sleepover at the age of 13.

I don't know why we're alone.

Maybe like the parents were out somewhere.

And I was just like, Jesus Christ, is someone going to come in now?

And I know that feeling will never happen again because you grew out of it.

You don't believe TV anymore as much.

You know this is entertainment.

This is like a form of escapism.

You know it's not real.

But at that age, you just think TV is real?

I think you carry some of that because I've had similar experiences with films like that that have left...

I don't even want to talk about it because it will freak me out, but I saw a film...

So basically like what you're talking about, like any kind of home invasion film, because I've seen some of those as a kid, and even now we're about to move.

If we move to a house, then we're going to be downstairs for the first time in a long time.

So I immediately think someone could come in.

I can't not think that.

What we're talking about really is those moments when you see something for the first time and you realize that's a possibility.

And the time you first see that is what you remember, right?

Yeah.

So is there any other...

Let's get away from that shit.

Is there any other kind of creepy Czech things that you saw?

Because I've heard about these kind of stop-motion sort of kids' cartoon-y kind of things from Czech Republic that are actually quite creepy and weird.

Do you know what they're called?

I'm not sure, but we have a lot of like stop-motion like things or like there was this one thing.

I don't know if this is Slovak or Czech, but this is a very like cute little cartoon.

It's called, oh shit, what is it?

I think it's called Mečiníček.

I'm not sure, don't quote me on this.

Anyone that's from where I'm from, please don't quote me on this.

But it's basically this guy and it was before, before the news, I think, around that time.

And I think because it's like bedtime for kids.

So it was like this guy would take the star from like, no, he would have the star on a stick and just put it back into place in the night sky.

And then it would have like this music.

And I think every kid of that generation would hear this and think it's bedtime now.

So it was like stage around like, yeah.

And there was this, I think it was really cute though, because it was just like an old guy just kind of like sending you off to bed.

And then your parents could probably watch the news after that.

I think I remember that.

And there was another one.

Like a social cue, like Pavlov's dog thing.

And then there was another thing, which I think that's Czech, but it's very heavily like popular in Slovakia.

It's called Pat a Mat.

So it's Pat and Mat, like two characters, which we just always like, it's very goofy.

They would go and fix things, but they're very like, they mess up and it's very like grotesque cartoon, like they take a ladder, then one of them accidentally like moves somewhere, hits the other one with the ladder, and it's all a cartoon.

And it's just, I don't know what that was supposed to teach us.

I don't know what that was, but that was just like a very like time-wasting television because it doesn't teach you anything.

It's not that funny, but maybe as kids.

But there was one thing that really creeped me out.

It was one of like TV shows that you always get this, and I feel like you will look back and think it's weird every time that you grow up and you look back and you realize that all the TV shows that are like live action, they're all adults, but they're doing children's TV.

And you're like, that's a bit weird.

Like now you might be like, yeah, that's someone's dad pretending to be this like dancing lollipop.

And you're like, what is this shit?

I always think that when I see children's TV and the presenters are all like, is this a...

And they're like, okay, everybody, let's do it.

He's really, like, really energetic.

I'm Channel 5 on Milkshake.

And he's like, okay, coming on.

The Adventures of Paddington.

Come on, guys, everybody, stretch.

And I'm thinking, in his head, is he thinking, fuck this?

Why the fuck am I doing this at eight in the morning?

I want to be a proper actor.