Mark Steel's In Town

Mark performs at the Portland Spa Hotel & Conference Centre on the Isle of Portland in Dorset, celebrating the quarries, the military history, the dislike of Weymouth and the hatred of a certain fluffy animal beginning with "R".

This week, Mark comes from the Portland Spa Hotel & Conference Centre on the Isle of Portland, Dorset: a town most famous for its stone.

Mark talks about the town's hatred of Weymouth, Portland's very own shipping forecast area, and the local lighthouse. However, things really begin to hot up when he talks about a certain long-eared fluffy animal beginning with "R" which is considered so terrible that even to say the word is bad luck. This resulted in adverts for the Wallace and Gromit film to be re-titled The Curse of the Were-Bunny.

Mark then talks about the history of Portland stone, which has been used to make the Cenotaph, St. Paul's Cathedral, Buckingham Palace, Broadcasting House, the Bank of England, and the United Nations building. However, there is a campaign to prevent the opening of a new quarry.

The island has also been home to a military base and a torpedo development site. The building where the gig is performed used to be that based. From the outside, it still looks like a base. This leads to Mark to tell the history of smuggling and other crimes in the area, including an escape form a local prison that might have been inspired after the prisoners were allowed to watch an episode of Colditz.

Mark then tells how he wanted to go on a tour of Portland's bird sanctuary, but was not allowed to. The manager said: "Sorry, I looked you up on the internet and I don't think your sort of thing is suitable."

However, at the end of it all, surely Mark would not spoil everything by saying "Rabbit"?