Gordon in the morning: Michael McIntyre asked to stop telling jokes

First, a warning: It looks like Gordon has undergone meiosis:

Editors?

Anyway, today, the Gordons report on a sense of humour failure:

OFFICE Christmas parties wouldn't be the same if staff were banned from singing Fairytale Of New York half cut.

Michael McIntyre has a similar problem, as he's claimed The Pogues have stopped him using the festive anthem in his stand-up routine.

Actually, it's a Michael McIntyre comedy routine, so that's two sense of humour failures for the price of one.

As ever, the story isn't quite as Smarts pitches it; there's a vague allusion to "their [The Pogue's] people", and presumably only the publishers, not the band, could issue an edict to stop the lyrics being used. And possibly they could only do that successfully for a broadcast or DVD recorded at a gig. But the facts are cloudy.

And there's a good reason why they're cloudy:

Speaking at a recent warm-up gig at London's Soho Theatre ahead of his arena tour, which starts in August, he said: "Last year I was here trying out material before my Christmas show where I did a joke about that Pogues song.

"After that show I got a call from their people and I've been banned from doing that joke."

Yes, you read that correctly: speaking at a recent warm-up gig. Gordon and Gordon have run a news story that's based on part of a stand-up comedy routine.

Hold the front page for tomorrow's big story: Ronnie Barker struggles to buy spare parts for gardening tools.