A man fooled by Michael McIntyre in the comedian’s most-watched prank says he had to grow a beard to avoid being stopped in the street.
The clip of Danny Silk, a 60-year-old engineering product manager from Langley, near Maidstone, has been viewed 13.5 million times on TikTok – and after a re-run of the full show last weekend, his newfound fame shows no signs of abating.
In the episode of Michael McIntyre’s Big Show, which originally aired two years ago, amateur antiques collector Mr Silk had his home secretly visited by the comic, who took away several of his collectibles, including a figurine of Mr Pickwick and two pewter tankards.
The BBC show’s production team then arranged for Fiona Bruce and valuation experts on the Antiques Road Show to film a dummy episode in which they valued items allegedly brought along by punters, that were in fact Mr Silk’s own.
The programme was then screened on Mr Silk’s TV at the exact time of the regular Antiques Roadshow broadcast.
As he sat watching with his wife, Pauline, Mr Silk became increasingly dumbfounded as first one item and then another appeared on TV and was given an inflated value by the experts.
They said the Mr Pickwick figurine, which he had bought for £4, was worth £400, while a doll narrowly escaped being valued at £100,000.
Each time, the astonished Mr Silk rushed to get his own item, which had all been replaced in the meantime, to compare with the one on the screen – and of course they were identical.
“Flipping hell, “ he remarks, before telling Pauline he’s ”a bit freaked out.”
It was not until Mr Silk’s exercise bike was displayed, to be valued by a new “expert” – McIntyre in disguise – that he twigged something was up.
This week, he said: “It had all been set up by my wife, who had responded to a Facebook appeal from the production company, Black Bear.
“She was in on it, but she never said a word to me, so I was completely taken in. I had no idea I was being pranked. The whole experience was surreal.
“Everyone tells me it is hilariously funny, but I think being the butt of the joke may have given me a different perspective.
“But it is what happened afterwards that was really crazy.
“People would recognise me in the street.
“I make quite a few train journeys to the north east in connection with my work, and for ages afterwards I would have students on the train, saying, ‘Aren’t you the Antiques Roadshow guy from Michael McIntyre?’
“It wasn’t just immediately after the show was aired.
“Michael McIntyre has posted a video of the clip on his TikTok account, where it has been viewed 13.5 million times – it’s the most viewed video on his account.
“So people continued to watch it and continued to recognise me.
“In the end, I deliberately grew a beard, and then it stopped.
“Ironically, I had just shaved off the beard about three weeks ago; I thought it would be safe.
“Then they repeated the show on Saturday – I had no idea they were going to do that.
‘I’ve been recognised shopping in Aldi’
“And it’s started all over again. I’ve been recognised on a visit to Leeds Castle and shopping in Aldi.
“It thought I had had my 15 minutes of fame. Now it’s started all over again.”
But, Mr Silk said, he “didn’t regret anything.
He said: “I can see it was a good piece of fun, and Michael did buy my Pickwick figure off me – for £400.”
Mr Silk features in Season 6, Episode 1, available now on BBC iPlayer.
