Cooper loses it talking about Dépardieu’s airplane tinkle

Even the best presenters just have to succumb to the sheer ridiculousness of their given material at times. Here’s CNN’s Anderson Cooper covering Gérard Dépardieu’s recent little airplane urinary mishap and trying valiantly to suppress his increasing amusement until he just completely cracks up:

My transcript: (click the [+/-] to expand/collapse →)

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ANDERSON COOPER: Time now for the RidicuList, and tonight, we’re adding Gérard Dépardieu, noted French actor, Academy Award nominee, public urinator. That’s right, I said ‘urinator’.

Last night, on a flight from Paris to Dublin, Dépardieu reportedly peed on the floor. Apparently, the plane was on the tarmac, and the flight attendant told him he’d have to wait to use the bathroom until takeoff. So, Dépardieu created his own little jet-stream – or, as the French would say, oui oui.

When I first heard the story this morning, I thought there was no way it was real. But the airline CitiJet confirmed it beyond any shadow of skepticism. And by that, I mean they vaguely tweeted about it. Quote:

[Tweet by cityjet.com (@cityjet)]

As you may have seen on the news, we are busy mopping the floor of one of our planes this morning...

[Next tweet by cityjet.com (@cityjet)]

We'd also like to remind all passengers that our planes are fully equipped with toilet facilities...

COOPER: Hmmm. CityJet. I would’ve guessed he flies Incontinental. … Incontinental. Anyway.

While the airline was busy putting the ‘P’ back in ‘PR’, some of the passengers just couldn’t hold it anymore and started spilling their version of the incident to the press. Can you blame them? They saw an actual thespian actually thespeein’. [giggles] Oh, it’s full of puns.

This probably won’t come as a shock, but several passengers say Dépardieu was – you guessed it – visibly drunk. But I think there’s another explanation. See, as a celebrity, he’s not accustomed to being told he can’t do things he wants to do, when he wants to do them. Things like going to the bathroom. No, he’s probably used to being, you know, pampered. [image of “Pampers Cruisers” appears on-screen] I’d go as far as to say he depends on it. [Pampers image replaced with “Depends (Men”)]

COOPER: [pointing to image] We put a graphic in case you didn’t get the reference. “Depends on it.”

But it’s kinda sad when you think about it. This guy has been in hundreds of movies. Will he be remembered for Cyrano de Bergerac? Probably not. Will he be remembered for Green Card? Nope. This incident is likely to go down as his number one role. Although, there is a bright side. [giggles, looks around camera] Stop laughing, it’s distracting. Now that we know he doesn’t have any stage fright when it comes to public urination, maybe he can get together with his fellow cast-mates from La Vie En Rose and they can all have a pissing contest. You know, like a pee-off. (“Piaf”. The movie was about Édith Piaf.)

So, after Gérard took a little solo flight to uri-nation, the plane had to turn around and go back to the gate, and some unlucky cleaning crew had to deal with the Golden-Globe-winning tinkle. Now, all I can say is they should thank their lucky stars it wasn’t Dépar-doo. [giggles] Sorry. That made me giggle every time I wrote it.

He hasn’t commented on this incident … [giggles more] “Dépar-doo”. I know you got it, but …

[Cooper starts giggling more and more; we hear others behind the camera laughing as well, and before long, Cooper simply can’t help it and totally cracks up, trying several times but failing to regain his composure]

COOPER: [still giggling] Sorry, this has never happened to me. You see this sort of thing on YouTube, and you don’t think it actually happens …

[Cooper continues to crack up uncontrollably for a few moments]

COOPER: All right. Sorry. He hasn’t commented on the incident, but if I know the European celebrity spin machine, and I think I do, there will probably be some excuse like “he was doing research for a movie role”. As we speak, I bet somewhere in Paris, a screenwriter is furiously typing out a period piece about the potty-training misadventures of an overgrown, drunk French two-year-old. His entourage reportedly says that he wasn’t drunk, and he just tried to discreetly pee in a bottle, but I’m not sure that version holds water.

In any case, Gérard, chin up: Yes, this incident was in all the papers, but it’s nothing but yellow journalism, and soon it will be flushed from our memories. So, just go with the flow on the RidicuList.

That was one transcript that was actually almost fun to write.

(via Joe. My. God.)

Tags: Anderson Cooper • Gérard Dépardieu • RidicuList • giggles