“It’s a tough sell to a guy from Belfast”
Vittorio Angelone (middle) locked horns with Penny Mordaunt on The Last Leg(Image: Channel 4)
A Belfast comedian has locked horns with former House of Commons leader Penny Mordaunt during a heated exchange on Channel 4’s The Last Leg.
Vittorio Angelone appeared alongside Ms Mordaunt on the long-running talk show on Friday to go over the week’s news headlines, which ranged from the ongoing conflict in Iran to a new disability storyline in children’s animation Peppa Pig.
Mordaunt was on the Channel 4 comedy panel show discussing her role as an ambassador for the Music Man Project, a choir formed of people with learning disabilities.
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The incident occurred after host Adam Hills and his co-stars Alex Brooker and Josh Widdicombe turned their attention to Peppa Pig.
“I know disability representation’s a big thing for you, Penny, because you are an ambassador for something called the Music Man Project, which we had on the show last year,” Hills said.
After listening to Mordaunt talk about the project, Angelone sparked laughter and applause, saying: “Penny’s always been such a supporter of disabled people, you’re very supportive of the prosthetics industry… You were promoting on Twitter an arms fair in Saudi Arabia recently?”
Ms Mordaunt served as Defence Secretary for 85 days before being ousted by the then-Prime Minister Boris Johnson in 2019. She shared a post to X on February 16 congratulating UK companies that exhibited at the World Defence Show in Saudi Arabia.
“You’ve got to let me respond to that,” a visibly unimpressed Mordaunt told Angelone in response and attempted to make a case for investing in British defence “in this particular week”, a reference believed to relate to the current conflict between the US and Iran.
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“I’m on your side,” Angelone said, to which Mordaunt responded: “I don’t think you are, sweetheart.”
After calling her remark “patronising”, the comedian shot back: “As a positive thing I think it’s great, war-mongering has always been a male-dominated industry, you’ve smashed the glass ceiling.”
Mordaunt told Angelone she would like to introduce him to “some other women that put their lives on the line to defend people like you being able to do what you want to do in your life, and make jokes about the government and all sorts of things, and enjoy the freedoms that we do in this country.”
“It’s a tough sell to a guy from Belfast,” Angelone said in his parting quip, to more laughter.
Friday night’s episode marked Angelone’s debut on the show, appearing with Mordaunt and comedian Jamli Maddix, plus host Hills and his co-stars Widdicombe and Brooker.
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