Don’t Have Nightmares, Do Sleep Well

January 27, 2010 at 6:00 am

Ah, how we miss that warm, reassuring phrase from Crimewatch. And we mustn’t fear, folks, because the ever-vigilant forces of law and order are on the case.

Kids TV hosts Anna Williamson and Jamie Rickers have said they were questioned by police under anti-terrorism powers – for carrying glittery hairdryers.

The pair, who front ITV1’s hit show Toonattik, were filming a skit for the programme on London’s South Bank wearing combat gear and armed with children’s walkie-talkies and hairdryers.

Their fake fatigues aroused the suspicions of patrolling police, who stopped them and took down their particulars.

Williamson, 28, said: “We were filming a strand called Dork Hunters, which is to do with one of the animations we have on the show.

“We were out and about doing ‘dork hunting’ ourselves on the streets of London.

“Jamie and I were kitted out in fake utility belts, we had the whole bulletproof flakjacket thing, we’ve got hairdryers in our belt, a kids’ £1.99 walkie-talkie, hairbrushes and all that kind of stuff, and we were being followed by a camera crew and a boom mike and we get literally pulled over by four policemen and we were issued with a warning ‘under the act of terrorism’.”

Rickers, 32, added: “We were stopped, not arrested, but they had to say ‘we are holding you under the Anti-Terrorism Act because you’re running around in flak jackets and a utility belt’, and I said ‘and please put spangly blue hairdryer’ and he was, like, ‘all right’.”

The presenting duo named the escapade as one of the most memorable moments from their time on the show, which celebrates its fifth anniversary on February 6 and 7.

TheEye must confess to never having heard of this programme, and a sneaking suspicion that this story either has appeared or will shortly appear in the Daily Make-It-Up, thus destroying my confidence that it might be even slightly accurate. But until that happens, it could well be true.