Wednesday, 15th August 2007 at 10:57 am

Sir Richard Branson and the American talk show hosed

No one can say that Virgin doesn’t go to great lengths to keep folks hydrated.

When Sir Richard Branson, Virgin’s billionaire founder, appeared on American US talk show host Stephen Colbert’s Comedy Central television show a few nights ago, he apparently got rather riled up when he wasn’t allowed to plug his new Airline, Virgin America, despite the fact that he had named one of the planes in the fleet Air Colbert, to honour Stephen. So Richard grabbed a mug of water (all guests on the show always receive a mug of water to drink from throughout the segment) and poured the water from it all over Stephen. Talk about making a splash!
According to a witness: “Stephen was DRENCHED. He took a beat, then signalled for his own “ammunition” for about twenty seconds until Alison (Silverman) ran and gave him her bottle of water, and Stephen retaliated. The two of them sat for a VERY uncomfortable second looking like two wet cats. Then Stephen thanked him for coming. I really don’t think it was planned…”

Well, the water did appear to douse both men’s flaring tempers!

At first there was speculation that the segment wasn’t going to be aired without being retaped first, but apparently it is going to air, water fight and all, on August 22.

Additional reading: Branson flies off handle - Boston Herald.