The Week in Comedy: Jimmy Carr, Jack Whitehall & Jo Brand
C4’s Big Fat Quiz of the Year has been branded as “vile” by (you guessed it) the Daily Mail after comedians Jimmy Carr, Jack Whitehall and Jonathan Ross cracked apparently offensive jokes about the Royal Family, Barack Obama and (you guessed it again) Susan Boyle.
The Mail also reported this week that “grubby golden boy” Whitehall would be dropped from hosting the National Television Awards for his “lewd behaviour” on the Channel 4 panel show.
In an interview with The Telegraph, Billy Connolly has waded in on the debate, branding young stand-ups a danger to modern comedy. Connolly was plugging his new film, Quartet.
Elsewher, Mrs Brown’s Boys was the real festive hit this Christmas. The two-part special attracted 11.7m and 10.7m viewers – eclipsed only by Strictly Come Dancing.
Jo Brand caused quite a stir as she made her first appearance on swimming reality TV show, Splash. One user on micro-blogging site Twitter sneered: “’It’s gonna take Jo Brand to ‘bomb’ off the 10m to make Splash watchable.” Omid Djalili also appeared on the ITV1 show.
Comedian Gary Delaney has announced he will tour his 2010 Edinburgh show, Purist. Delaney is returning to Edinburgh for the first time since 2010 this summer. Details.
The new series of Yes, Prime Minister was made for UK Gold because the BBC had asked its creators to make a pilot episode, it has emerged.
Life’s Too Short, the BBC Two show co-created by Stephen Merchant and Ricky Gervais, will bow out with a one-off special later this year, US broadcaster HBO has confirmed.
David Walliams – who appears at the South Shields Lecture later this month – wanted to make another series of Come Fly With Me. Luckily Matt Lucas rejected the idea.
BBC Radio Scotland is to make a pilot based on comedian Jo Caulfield’s podcast The Good, The Bad And The Ugly. Caulfield records the podcast at The Stand in Edinburgh.
Last but not least, Jim Davidson has been arrested – and bailed – as part of Operation Yewtree, the police investigation into crimes against Jimmy Savile. Davidson had previously branded Yewtree a “witch hunt” on his blog.
That’s all for this week, folks. Check back every Sunday morning for another brief round-up of the week’s paper talk and comedy chatter.
