BCG Daily Saturday 29th March 2014

Review: I Can't Sing! (London Palladium)

If you can get over the total absurdity and nonsense then there is much to enjoy in Harry Hill and Steve Brown's money-maker.

Hitchhiker's cast reunite in theatre where it all began

Original cast of science fiction classic reunite in studio for live performance as part of Radio 4's Character Invasion season.

Radio Times review

Stewart Lee is on nasty, bilious form tonight. A long routine about how much he hates dogs is almost self-sabotaging. But then he later implies it was all designed to mock that sort of routine anyway. When he's like this, you'd be hard pressed to argue with someone who found him insufferable, but then the mini-interview segments with Chris Morris make exactly that point.

Similarly, Lee talks straight down the camera lens to address us at home several times ("You can carry on watching if you like, but you need to raise your game"), then has Morris berate him for doing so. All of this would be too self-referential to bother with, if it weren't also funny, inventive and acutely observed. And who else would imagine a stand-up routine aimed at a roomful of oligarchs?

Radio Times review

BBC sensitivity was such that for years we were deprived of this triumphant episode. It was off our screens for 42 years until 2012, its IRA subplot deemed too controversial. But the Irish question is very much an aside to an instalment so packed with gags, misunderstandings and drama that it fairly takes the breath away.

Contrasting phone manner offers a lot of initial fun: Wilson's hilariously fey "Hullo?"; a submissive Mainwaring deafened by his wife's receiver slamming. Soon the platoon teeters on the brink of mutiny (over a pub darts match, but there is real acrimony), Jones comes to regret his under-the-counter offer to the captain and Hodges muscles in on Mavis Pike. Is Wilson too much the gentleman to intervene?

You'll laugh, you'll be tense, you'll worry about 74-year-old Arnold Ridley getting roughed up by a burly henchman.

Lee Hurst's comedy career isn't all over...

Lee Hurst has been off the comedy circuit for a while, running his own comedy club in Bethnal Green, London, but the lure of performing live has put him back in the spotlight.

Bath Comedy Festival review

Most comedy festivals have their launch gala shows with in the biggest theatre in town with the starriest names they can get. Bath, in contrast, has the gala for its sixth annual event in a cricket club bar.

Edinburgh Comedy Festival dies - long live the Fringe

The demise of this land grab-cum-marketing initiative shows how the fringe defies attempts to control and corporatise it.

Simon Cowell wants to make movie out of Harry Hill show

Simon Cowell has confessed that he wants to make a movie out of Harry Hill's X Factor parody musical.

Comedy review: Zoe Lyons, Glasgow

For an hour of consistently strong social commentary, anecdotal and observational routines, look no further.

Matt Richardson talks about family, friends and life

"I sometimes get asked for my autograph but more often people come up to me and say 'were you at school with me?'".

Steve Coogan: Partridge is heir to Fawlty & Hancock

Steve Coogan says his character Alan Partridge comes from a lineage including Captain Mainwaring, Basil Fawlty and Tony Hancock.

Norman Lovett's old and new philosophy

Norman Lovett is what you might call a silver surfer, "if I had any hair" laughs the 67-year-old.

Ed Byrne: 'People annoy me'

Ee Byrne has decided people annoy him. The comic, a familiar face to audiences of TV show Mock The Week, and self-proclaimed "grumpy old git", recently turned 40 and has decided that nearing middle age is the time for a spring clean.

Preview: The Trip To Italy

If you are after big belly laughs the first episode is a little disappointing. The food and eevrything else, of course, could not look more exquisite.

How Morecambe & Wise recorded their only ever live VHS

Morecambe and Wise will be bringing sunshine back to Fairfield Halls next month - the site of their only ever recorded live tour show.

Comedy review: Dan Bingham, Glasgow

Are comedians born funny? Are they forces of nature? Or products of nurture? That's the intriguing question at the heart of this enjoyable hour from Canadian Dan Bingham.