Alexander Armstrong

Fans of Father Ted and The Vicar of Dibley might recoil from the relatively gritty realism of this new six-part ecclesiastical sitcom. Tom Hollander stars as the Reverend Adam Smallbone, a country vicar who takes over an inner-city parish and finds himself tested by a very modern set of moral dilemmas. In episode one, it's the miracle of a good Ofsted report that fills his church with parents of little faith but a genuine fervour to get their children into the church school. When someone throws a bottle through the stained glass window causing £30,000 worth of damage, the Rev has a range of fund-raising ideas from a bring-and-buy sale to sitting on the church roof until someone pays for him to come down. "I think you might be up there for some considerable time," opines Simon McBurney's iPhone-equipped archdeacon. The Rev's best bet is a spot of horse trading with the local MP (Alexander Armstrong), which could bring in the cash in return for a school place for the politician's son. But ought a vicar to be a little more high-minded in how he goes about God's restoration work? Hollander previously donned clergyman's robes in 2005 to play Jane Austen's obsequious Mr Collins in Pride and Prejudice, but he's much more of a baffled everyman here. The script could use a little of Austen's light touch, though. Do vicar's wives really talk about "bashing the bishop"?

This intelligent new sitcom offers a much more gentle take on clerical comedy than Father Ted. Actor and co-creator Tom Hollander, who stars as the Reverend Adam Smallbone, was intrigued by the idea of a classic Church of England vicar being thrust into a parish in the unforgiving urban jungle of London.

The cast clearly had faith in Hollander's vision, because he's got the wonderful Olivia Colman (Green Wing, Peep Show) as his wife Alex and Lucy Liemann (Moving Wallpaper, Reggie Perrin) as the local headmistress, alongside Alexander Armstrong guesting hilariously this week as an MP.

With the London landmark of St Leonard's church in Shoreditch standing in for the fictional St Saviours in the Marshes, tonight the Rev is delighted to see the meagre ranks of his congregation swelling - until he discovers the parents are just trying to boost their religious credentials to get their kids into the good C of E school round the corner. And Adam faces a moral conundrum about whether he should award places in return for money.

The Archdeacon (a brilliant turn by Simon McBurney), who holds very unsentimental views about a vicar's role in the inner city, would undoubtedly think so. He seems to be constantly circling the capital in a black cab and there's a lot of mileage in this character, in every sense.

Rev's mission isn't to make you roll on the floor laughing. It's subtle and thoughtful, with heart and soul as well as a funny bone. I'll say Amen to that.

Alexander Armstrong in baby dash

Alexander Armstrong made a quick dash out of the This Morning studio today - when he found out his wife was in labour.

Incredibly, this is the 20th anniversary and the 39th series of the BBC's flagship entertainment programme - the only entertainment programme that is consistently and genuinely entertaining. Paul Merton's unstoppable flow of surreal invention never seems to dry up, while Ian Hislop must be one of the few people on the planet who can appear on television suffering from a burst appendix and still manage to be funny. With an election looming, the big challenge of the new series - according to Richard Wilson, head of comedy at the production company Hat Trick - will be "to take the spectacularly dull things that politicians say and get laughs out of them". The host tonight is Lee Mack, with Alexander Armstrong and Jo Brand booked to appear later in the run.

This much I know: Alexander Armstrong

The comedian and actor, 40, on playing David Cameron in The Trial of Tony Blair, and his more famous father - a village doctor.

Alexander Armstrong: BBC shouldn't have axed Ross

The comedian Alexander Armstrong tells The Telegraph how filthy jokes can be funny - and why Jonathan Ross shouldn't have been forced out of the BBC.

I can't shake off the sense that this show has switched onto cruise control. It's still funny and there are excellent moments, but they come as occasional flashes. There isn't the sense of one belter of a sketch following another. Focusing on the positives, this week we get an inspired 1960s-style safety film that offers a neat solution to the lack of seatbelts in the backs of cars. And there's a new character, too: champagne-quaffing royal correspondent Terry Devlin, who sits in a breakfast news studio with a sweater draped over his shoulders answering questions such as "What would be the prince's state of mind at this time?" with an expertise that turns out to be distinctly limited. Alexander Armstrong's posh/slightly camp Northern Irish accent (if I'm hearing it right) for the character is a tour de force. Elsewhere, the Spitfire pilots have discovered that there's a spy in the ranks ("The group captain's well vex"). And the businessman who strides through the office taking on-the-hoof briefings learns "Beetroot's making a comeback" and "Nobody misses Sodastream". Plus, look out for a cameo from Dermot Murnaghan.

Alexander Armstrong and Ben Miller's comedy sketch show features the sort of quotably amusing characters that made Little Britain such a success. The street-slang-talking Second World War pilots, in particular, may well be remembered in the same breath as Little Britain's entertainingly verbose Vicky Pollard or Catherine Tate's snappy "Am I bovvered?" schoolgirl in years to come. In tonight's episode, the pilots are aggrieved that one of their "homeboys" has been talking behind their backs ("Oh my days, that's like, er, so two-faced"). Other highlights include Divorced Dad giving his son some frank - and rather crude - sex advice, and Terry Devlin, the Ulsterman Royal Correspondent, talking about the intricacies of the Royal Family's lives.

Chalkie Von Schmidt? A spy?! Theres some awfully bad news for the RAF pilots this week in another bunch of very likeable sketches from Ben Miller and Alexander Armstrong. A great old running gag makes a welcome return and a new character is introduced.

Its a royal correspondent who knows absolutely nothing about what the royals might be doing, eating or thinking but is nevertheless very happy to appear on rolling news channels and speculate about what he doesnt know at great length. It would be nice to see the pair introduce even more new characters like this one to keep things fresh.

Jilted Jim (the loser dumped on his wedding day for the DJ) pops up again tonight and the happy honeymooners probably arent the only ones groaning now every time they see his face.

Other bright spots include a warning about the danger of wearing T-shirts with writing on them. Meanwhile, the Neanderthals name a baby and we're reminded what a very dangerous decade the 1970s must have been by way of another terrifying Safety First film.

Consistently funny if essentially conventional, Armstrong and Miller's sketch show goes back to the old Kenny Everett format of using a handful of recurring characters to tell the jokes. Best this week are the prehistoric couple embarking on a naming ceremony for their newborn, who ends up being called "Mmm": 14 years later, Mmm is a classic grumpy teen forever frustrated when anyone bites into a tasty bit of mammoth.