Andrew Sachs

Andrew Sachs to talk about Sachsgate in memoirs

Andrew Sachs is writing his memoirs which will include his feelings towards Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand who subjected him to a series of calls about his granddaughter.

Mark Freeland: BBC comedy shouldn't be afraid to offend

BBC's head of in-house comedy refutes the idea the corporation has lost its nerve since the Andrew Sachs affair.

Russell Brand's Buzzcocks to be screened

A Never Mind the Buzzcocks episode with Russell Brand, pulled after the furore over his on-air phone messages to Andrew Sachs, is to be shown more than two years after it was filmed.

Jeremy Paxman meets Russell Brand

Jeremy Paxman asks comedian Russell Brand about the scandal which followed the prank calls he made to actor Andrew Sachs in 2008.

Watch Jeremy Paxman's full interview with Russell Brand on Friday 1 October 2010 at 10.30pm on BBC Two and then afterwards on the Newsnight website.

Jonathan and Russell put a lid on lewd humour (almost)

Almost exactly two years after the storm over Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross's prank call to Andrew Sachs, it was finally deemed safe for the duo to appear onstage together last night.

Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand team up to promote book

Controversial presenters Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand, who were disgraced after leaving lewd messages on the phone of veteran actor Andrew Sachs, are teaming up again to promote a new book.

So this is it. The end. The final curtain. The last ever Friday Night with Jonathan Ross after nearly ten years on BBC1. Ross was always an acquired taste; his blokey, jokey style was too smut-centric for some, while others thought him edgy and funny. None of that matters now, of course. Ross was all too willing to assist in the implosion of his BBC career when he and Russell Brand Went Too Far and left mucky messages on a blameless Andrew Sachs's answering machine during Brand's Radio 2 show. The reaction was ridiculously overblown - the sky didn't fall in - but it was the kind of national convulsion that could end only, eventually, with Ross's departure. Tonight's final guests are David Beckham, Jackie Chan, Mickey Rourke and Roxy Music.

David Beckham, Roxy Music, Mickey Rourke and Jackie Chan will be the last ever guests on Friday Night With Jonathan Ross which ends tonight. After the outcry over his £6million salary, and the prank phone call to Andrew Sachs that led to his suspension (and, ironically, jump-started Sachs' career) his position at the top of the BBC totem pole had become untenable. But it's not the end of Wossy.

He's already signed a deal with ITV for a brand new show which will appear towards the end of 2011, making him the third BBC presenter, after Adrian Chiles and Christine Bleakley to defect to ITV recently.

The move also means he'll have presented talk shows on three different networks, having made his presenting debut in the Last Resort With Jonathan Ross on Channel 4. It was that show which first shook up the staid and stuffy British chat show by injecting satirical comedy, irreverence and a fresh, American-style vibe. That style has now become so much the norm you couldn't imagine it being any other way.

Friday nights really won't be the same without him.

TV's decision to sign up Jonathan Ross for a prime-time chat show is a magnanimous one.

In January, the foul-mouthed presenter announced Hayley Mills, the actress, as a guest on his Radio 2 show by saying: "She's now on ITV, which, I think, must be some sort of punishment."

Not all of his new colleagues may greet him with open arms. "Viewers have been put off watching Ross because he is beyond a joke,'' Lizzie Cundy, the presenter of ITV at the Movies, told Mandrake in 2008, after his suspension from the BBC for his shameful harassment of the actor Andrew Sachs, 80.

"On our show, we're not rude or condescending to anyone. We do nice interviews and don't make any crude comments. Angelina [Jolie] was meant to be on the Ross show, but she's coming over to us."

I know nothing could possibly endear Brand to the thousands of listeners appalled by the whole tawdry Andrew Sachs/Jonathan Ross farrago. Which is a shame. Of course it's his own fault, but the whole silly mess eclipsed Brand's gifts as a highly imaginative stand-up who's fantastically well read, with a true love of the myriad minor beauties of the English language. He's also carving himself a Hollywood career and his new film, Get Him to the Greek, has just been released, which is presumably why Channel 4 is showing this not terribly new gig, recorded at the monstrous O2 Arena in London last year. The title is the giveaway as Brand uses the gig to examine his risky exploits, including "Sachsgate" and his, ahem, controversial hosting of the 2008 MTV Music Awards.