Annette Crosbie

Stephen Fry & Ardal O'Hanlon lend voices to kids show

QI host Stephen Fry is voicing a character in forthcoming series Driftwood Bay, playing the aristocratic deer Lord Stag. Also in the series to be screened on Nick Jr is Ardal O'Hanlon - famed for his role as Father Dougal in Channel 4 comedy Father Ted - and Annette Crosbie from One Foot In The Grave.

Made by Steve Coogan's Baby Cow stable, Common Ground is a collection of ten 15-minute comedy shorts, each set in a neighbourhood in south London. Having featured Simon Day, Amelia Bullmore, Jessica Hynes and Charles Dance in previous weeks, the series concludes with Barry - based around Alex Lowe's octogenarian little Englander character which he honed by calling in to Iain Lee's LBC programme in the mid-2000s. With his wife having run off with a retired financial advisor, Barry embarks on a bucket list with his grandson.

It may not be earth-shatteringly original, but it's worth it just to hear Barry's view on pink candy floss: 'It's like eating Barbara Cartland's minge.' A (fictional) former member of So Solid Crew takes over a church choir in the far-funnier Nell, Ted and Marlon. It quickly descends into a creepy love triangle (with One Foot In the Grave actress Annette Crosbie occasionally chiming in with some unexpected filth); the humour is sharp, surreal and pleasantly wicked in places.

One of the oldest sitcoms on the radio returned for two specials this past fortnight, covering the Olympics in all its hellish glory...

Andy Hamilton returns as the underworld-weary Satan in Old Harry's Game, giving his professional opinion of the Olympics while trying to persuade those around him, especially the kindly historian Edith (Annette Crosbie), that the Olympics are not as great as everyone makes out to be. (It's not that difficult, is it?)

In the first special last week, Satan takes Edith to the original Greeks who founded the Games, who mainly wanted to just look at naked men. The show also explored what happened to the original marathon runner Pheidippides after he discovered his run was a waste of time. At the end of this episode, though, we learn that Edith's daughter is taking part in the hurdles, so Satan agrees to take her up London; but in exchange she will eventually finish writing Satan's official biography.

Although this sitcom's been running since 1995, I think it's still one of the best around, because of both the images it creates and the ideas that appear in the show. For example, in Old Harry's Game all twelve Apostles are in Hell and Judas claims he was killed by Mossad. Then there are Satan's various "guises". In this episode he pretends to be Kate Middleton...

It's amazing that this show can still produce laughs after being so long on the air; proof, if needed, that this sitcom is simply top notch. Let's hope there will be a few more episodes made yet, as it can clearly stand the test of time...

Two-part special of Andy Hamilton's great situation comedy, set in Hell with him in the lead role as the Devil (aka Old Harry, Satan, Prince of Darkness etc). Old Harry fans will know that anything that's going on upon Earth (even in banking) sooner or later catches Satan's attention. He's now learned that London is about to host the Olympic Games and decides to take a closer look. I wonder does Lord Coe realise that all that stands between him and total 2012 disaster is Annette Crosbie, as Edith, wrongly assigned to Hell, Satan's (sort of) conscience?

Hope springs eternal whenever I get set for a new British drama. I don't demand too much: believable characters; some wit; a mood-enhancing soundtrack; a story that makes some kind of sense; performances that hint the actors haven't just learnt their lines in the nearest portable loo. Suffice to say, Hope Springs fails on all counts.

Bad Girls meets Hustle on the backlot of Take The High Road, Hope Springs stars Alex Kingston as the leader of a group of four ex-jailbirds who have unfeasibly scammed a cool £3million from Alex's too-timing gangster bloke. For reasons too absurdly contrived to bother with, they wind up hiding out in the Scottish Highlands at a hotel where Annette Crosbie spends every waking moment getting plastered. You can see where she's coming from.

Don't be too shocked, but their hideout is not the rural idyll it looks. Far from passing their time tossing shortbread and knitting haggie, the Hope Springs locals spend their time murdering, plotting, covering up dark secrets and eyeing up the new girls in town. It's the kind of material David Lynch could turn into a surreal and alluring mystery. But Hope Springs reduced it to Carry On Up The Caber cliche.

The unbearably jaunty background music set the tone. When the action needed a touch of tension, what you got was what sounded like a jingle for a snack biscuit. And what Paul Higgins (brilliant as Jamie in The Thick Of It) was doing in it as a drippy policeman is anybody's guess. You can only hope for his sake that he gets to cuddle up to the corpse beneath the floorboards before this shambles kills his career stone dead.

Andy Hamilton's glorious radio comedy returns for a new series. It may be bad luck for Hamilton's bank account that it's unlikely to transfer to TV (too expensive, too topical, too funny) but it's good news for listeners who discover tonight how many bankers are now in Hell, what to do with a dog that's suddenly turned up there and why God appears to be on a gap year. Hamilton, as ever, plays Satan, attended by lesser devils Scumspawn and Thomas (Robert Duncan and Jimmy Mulville). Annette Crosbie plays Satan's crisply academic biographer.

Old Harry's Game I regard as one of the best-written comedies around, sustained over its 12 years on the air by brilliant performances and production.

Its commentary on man's inhumanity to man, as Old Harry (more commonly known as the Devil) surveys it across the ages, is very funny indeed. It is satirical, philosophical, inventive, topical yet timeless. What's to dislike?

Could it be because last week's episode mentioned the Bible? This often upsets people. But look at the context: there's a new arrival in Hell, an academic, played by Annette Crosbie. She can't understand why she is there. Old Harry (Andy Hamilton) makes her an offer. He will investigate why if she writes a biography of him which tells the truth. He sees the truth as being favourable to him. She sees it as something arrived at by due historical process, the examination of evidence, the comparison of texts.

She asks for a Bible. Variants on biblical accounts, for instance of the Adam and Eve story, then ensue. I found them very funny. Is this to do with Christianity? I am a Christian, but still laughed my socks off.