Bob Monkhouse

Radio Times review

Readers of a certain age will remember the Bob Monkhouse version of this genial noughts-and-crosses quiz game from the 1970s. Revived now with host Warwick Davis - who is just the right combination of cheeky yet charming - the format is pretty well the same as the original. General knowledge questions are put to the celebrities and the contestants decide whether or not they've answered correctly. If they're right, they win that square. The object then is to try to get three in a line.

As in the show's previous incarnation, the comedians (James Corden in Willie Rushton's central square position, Tim Vine, Joe Wilkinson etc) try to be funny. And sometimes they succeed.

Bob Monkhouse's comedy gems found in an old bag

Up in the roof space of Bob Monkhouse's home was a plastic bag, seemingly forgotten in the years after his death but discovered by experts in television history who could only marvel at what was inside.

Review: Simon Evans, Soho Theatre

Stewart Lee recently wrote an article in the New Statesman about the lack of right wing comedians. I sort-of doubt if Simon Evans is a card-carrying Cameronite, but there is something distinctly conservative about him. Not in a horrible Bernard Manning/Bob Monkhouse way, but in his love of traditional old values.

I Think I've Got a Problem is a gem from the comedy archive, featuring the late Bob Monkhouse as a psychiatrist and Suggs (lead singer from Madness) as Tom, his patient, who wakes up one day to find he can't stop singing. By Nick Romero and Andrew McGibbon, it's witty, original and curiously wise.

Ricky Grover: Was gonna quit till Bob Monkhouse called

As career paths go, Ricky Grover's has been nothing short of winding.

Heard the one about the bloke who couldn't tell jokes?

Even Bob Monkhouse couldn't teach me the knack of delivering a punchline...

Heard the one about the bloke who couldn't tell jokes?

Even Bob Monkhouse couldn't teach me the knack of delivering a punchline.

When the comedian and television presenter Bob Monkhouse died in 2003, his family became the custodians of a 50,000-strong collection of videotapes and film reels that he'd amassed with what can only be described as fanatical zeal since the late 1950s. This fascinating documentary, which went out on BBC Four last month, uses clips from the archive to profile Monkhouse's life and career, from early home-movie footage right through to his final stand-up performance.

Bob Monkhouse never inspired universal public affection the way Morecambe & Wise did. Indeed, he once simultaneously topped opinion polls as Britain's most and least popular performer. The one thing everyone did agree on was Monkhouse's professionalism.

The Secret Life of Bob Monkhouse told the comic's fascinating story, with help from the vast archive of films, albums, cuttings, clips and journals he obsessively collected throughout his life.

Included amongst them was a compelling recording of Monkhouse presenting The Golden Shot, having been unfairly sacked, when anger, bitterness and disappointment very nearly got the better of his professionalism on live TV. Rare footage indeed.