Dave Gorman (I)

Video: Comedian Dave Gorman plays funny games

Stand up comedian Dave Gorman talks to BBC Breakfast about his recent comedy adventure that took him around the UK.

He and fellow comedian Danny Wallace are known for their whimsical ideas that take them to strange places to film comedy programmes.

Gorman explained all to Breakfast's Bill Turnbull and Sian Williams.

King of Twitter and insurance salesman Chris Addison splits the tvBite office. Features Editor Steve refuses to follow his "middle-class mumbling" on Twitter. Other people are amorously attracted to his angel-faced charm, while our Editor can forgive him everything because he's in The Thick Of It.

Here he does his very-good-but-not-excellent stand-up, making a point of referencing Manchester a couple of times in order to remind viewers that they're not watching Live At The Apollo, they're watching Dave where comedians play their home towns. As Dave Gorman told us recently, "I didn't even know that was part of the deal until I'd signed up because they'd booked me into a theatre in Birmingham and I come from Stafford." Still, it's something on Freeview that's new, good and not on BBC.

Dave Gorman: The Libel Reform Bill

It's about making the system fairer for all. At the moment the UK libel laws allow rich people to bully poor people. If you write a blog or post on a forum you should be in support of Libel Reform.

Dave Gorman launches monthly comedy night

Finally, a niche night for lovers of Powerpoint comedy.

Dave Gorman's Daily Mail origami...

See what he's done here...

The Thick Of It's Chris Addison and Mel and Sue's Mel Giedroyc join Dave Gorman tonight in judging his audience's often superb ideas to improve modern life. Suggestions in this episode include a hand-shaking machine, the prototype of which is quite impressive, an ingenious idea to liven up Olympic coverage and a de-wedging device for buttocks prone to munching cloth. Anything that brings the spirit of Heath Robinson to television is a good thing.

I've got a lot of time for Dave Gorman. America Unchained, in which he attempted to cross the US using only independent hotels/garages etc, was an inspired subversion of the travelogue genre. So it's hard not to feel he's wasting himself on formula panel show Genius With Dave Gorman (BBC2).

Proving simple ideas are not always the best ones, Genius gets the audience to suggest daft ideas and the guests decide if they're genius. So you get sky-diving dolphins, soup ice lollies and so on. It had Russell Howard on - because that's panel-game law - but it's a long way off genius, just an average night's daft banter down the pub.

Dave Gorman returns to showcase the inventiveness of the British public, with people keen to show-off their ideas which they believe are touched by genius. We went to see one of these episodes being filmed, and one of the ideas involved several paintings of birds. That was about it. Hopefully, guests Russell Howard and Hazel Irvine will be asked to judge slightly cleverer notions, although we do know one of the concepts they're faced with are soup lollies... Bonkers fun, and at times very funny indeed.

Video: Dave Gorman on the 'Genius' of the public

Video of Dave Gorman talking to BBC Breakfast about the new series of Genius.

Interview: Dave Gorman

If we Brits are known for one thing, it's embracing the eccentric. So it's little wonder Genius With Dave Gorman has proven a hit, first on radio and now on TV.