David Baddiel

A close-to-the-bone, identity-swap tale, The Infidel sees Omid Djalili as Mahmud, a settled, non-practising Muslim family man whose life flips over when he discovers that not only was he adopted, but that his birth parents were orthodox Jews. The Infidel starts wonderfully, introducing us to a cast of carefully constructed stereotypes and then just as carefully it undermines them. David Baddiel's script is sharp, wise and very funny, and never flinches from exposing the hypocrisy and power games that fuel religious intolerance. But the film struggles to maintain this high standard; what began as a smart, challenging exercise in boundary pushing becomes just another sentimental life lesson.

David Baddiel's comedy about a Muslim man (played by charismatic comic Omid Djalili) who discovers he is Jewish and embarks on a quest that leads him into an unlikely friendship with a Jewish taxi driver (Richard Schiff). With cameos from the likes of Matt Lucas, Tracy-Anne Oberman and David Schneider, it's mildly amusing fare.

Curb Your Judaism saw David Schneider ponder why Britain's Jewish comics often avoid looking to their religious background for material, unlike their opposite numbers across the pond.

This was a hotchpotch of a documentary with different contributors - among them David Baddiel, Matt Lucas and writers Laurence Marks and Maurice Gran - all offering their thoughts on why Jewish humour has largely stayed in the closet. Could it be the effect of political correctness? The performer's fear of being pigeonholed and not making the mainstream? It wasn't clear whether the programme sufficiently answered any of these questions. Perhaps placing the debate in some kind of historical and/or social context would have helped as well as hearing the thoughts of the American performers mentioned.

Peter Sellers, Sid James, Bud Flanagan. All Jewish. Who knew? I certainly didn't and it's just one fascinating tidbit unearthed by stand-up David Schneider as he explores why British Jewish comedy is not as successful as its American counterpart.

The most popular reason seems to be that British Jews were more likely to be assimilated into mainstream culture, though David Baddiel does come up with a far-fetched theory that the benefits of political correctness bypassed Jews, meaning that black and Asian people had comedy TV shows while Jews didn't.

The programme is scattered with wonderful Yiddish - "kvetching", "schmaltzy", "shiksa", "sheitel" - and offers a superb chance to hear Matt Lucas (yes, he's Jewish too) describe his plans for a sitcom about a Jewish family in great detail.

The Jewish youth group that made Sacha Baron Cohen

Mike Leigh was a member - and so were David Baddiel and Sacha Baron Cohen. How did a club for 'hippy Jewish scouts' become a hothouse for the entertainment industry?

McIntyre's mega-tour could make him most bankable act

Robert Newman and David Baddiel's pioneering one-off Wembley Arena show in 1993 prompted declarations that comedy was the new rock'n'roll.

Eighteen years on, Michael McIntyre is due to play several dozen similar sized gigs, making a strong challenge for the title of the UK scene's most bankable act.

Tonight, David Baddiel's swotty teenage self locks horns with Guinness Book of Records editor Norris McWhirter (an uncannily authentic Alistair McGowan). Next, we meet an equally uncool 14-year-old Julia Davis. Fortified with Dutch courage filched from her parents' house, young Julia isn't going to let flat chest, braces and frizzy perm get in the way of her first kiss. Or is she?

Running nightly this week are this year's seasonal shorts little crackers from Sky One, which annually tries to make up for the dearth of decent original drama and comedy from January-November by gorging us with a festive selection box featuring some of the best-known names in the business.

This time they've got the likes of Victoria Wood, Catherine Tate, Stephen Fry, Kathy Burke, Julian Barratt, Jo Brand, Bill Bailey - oh, the list goes on, basically anyone who's ever appeared on a panel game is either appearing in, writing or directing one of these 12-minute films, mostly based on autobiographical stories about their childhoods.

And like a selection box, there are a few yucky praline noisette ones. David Baddiel's film is as annoying as he is, though it does feature a good impersonation of Record Breakers star Norris McWhirter by Alastair McGowan, who must have been delighted to get a chance to do an impression he probably last did as a child. Chris O'Dowd has a dull grumpy Santa story and Dawn French oddly casts herself as the late Queen Mother.

But there are some nice strawberry cream ones too: Victoria Wood's is a sweet, nostalgic tale, Julian Barratt's teenaged heavy metallers are quirky and Kathy Burke's memory of meeting Joe Strummer is endearing. Anyway, they're all over so quickly that even the ho-hum ones are watchable enough - shame though that for Sky, decent original programmes come barely more than once a year.

Sean Lock: Twitter is for sad, needy people

Comedian Sean Lock, 48, started his career in the early 1990s and toured with Rob Newman and David Baddiel. He appears regularly on comedy panel shows Argumental and QI and is a team captain on 8 Out Of 10 Cats. He's currently on a British tour.

Karen Gillan cast in David Baddiel's new movie

Karen Gillan (Doctor Who) and while Robert Sheehan (Misfits) have signed to star in Romeo And Brittney, the follow-up movie from comedian David Baddiel (The Infidel).