David Frost

The delightful David Nobbs proved in With Nobbs On what his friends and colleagues had known for years - that he is has perfect comic timing, both as writer and performer. In the first of a three-part audio autobiography he recalled his days as a cub reporter in Sheffield and London and how, while covering Hampstead Magistrates' Court, he got the call from That Was The Week That Was (TW3) to join its team of scriptwriters. It was to be some years before he conjured up Reginald Perrin but the combined enthusiasm of David Frost and Ned Sherrin, presenter and producer of TW3 respectively, was what elevated him from humble hack to satirical sketch writer.

David Nobbs, wonderfully comic writer whether on radio, TV or in print, begins a three-part series talking to an audience about his work and some people he's worked with over the years. As he's written for Frankie Howerd, David Frost and The Two Ronnies, invented such TV comedies as A Bit of a Do, The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin and (for Radio 4) The Maltby Collection, it's a rich field. Mia Soteriou and Martin Trenaman are the readers, Andrew McGibbon produces for independents Curtains for Radio.

David Walliams flies solo from comedy compadre Matt Lucas to anchor a marathon of mirth for Comic Relief. A nightly residence on BBC3 till Thursday offers highlights from a one-day panel show staged last week, featuring rounds from Have I Got News for You and many more. The gig for giggles will also revive classic shows, reuniting David Frost with Looooyd Groooossman for celebrity pad-peeking Through the Keyhole. After his charity Channel swim and bikeathon, it's another endurance test for Walliams, who even squeezes in a spot of Generation Game participation. "Didn't he do well!"

10 O'Clock Live is That Was The Week That Was for now, and good fun because of that show's formidable heritage, as the four presenters are all competing to avoid being cast as the new Lance Percival, he of the laugh-free "topical calypsos".

David Mitchell and Jimmy Carr are jockeying for the David Frost role; Lauren Laverne is Millicent Martin, the not-so-dumb blonde. Mitchell didn't quite know whether to ask proper questions or go for gags during a discussion on bankers' bonuses, but he fared much better when interviewing the universities minister, probably because he's passionate about education.

Best joke? That would be Charlie Brooker on the unrest in Tunisia. He described the incident where a young vegetable seller set himself on fire as "an act of tomartyrdom".

Sir David Frost, sometimes dubbed "the godfather of satire", talks about the impact of this particular type of humour on politics in the UK and the US. Using clips from That Was the Week that Was and America's Saturday Night Live, Frost shows how the genre has changed and garners the opinions of satire veterans such as Jon Stewart, Ian Hislop and Rory Bremner.

Ian Hislop puts it well when he says satire's job is to ridicule "vice, folly and humbug". He also argues that it works best when politicians are particularly divisive, hence Spitting Image's success at the height of the Thatcher years and Tina Fey's Sarah Palin in the 2008 American election campaign. It's one of the many good points made in a documentary that makes excellent use of David Frost's cachet on both sides of the Atlantic. So sit through the umpteenth showing of Bernard Levin being punched on TW3 in order to also see some insightful interviews with those who have impersonated our leaders, namely Rory Bremner (Tony Blair), Chevy Chase (Gerald Ford) and Will Ferrell (George W Bush), who all consider the extent to which impressions tarnish the reputations of people in high office.

Frost on Satire: the power of a good joke

David Frost's new television show suggests that satire changes things, says James Walton. But is he right?

David Frost's Q&A on how to be a satirist

As a new BBC4 documentary airs, the host of That Was The Week That Was looks back on a particular brand of humour.

Sir David Frost's charm offensive

Sir David Frost, veteran TV presenter, continues to use his legendary charm when interviewing the great and the good.

The post-Watergate interviews between David Frost and Richard Nixon were first dramatised back in 2006 with Michael Sheen as the jet-setting talk-show host. So who better than Sheen to celebrate Frost's five decades in the media on both sides of the Atlantic in this one-off documentary? We hear from Frost himself who recalls a career that takes in That Was the Week That Was, The Frost Report and TV-am, while friends and colleagues, including Michael Parkinson and Ronnie Corbett, give their verdict on the only person to have interviewed the last seven US Presidents. The catchphrase may be much mimicked, and the softly-softly approach of more recent ventures like Breakfast with Frost has been criticised by some, but there's no denying the staying power of this giant of broadcasting.