Eddie Izzard

Eddie Izzard made suggestions for Monty Python reunion

Terry Jones explains why he's 'not proud' of Monty Python and talks about his new Christmas show.

Eddie Izzard is your host tonight as the mainstream comedy slot returns. After his stints in Hollywood dramas, it's genuinely strange to see Izzard doing his uniquely bewildering surrealism again, even if you suspect that it might be a bit much for the Michael McIntyre crowd. More easily assimilated stuff is at hand with the reliably baleful Josh Widdicombe and show-closer Trevor Noah. Noah's bits on growing up in apartheid-era South Africa and on learning German from Hitler speeches are, as Izzard suggests, "annoyingly good".

Eddie Izzard saddles up as host for the first of a new season at the Apollo - and kicks off with a comedy canter around the Greek gods and the furtive nature of dressage. Tonight's bright new star is Trevor Noah - born in apartheid South Africa, the son of a black mother and a white father, his witty take on cultural identity stems from being 'born a crime'. He's going to be huge.

'Tis the season to buy jolly DVDs

It was Super Monday this week - the comedy industry's equivalent to Super Thursday, when publishers flood the bookshops with celebrity memoirs and other sure-sellers for the festive market. So on Monday DVDs by Miranda Hart, Reginald D. Hunter, Micky Flanagan, Jack Dee, Eddie Izzard, Jimmy Carr, Bill Bailey, Seann Walsh, Keith Lemon and others hit the shelves.

When the evening's host is as quick and brilliant as Eddie Izzard, it's easy to think of the guest acts as the lowlier partners. But while they lack Izzard's nimble physicality - put to use tonight in a routine about dressage horses burgling houses - Josh Widdicombe and Trevor Noah both have plenty of character.

Widdicombe has worked up a head of steaming dislike for cereal variety packs, Super Noodle serving suggestions and people who make their own jam, while Noah condenses his experience of growing up mixed-race in South Africa in what feels like a taster for his proper act. Apparently both parents had to disown him in public on occasion. Processing that has left him vulnerable to the seductive allure of American culture, and the challenges of ordering a sandwich in German.

Stand up and be counted: Eddie Izzard interview

As Live at the Apollo returns tonight for a new series, read Ginny Dougary's interview with host Eddie Izzard in which he talks about his ambitions to enter politics, learn more languages, run more marathons and start a family.

Eddie Izzard on his Force Majeure tour

"You've got one life, you may as well try and make things last," is how Eddie Izzard explains the ambition behind his stream of consciousness comedy, captured most recently in his 'Force Majeure' stand-up routine.

Eddie Izzard: If I'm made mayor I won't give up comedy

Eddie Izzard has assured fans his comedy career will not end if he is elected Mayor of London in 2020.

Eddie Izzard has been beaten up twice for crossdressing

Cross-dressing star exclusively told the Sunday People he has been attacked by bigots in Leicester Square and Times Square in the past year.