Graham Norton

It's Lady Gaga tonight, but what will she wear? On Ross's BBC1 show she wore a 1930s telephone as a hat, while with Graham Norton she wore a kind of ghost's wedding dress. But it's not all surface: Gaga can be frank, charming and funny if she's in the mood, and Ross is a big fan. More than making up the numbers are Jamie Oliver and Lee Evans.

Graham Norton battles Jonathan Ross for TV award

Chat show rivals Jonathan Ross and Graham Norton are to battle it out at the National TV Awards in January.

This semi-improvised comedy continues to assert itself as top dog of British comedies, delivering more laughs per minute than perhaps any home-grown sitcom of the past decade. A bold claim, perhaps, but week after week Outnumbered brilliantly captures the essence of family life today, in which a generation of middle-class parents are in thrall to their bossy children. We all know a Sue or a Pete (Claire Skinner and Hugh Dennis), who tie themselves in knots trying to do right by their impossible offspring.

The programme also packs in a remarkable number of throwaway jokes. Tonight, for example, Pete is late home from work. "Passenger action on the trains," he says. "I think they were lynching the driver." And the children's quirky interpretations of the world are impressively relevant. The flights of fancy from Karen (Ramona Marquez) tend to be the funniest, thanks to the juxtaposition of solemn observation and her adorable voice. Tonight, when Karen is quizzing her mother on terrorism, Sue mentions that when she was young, the terrorism threat came from Ireland. "The Irish? Are you sure?" squeaks Karen. "You mean people like Graham Norton and Jedward?"

The Jonathan Ross Show was given a fairly low key launch last week given that it was the long-awaited return of a British talk show staple, and followed suit with a similarly muted episode.
Sarah Jessica Parker was candid and Adele as booming as ever but the line-up felt a little lacklustre for an opener.

This was rectified tonight however with an entertaining, albeit slightly random group of guests perching on the Jonathan Ross sofa.
Benedict Cumberbatch talked John Le Carre novels while The Saturdays were a little less prosaic with their insights into the pop industry, but Alan Carr proved the most interesting booking. An odd choice to invite a clear rival onto the show though perhaps, especially since the bespeckled comedian, along with Graham Norton, is arguably surpassing Ross in the talk show stakes at the moment.

With Friday Night With...'s pre-Jools Holland slot the BBC vehicle often saw some good live music and it was pleasing to see that this is to be kept up on ITV, with tonight's performance coming from legendary funksters The Red Hot Chili Peppers, sans departed guitarist John Frusciante.

Watching this series's parade of classic comedy clips, chosen by comedians of today, confirms the theory that some people just have funny bones. It wouldn't matter if Tommy Cooper were clipping his toenails or performing the elaborately shambolic glass bottle trick from 1974 that is replayed here tonight: the fez-wearing comedian induces guffaws just because of who he is. Similarly, Peter Cook and Dudley Moore go wildly off-script in their "Pete and Dud" sketch in the art gallery and start giggling, but they're naturally funny together, as Phill Jupitus and Rhod Gilbert attest here. Funny comes in many packages, and while the American stand-up Joan Rivers, chosen by Graham Norton and Jo Brand as a favourite, is well-known for her shock tactics, her outrageous quips about growing old on The Graham Norton Show appeared to take even Norton aback at the time. Other treats featured are the University Challenge scene from The Young Ones in 1984, co-starring Hugh Laurie and Stephen Fry, and the bit in the Monty Python film Life of Brian in which Graham Chapman's Brian Cohen exhorts his followers to think for themselves. It may be a clip show and most of the clips are more than familiar, but it surely contains more laughs per minute than any of the newer comedies on television tonight.

MediaGuardian 100 2011: 66. Graham Norton

Graham Norton has hit his stride at the BBC, stepping into Jonathan Ross's shoes with a BBC1 talkshow and Radio 2 slot.

Alan Carr & Graham Norton sign deals worth £4m

Chat show hosts Alan Carr and Graham Norton have both talked their way into new £4million deals.

He's a great stand-up and I love his sitcom, Not Going Out. So my expectations were already ridiculously high for Lee Mack's new talk show, Lee Mack's All Star Cast which made its debut on BBC 1, Friday night. I wasn't disappointed.

Despite the fact that it was all fairly shambolic and chaotic - like it had been shot and edited on a shoestring budget for Channel 5 - the strength of Lee Mack's character and his sharp Northern wit kept it entertaining and fast paced from beginning to end.

During the show guests Frank Skinner and Fern Britton were invited to guess who various audience members were supposed to look like and choose their most embarrassing stories - all very Graham Norton, though somehow much more engaging. Lee Mack was also great in his ability to take the piss out of his guests without them taking umbrage.

But without doubt the best bit of the show was the sketch which saw Mack in his bed sit trying to get Tess Daly to ditch her hubbie 'Peter Kay' and sleep with him while being serenaded by James Blunt taking off his monster hit, You're Beautiful.

It was all reminiscent of Eric Morecambe at his best (indeed there was an Eric Morecambe poster on the door of the bed sit). And Tess Daly's acting skills were a revelation. She could have found it all rather embarrassing but really went along with it.

Looking forward to the next one, though I hope they manage to sort out the editing!

Lee Mack, the comic and star of the sitcom Not Going Out, gets his own vehicle. It's a glorified chat show with celebrity guests, stand-up, sketch and musical acts - starting tonight with James Blunt. The gimmick is that the studio audience and viewers at home are invited to take part too. Mack makes amusing company but it's rather Graham Norton lite, and, similarly to John Bishop's Britain, which went out in the same slot, feels like a comedian carrying a slightly awkward format.