Jane Anderson (II)

Radio Times - Pick of the Week

It's a credit to Pete Jackson's writing and the cast's acting prowess that the listener can switch from laughing out loud to rapt silence.

Junior Just a Minute is a punishment to the ears

I am traumatised by precocious "performing" children on the radio.

Radio Times review

I like to laugh. I just don't get enough opportunities listening to the radio. This is where the humourist and writer David Sedaris takes on a heroic status. There was not a single sentence that did not raise a smile, and most of them led to full-on, unadulterated laughter.

Sedaris writes about what he knows: in the case of these three short readings that's a terrifying babysitter called Mrs Peacock, an altercation with a giant human poo in someone else's toilet and a trick that he played upon his partner involving two artificial pistols. He makes the mundane extraordinary and his acute observational powers add a whole new dimension to the everyday experience.

There will be nothing as funny as this on radio this week -- or possibly this year.

Radio Times review

Miles Jupp returns as the jovial host, who manages to slip in some boundary-pushing quips - gasps from the audience on one occasion - under the guise of his apparently gentle delivery.

His guests are also comical - Sarah Millican, Nathan Caton and Richard Osman. But the biggest laughs come from the answers given by the three individuals they have nominated as people who know them really well. Millican selects her friend Lou (a fellow comic); Caton picks on, quite literally, his younger brother; and Osman chooses his mother, whom he claims for most of the show is using her "posh" voice, the one she favours when she answers the telephone.

It's akin to a re-versioned Mr And Mrs, with friends and family members instead of spouses, but it's a damn sight funnier - even potatoes get a laugh.

Radio Times review

Oh what a pity! After my absolute joy in the return of this series last week, there was no preview copy available to listen to. Fellow Mark Steel fans may like to check out the Radio Times website where we have an interview with the man himself.

He was originally due to be interviewed on Friday 8 May but when our journalist rang, after the general election results, Mr Steel, understandably came back with "Not today mate". I have been informed, however, that his mood is grand in this performance from Melton Mowbray, Leicestershire.

Radio Times review

Mark Steel is no slacker. He always does his research before taking to the stage to talk to a town about itself.

In the case of Fleetwood in Lancashire, subject of this performance, it has involved reading local history books and pamphlets, going on a tour of the Fisherman's Friend factory (Fleetwood's most famous global export), visiting the museum and trying his best to get on the ferry, which never seems to be in a position to cross the 20-yard river to neighbouring Knott End.

But it is how he presents his research that wins over the locals and his Radio 4 audience. He discovers on the Fisherman's Friend website, for instance, that the high-octane cough sweet is "lozenge of the stars" -- based on the fact that Stevie Wonder once asked for one when he had a cold.

Radio Times review

Life is going comparatively well for that literary curmudgeon, Ed Reardon. Elgar, his cat, is not dead. Laura, his alcoholically-enhanced latest lady friend, has not dumped him. And his new publisher Suzan (pronounced Suzanne) appears to be genuinely impressed by both his personality and his talents.

He's even earning some money for his writing, albeit from an estate agent's publication. Fear not though, Reardon fans. It doesn't last long. Ed's happiness turns out to be typically transitory and he ends this episode facing homelessness (again). His dejection is, as ever, our delight.

Radio Times review

Only Sue Perkins could imply that former Blue Peter presenter Janet Ellis is a sizzling dominatrix behind that sweet-natured exterior and get the whole audience -- and Ellis herself -- on side. Perkins is the perfect host for this canny combination of real moral dilemmas and sharp, unscripted responses to the problems laid before the panel of guests.

Here, for example, the comedian Sarah Millican has to decide what to do if the DJ at her sister's wedding made deeply offensive, sexist remarks to her before the party got started. Millican's first question is "Why am I at the party half-an-hour before everyone else?"

And so the laughter begins -- and continues.

Radio Times review

"Do you have a legal list?" Olivia Colman asks her interviewee Sharon Horgan. "Sorry, what's that?" responds Horgan, in answer to which Colman informs her it is a list of people you are allowed to sleep with without your husband getting cross. The audience roars with laughter, which soon increases in volume when an innocent Sharon asks, "Can they be dead?" -- not quite making the necrophilic link implied by her wish to have Steve McQueen on her "legal list".

This gives a flavour of the conversation between these two very funny women. Colman's questions cover topics ranging from work--life balance to the joys of nit-combing a child's hair, and Horgan's wickedly witty responses exemplify why she is at the top of her game at the moment.

Radio Times review

Graham Norton, Jonathan Ross and Alan Carr are not going to lose any sleep if they listen to this. Jim Moir, better known as Vic Reeves, is not a natural interviewer. It's his guest, Olivia Colman, who holds the show together, using her ability to ad-lib with wit.

I love this series. I love Vic Reeves. I love Olivia Colman. It's why I chose this as my Pick of the Week. But were it not for Colman's thespian talents there are moments when tumbleweed would have blown through the studio (à la Shooting Stars). She picks up when Reeve's questions or direction of thought trails off, and yet, while he sounds delighted to have got to the end of the show intact, there are some parts where this interview is so funny it should come with its own health warning.

If Olivia Colman had to choose between a plastic hand and a hook, which would she favour? Is she any good with blood? As I said, Reeves is not your typical interviewer, but these surreal questions do encourage Colman to reveal more about herself than she would on a predictable chat show.

And so, I now know that she believes that the path to true love depends upon clutching a fallen eyelash with one's intended and making a wish. And that she can spend hours staring at pictures of men's swollen testicles (in medical books, not real life).

It's a peculiar half-hour, but one I wouldn't have missed for the world.