Joan Rivers

This news-comedy show was the unexpected star of the 2012 Paralympic Games: led by comedian Adam Hills, its irreverent round-up of the day's events won a following all of its own. So much so that it came back earlier this year, not to comment on sport but simply on the week's news. That's a crowded marketplace, in which The Last Leg has found a niche.

Along with the wry, sideways, irreverent looks at some of the quirkier stories you might have missed, there's a convivial and inclusive atmosphere that softens the sharpness of the gags - the first 2013 series was best known for a piece to camera in which Adam Hills eviscerated US comedian Joan Rivers, but he was doing it because Rivers had made fat gags about Adele. That's The Last Leg all over: right-on, usually spot-on and brightly funny.

Hills is flanked by co-hosts Josh Widdicombe and Alex Brooker. Tonight's guest: Russell Brand.

10 years of the Glasgow International Comedy Festival

Joan Rivers, Kevin Bridges, Frankie Boyle and Sarah Millican among the highlights of the last decade.

Tonight's line-up has the potential for all kinds of off-kilter brilliance - Hollywood star Jake Gyllenhaal, caustic comic Joan Rivers and Top Gear's Jeremy Clarkson and James May. Makes you almost feel sorry for Gyllenhaal, a serious actor, surrounded by that lot. His sister Maggie was a Norton guest two years ago and looked terrified.

He's here to talk about his latest film, the police thriller End of Watch. Rivers will be triumphant after a sell-out British tour, while Clarkson and May have a Top Gear DVD to plug.

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.

A welcome new addition to the Friday night schedules - some real comedy in among the chat shows masquerading as such. Pitched at the post-pub crowd it's an archive show in which some of today's comics celebrate the great TV moments that inspired them to pursue a career in stand-up, or simply left them doubled over helpless with laughter and admiration.

Jack Dee is up first, recalling the impact that Billy Connolly's debut appearance on Parkinson - when the Big Yin told the infamous bum joke that turned him into a comedy superstar overnight - had on his teenage self back in 1975. Among those piling in to concur, and recall what an enormous influence Connolly was, are Jon Culshaw, Dara O'Briain, Alan Carr and Jo Brand. Then, before it all gets too indulgent, Brand recalls her own favourite - a groundbreaking 1988 sketch from French and Saunders in which the duo play dirty old men watching a beauty pageant. Again, there's praise from the likes of Alan Carr, Joan Rivers, Andi Osho and - a touch bizarrely - Paddy McGuinness, before moving on to the next (Rhod Gilbert on Eddie Izzard's surreal "learning French" routine), and finishing with hymns to Max Miller and Les Dawson. In truth, the old doesn't always mix with the new, and the insights aren't always scintillating, but it's a chance to enjoy again some hilarious moments, and to discover some past flights of genius that may have passed you by.

Unlike the US version of this show, which can be shockingly vicious and unpleasant (see Joan Rivers's on Monday), there's something rather comforting about Channel 4's effort, which sees tribute paid to Bruce Forsyth through mockery. Despite host Jimmy Carr giving off his usual warmth (reptile in outdoor bath, mid-Siberian winter), it's like watching a series of best man's speeches.

Jonathan Ross, Jack Dee and Barry Cryer all step up to wheel out jokes about how old Brucie is, how rubbish his early career was and how young his wife is. It does sound like irritating vieux chapeau - but it's done with enough classy lines to pass the time. In a comforting way.

If you happen to find yourself relaxing in an armchair in front of the television as the end of the decade approaches, you can do much worse than titter away the last hour of the Noughties in the frisky company of Graham Norton and his lively chat show. Joining him in a satirical review of the year are Dominic West, the British actor and star of the American drama series The Wire, the evergreen comedian Joan Rivers, and Sex and the City's Sarah Jessica Parker. Followed by the New Year Fireworks over the Thames in London (BBC One, 11.45pm).

He's always loved a good chuckle, has our Charlie - aka HRH The Prince of Wales.

So this comedy spectacular, recorded earlier this week, was the best possible way for the heir to the throne to celebrate his 60th birthday (other than for his mum to shift over and let him run the country for a day, and I was never convinced that was going to happen).

Also designed to help raise awareness of (and money for) The Prince's Trust, it features some all-time comedy greats, a number of whom are stepping onto a British stage (the New Wimbledon Theatre, to be precise) for the first time in yonks.

John Cleese, for example, is our Master of Ceremonies, while those performing stand-up and sketches include Robin Williams, Rowan Atkinson and Joan Rivers.

Though The News Quiz is one of Radio 4's most loved programmes, it's hard for me to write about. It goes out on a Friday night, after my column deadline, and - obviously - it's topical. I can only review the previous show, in this case the first in the new series, which discussed the Labour party conference, the EDF energy company and Sarah Palin. See: they're so last week! (Apart from Sarah Palin.)

The other block to me reviewing The News Quiz is, well, me. Though I am a Radio 4 devotee, its panel shows drive me mad. They're so cosy! The combination of laugh-at-anything audience and aren't-I-clever contestants creates a tittering dinner party atmosphere that makes me yearn for Jerry Sadowitz or Keith Allen or Joan Rivers. In short, I want anger.

Still, there's enough of that in today's Britain, eh? And anyway, The News Quiz has Jeremy Hardy, whose anger is there, just clothed in exquisite one-liners, and he usually keeps me listening. Hardy has a gentle bedside manner which hides his vicious shanking of the pompous establishment. Last Friday he managed to stick it to middle-class parents, banks, the government and Barack Obama within the first 10 minutes. 'Obama said that the collapse of the banks is no time for politics. No, Christmas dinner is no time for politics.' But the bit I really liked was when he had a pop at Sue Perkins over her appearance on Maestro. What that says about me, I hate to think.