Jonathan Harvey

TV preview: Tracey Ullman's Show, BBC1

By their supporting cast shalt thou know them. Or something. The first episode of the second series of Tracey Ullman's return to British sketch show comedy features an enviable cast list of contemporary comedians and actors.

Right now, John Bishop feels like the most inescapable presence on British TV. But that doesn't mean he hasn't paid his dues - this comedy drama, co-written with Jonathan Harvey probably represents the last leg of J-Bish's journey from the showbiz margins to centre stage. Fittingly, it's inspired by his own adventures on the pantomime circuit - here, he plays Lewis Loud, a Morecambe FM DJ making his debut in a run of Dick Whittington. Look out for supporting turns from the equally hardworking Sheridan Smith and the slightly less prolific Chesney Hawkes, whose career has followed an almost geometrically opposite trajectory to that of Bishop. No preview material was available as we went to press, but we'd confidently stick our money on a cheerful, rough-around-the-edges but essentially good natured romp which might well slip down easily in Christmas week.

It's the story of failed flirtations, strained marital relations and a passion for innuendo. Yes, sitcom heroes may be sexually frustrated but it seems there's a lot of laughs to be had from being unlucky in love. This examination of TV characters that have lusted and usually lost takes the likes of Hancock, Ria from Butterflies and the Men Behaving Badly and sets their behaviour into a social context. So we witness the liberation on The Liver Birds that was brought about by the introduction of the contraceptive pill and see how the gradual shedding of inhibitions resulted in the anything-goes atmosphere of Gimme Gimme Gimme. Writers Simon Nye and Jonathan Harvey are among those contributing their thoughts and there are plenty of accompanying clips to release your titters.

Tom Hollander's Adam Smallbone is such a lovable creation, I'm starting to wish he could find a life outside of this series where, by definition, he's slightly hemmed in by storylines about the business of being an inner-city vicar.

Tonight's episode is written by Coronation Street scribe Jonathan Harvey, and it would have been an ideal opportunity for him to bundle dinky little Adam into a largish picnic hamper and take him back up the M6 to practice vicaring on the streets of Weatherfield.

Tonight sees Adam attempting to spread his wings a little by flirting with the smoky trappings of Roman Catholicism - or, in the words of Nigel his curate, "going a little bit Abramovich".

The occasion is the wedding of a chap called Leon (Colin Salmon) who Adam wants as his new best friend. Lord knows, he's in need of one of them.

Memo to the Minister: Sir Humphrey returns

BBC Comedy producer Jonathan Harvey explains why Sir Antony Jay, co-writer of classic political comedies Yes Minister and Yes, Prime Minister, has resurrected the master of obfuscation and manipulation Sir Humphrey Appleby for Newsnight's Election 2010 campaign coverage.

If The Office made Slough look dismal then Beautiful People makes suburban Reading look similarly gloomy, especially from the viewpoint of an effeminate 13-year-old schoolboy desperate for the glitz, glamour and excitement of London. Written by Jonathan Harvey (Gimme Gimme Gimme) and based upon the childhood memoirs of Simon Doonan, creative director of Barney's department store in New York, the camp comedy drama is back for a second six-part series. Using flashbacks, narration and fantasy sequences, each episode centres upon how Simon (played by Luke Ward-Wilkinson and, in his older years, Samuel Barnett) came to own some of his most treasured possessions. In this first episode Simon recalls a school genealogy project that led him to find out that his parents never actually married.

How I got my second series

To be honest we'd given up hope of a second series of Jonathan Harvey's Beautiful People so when it was finally annnounced there was much cheering. The initial run was one of the funniest, most warm-hearted programmes of 2008, and without doubt the campest.

Winner of the Best Comedy Award at the Banff TV Festival (no, me neither) this sitcom is an acquired taste - a cocktail of Advocaat and helium. Simon Doonan's memoirs of Reading ("Reading: You're Welcome To It," as the road sign puts it), the start of series two finds its caricature of family life still slapping on comedy with a spangly trowel.

Surprisingly, it's written by Jonathan Harvey who penned Gimme Gimme Gimme and creates some of the funniest scripts on Corrie. In one interview he said he originally thought that writing for the soap would be beneath him. If he thought Corrie was beneath him, he must have needed a diving bell to sink to the comedic depths of Beautiful People.

The cast - including Olivia Colman and Aidan McArdle as Simon's parents - gamely give it their best shot tonight as Simon discovers that, gasp, they're not married.