Lee Mack

Radio Times review

Occasionally you have to wonder at WILTY?'s booking process. I mean, if you were searching for a quick-witted guest with a sharp sense of humour, would you immediately come up with the name of bushcraft expert Ray Mears? In fact he acquits himself very well, especially considering he's sitting alongside fiercely comic guests such as Jo Brand. She comes up with a ridiculous story about hitch-hiking down to the coast on Christmas Day that could be the basis of a Tarantino film as well as one about squeezing through an ex-boyfriend's dog flap. Both will make you cry with laughter.

Once again the best exchanges are between the peerless Lee Mack and David Mitchell. Carried away with his tale about a fox (illustrated beautifully by Rob Brydon doing an impersonation of Basil Brush), Lee says something that David pounces on with almost Poirot-like powers of deduction. It's very impressive.

Make the most of tonight's edition as WILTY? is taking a break for a few weeks.

Lee Mack live review

It's a brave stand-up comedian whose encore is to invite questions from a crowd that has been, up until now, notably restless.

Review: Lee Mack, Eventim Apollo

Amiable comic races through a disappointing set.

Lee Mack review

Lee Mack miraculously bridges the gap between alternative and mainstream, even if at times he is a whisker away from mother-in-law material.

Lee Mack review

This is comedy that time forgot - meticulous, gag-heavy tomfoolery with a great sense of attack.

It's a new series for the gag-heavy sitcom starring and co-written by Lee Mack. Lee and Lucy's night at the cinema ends in a mugging at the hands of a teen gang, and they make away with Lucy's bag (containing mostly knitting). The incident, in which Lee is utterly useless, plunges him into a crisis of his own masculinity. He joins a boxing gym and takes on a trainer, with predictably terrible results. Even when the plot feels a little thin - as here - the one-liners are still pretty solid.

Radio Times review

Uber-loafer and all-round northern waster Lee (Lee Mack) feels a direct attack on his manhood when his flatmate Lucy is mugged by a group of young thugs. Lee watches helplessly as they flee with her handbag, and decides he must prove himself as a real man.

As a new series starts, Not Going Out doesn't deviate from its standard, winning formula. And why should it? What it does, it does brilliantly. Gags are carefully set up, you can see them coming, but when they hit, you laugh. Simple. Of course all of this is made special by Lee Mack, probably the best gag-man on television, and a proper comedian who is funny to his bone marrow.

But let's also give a cheer to his wonderfully dry foil, Sally Bretton as Lucy, who heroically feeds Lee with his jokes, while also slapping down his doomed attempts at self-improvement.

Lee Mack returns for a new series of Not Going Out and this time it's personal - he's character has managed to work his way onto TV.

Appearing in an episode of BBC quiz show Pointless, it doesn't take much for quizmaster Richard Osman to work him out.

In the video above Osman says: "We pre-record these so you're not going to look like an idiot for two or three weeks."

We're not sure how well Lee does on Pointless, the BBC One programme which gives its contestant a chance to score as little as possible, but we know it will be entertaining.

The sitcom, which follows the jokes, jibes and general misunderstandings of happy-go-lucky Lee and his friends returns on Friday.

Episode one of series seven is called 'Mugging' - when Lucy has her handbag stolen from right under Lee's nose, he feels the need to prove his manliness over and over and over again.

Lee Mack: stand-up or sit down?

The Lancashire joke maestro begins an eight-show stint in London this weekend and his silly sitcom Not Going Out returns to BBC One. So, should you see him in the flesh or on the box? Time Out weighs up whether or not to leave the house.

The Beeb's decision to run Would I Lie To You? directly before HIGNFY is a particularly cruel piece of scheduling. The former show, thanks to team captains Lee Mack and David Mitchell and host Rob Brydon, is as sharp as a tack and laugh out loud; messrs Hislop and Merton's effort, by contrast, now looks creaking and dated.