Mathew Horne

Although creator and star Jack Whitehall hasn't confirmed whether school's out forever at Abbey Grove, tonight's series three finale ties things up nicely just in case. With their GCSEs over, Form K have some important decisions to make about their futures, as does their tutor Alfie (Whitehall), who has decided that he can't carry on at the school without them. With headteacher Fraser (Mathew Horne) in bits at his resignation, can Gulliver and Form K get Alfie to the prom and perhaps back to the classroom?

Radio Times review

The rude school sitcom, starring Jack Whitehall as the spectacularly loyal, endearingly thick teacher Alfie Wickers seems to have improved a notch from the slightly flat opener. Here we have a contrived but confident episode, which uses the classic trick of forcing our hero to be in three places at once.

So there's the fantasy convention organised by Alfie's tragically pitiable colleague (Mathew Horne), his girlfriend's book group and student Mitchell's leaving party. Will it go wrong? Of course it will... up to a point. Because just as with Whitehall's posh buffoon from C4's Fresh Meat, you wish Alfie well against your better instincts. And the writers don't let you down.

Bad Education is welcome, light-hearted, puerile, peculiarly British relief. Abbey Grove has a new deputy who, worse luck for Jack Whitehall's character Alfie, turns out to be his dad (Harry Enfield). Or, put another way - headteacher Fraser's way - there's a new banterlope at the watering hole. Fraser (Mathew Horne), incidentally, has started a new clothing range, Dolce and GoBanter.

Someone needs to go, to save money. There are interviews. Not Fraser, says Fraser. He is a "succeedophile ... a massive unrepentant succeedophile and you better put me on the goddam register sister, cos I will reoffend ... at succeeding."

Not Alfie either, says Alfie, who insists he's not feckless: "I've got loads of feck, I'm a fecking motherfecker so why don't you three just back the feck off ..." I know, very much the same kind of idea as the succeedaphile one. And very silly. But still funny.

Mathew Horne, Tamsin Greig & Andrew Sachs in new film

A film starring Frasier's Kelsey Grammer and Gavin and Stacey actor Mathew Horne is shooting in Croydon today. Horne, who played Gavin in the BBC Three sitcom, tweeted Croydon dubstep pioneer Skream to tell him he was filming Breaking the Bank in the town.

It's fair to say that Catherine Tate has had an interesting couple of years; from her role in the American version of The Office to acting on the stage, I feel she's come a long way since her sketch show. However this week saw her revive one of her most popular sketch show characters, Joannie Taylor, for a one-off special Nan.

At first I thought Nan would be simply an extended version of the sketch show, but the plot of the programme was fairly endearing. It saw Nan being paired with teenage volunteer Alice (Ami Metcalf) while her grandson (Mathew Horne) is off building a school in Africa. The main thrust of the episode concerns Nan's taps and her constant fights with the council to get it fixed. In her own unique style Nan's interactions with council representative Miss Donnelly (Nikki Wardley) land her in hot water and eventually see her serve two community service orders. Eventually though Nan is able to save the day by allowing her Indian neighbours to host a wedding in her flat.

Anybody who loved Nan's foul language and bad attitude wouldn't have been disappointed by what they saw here. However I was surprised that Tate fleshed out the character especially in constructing a relationship between Nan and Alice. I feel the episode really benefited from the appearance of Ami Metcalf, who so good as the young Kathy Burke in Walking and Talking. Metcalf and Tate made a fine double act and I particularly enjoyed Alice's confrontation with Miss Donnelly. The focus on the bureaucracy at the council was also a story that most people could identify with and they could understand Nan's frustration and the way she dealt with the problem was completely believable.

Ultimately I found Nan to be funny, endearing and a sitcom that was well-paced throughout. If all the episodes are of the same quality as this special then I wouldn't mind seeing Nan return for a full series at some point. But for now I can definitely say that Nan was a big surprise as I didn't see myself enjoying it at all.

Radio Times review

The ubiquitous Jack Whitehall wrote and stars in this school-based comedy, back for a badly behaved Christmas special. Fed up with the nativity, his hapless history teacher invents a new festive story, a cross between Robocop and Nutcracker: Robocracker.

Sitcom staple Sarah Solemani plays the altruistic art teacher, while Mathew Horne sports an elf costume as the immature headmaster fond of tragic puns ("Snow-k?" "Yes sir, yours-elf?") Look out for Greg McHugh, Whitehall's co-star in Fresh Meat, as an expletive-spewing tramp.

Life just keeps getting worse for Stuart (Mathew Horne). Since being fired from his position at the job centre when the series began, Stuart has found himself adrift. His friends seem to prefer the company of Janice, a drug-addled senile alcoholic and former "human guinea-pig". Worse still, his old job has been given to Gary Probert, a socially dysfunctional light-bulb fetishist who can't cross the road without supervision. From then on, things get weirder.

Horne does a sterling job of making Stuart likeable, despite his lack of any redeeming features. If you're a fan of Clare in the Community, you might well find a new favourite in Seekers. Dark, surreal and a more than a little cartoonish, it's likely to divide listeners, but this has the makings of a sure-fire cult hit.

It is rare for me to recommend a programme that I have not been able to listen to but this new series strikes me as a risk worth taking. Why? Because it stars Mathew Horne (Gavin & Stacey), whose comic acting I greatly admire, and it is produced by Katie Tyrrell, who has Just a Minute and Clare in the Community among her many Radio 4 production credits.

The idea sounds strong too: Horne plays Stuart, a man recently made redundant by the Job Centre who finds himself in the invidious position of having to queue up with his former clients to be interviewed by his former colleagues. Watch this space...

Spotlight on: Mathew Horne's stage acting

Mathew Horne became a household name as half of the eponymous couple at the heart of Gavin and Stacey, but his current role in Jamie Lloyd's revival of The Pride at Trafalgar Studios sees three different side of him, injecting both comedy and pathos into his trio of supporting roles. So So Gay were lucky enough to grab some of this busy's man's time for a few incisive questions. And he gave us a killer sign-off.

Love him or hate him, James Corden undeniably does have a range of talents - actor, writer and co-creator of some very funny comedy (we'll politely forget the car crash of his misguided BBC sketch show with Mathew Horne). And now, dontchaknow, he's come up with another comedy vehicle, The Wrong Mans (****), which had a very accomplished debut last night.

Corden, late of the National Theatre and Broadway, has co-written, with fellow Gavin & Stacey alumnus Mathew Baynton, a comedy thriller in the style of Simon Pegg and Joe Wright's Cornetto trilogy, with appreciative nods (in the title) to Alfred Hitchcock's 1956 thriller and, in camerawork and misfit leads, to Peep Show.

Baynton is nice but weedy Sam, who wakes up one wintry morning with the mother of a hangover, only to find his pushbike has been stolen so he has to walk to work, as a town planning and noise guidance adviser for Berkshire County Council. On his way, he's the only witness to a car crash and he picks up a ringing phone; a man issues threats and in later calls it's clear a woman has been kidnapped.

At work Sam takes postboy Phil (Corden) into his confidence. Phil is beside himself; he's a 31-year-old living at home with his mum and he keeps trying to organise fun days paint-balling or bowling with his colleagues (oblivious to the fact they all think he's a boring knob); for him, this mystery is his very own live-action Grand Theft Auto, and he convinces Sam not to call the police but to try to rescue the woman and become heroes.

The opening episode efficiently essayed the set-up, and there are some promising relationships to be explored in the following five weeks. Sarah Solemani (who was so brilliant in Him & Her) is Sam's boss, but also the girlfriend who recently dumped him because he was too needy, while Tom Basden is the horrible colleague we'd love to be taken down a peg or two.

Corden clearly has pulling power, as those names above suggest, and Dawn French, Nick Moran, Rebecca Front and Dougray Scott will appear in future episodes - although David Harewood, who appeared briefly last night, shot his scenes before his Homeland stardom. The opener had some neat twists and turns and ended on a great cliffhanger. Definitely one to stay with.