Michael Deacon (I)

Russ Abbot interview: toasting the magic Tommy Cooper

Russ Abbot tells Michael Deacon about playing the irrepressible comic Tommy Cooper for new Radio 3 drama, Glass Chair Chair Glass.

When Rob Brydon launched this chat show last year, he said he was interested only in interviewing guests whose work he respected. That may sound like the kind of hot air any obsequious chat show host would spout, but in Brydon's case it may actually be true: among his guests in his two series to date have been Bruce Forsyth, Tom Jones, Ronnie Corbett and Terry Wogan, all of whom Brydon is well known to admire. Tonight's guest is another lifelong favourite of Brydon's, and indeed of most people in Britain who enjoy comedy: the majestic Dame Edna Everage, who's still going strong at... well, it wouldn't do to mention a lady's age, now, would it? There will also be a song from Will Young, and some stand-up from the startlingly young Phil Wang. We're sure Dame Edna will have the good taste not to draw attention to that surname.

The most excruciating experience of the week, if you weren't named Murdoch or Brooks, was Show Me the Funny (Monday, ITV1), a new reality series that is essentially The X Factor but with wannabe comedians. That's its problem. The X Factor can get away with showing bad amateur singers because bad amateur singing can be entertaining. Bad amateur comedy can't. It hurts to watch. The only people who enjoy bad amateur comedy are the sadists at open mic nights, heckling. One of the contestants' punchlines was, "Not on the lips, Dad - remember what the policeman told you." I can't seem to recall the set-up, but then the mind often blocks our most anguished memories.

The best of Richard Curtis's romcoms about awfully nice chaps dithering over frightfully pretty girls. Hugh Grant plays bumbling Charles, who, ah, er, can't tell what's, um, going on between him and Carrie (Andie MacDowell), whom he keeps bumping into at weddings.

John Sullivan, the marvellous comedy writer who created Only Fools and Horses, died at the weekend aged 64. Tonight his prequel of Only Fools, Rock & Chips, returns. Showing the misadventures of a young Del Boy Trotter, it was partly inspired by Sullivan's own youth in South London (the significance of the title, he said, was that in those days "rock music and chips was what we lived off"). Nicholas Lyndhurst (Rodney Trotter in Only Fools) plays local gangster Freddie Robdal, with James Buckley as Del Boy and Kellie Bright as Joan, Del's mother and Robdal's mistress. In tonight's episode, Del Boy turns his charms on well-to-do Barbara Bird (Jessica Ashworth), and the police pursue Robdal over the Margate jewellery heist.

Aardman Animations, the studio behind Wallace & Gromit, conjures another stop-motion corker that swarms with clever jokes and details. Our heroes are anthropomorphic chickens plotting their escape from the tyrannical Mr and Mrs Tweedy. Mel Gibson and Julia Sawalha are among the voices.

Silly walk has not stood up well to the march of time

Monty Python was fun while it lasted but a realistic comedies have a better chance of enduring, argues Michael Deacon.

Have I Got News for You is back on Friday nights

Michael Deacon previews the satirical panel show, which returns to BBC One for its 41st series.

Last in the run of the sitcom about a Jewish suburban family. It's been low-key but likeable, each episode squirming with minor social embarrassments. Tonight, Mum (Tamsin Greig) invites a girl called Tanya over, in the hope she'll take a shine to Adam (Simon Bird), the elder of her sons. As always, the best lines come at the expense of Dad (Paul Ritter). Mum: "Jonny, don't leave your dad on his own with Tanya. He'll only start talking about Isaac Newton or somebody." Cut to Dad: "He also invented the first practical reflecting telescope..."

After two series spent looking oddly out of place on Thursday nights, the topical quiz returns to its rightful Friday-night home. Jack Dee is the guest host (for the 11th time; only Alexander Armstrong has been asked back more often). The panellists are Caroline Wyatt, the BBC News defence correspondent, and comedian Jon Richardson, joining old-timers Paul Merton and Ian Hislop.