Richard Curtis

This year has only just got out of the starting blocks, but it is already shaping up to be quite a special one for James Corden.

He was awarded an OBE in the New Year's Honours list, and in March he will be off to the US to host The Late Late Show on CBS five nights a week.

And after his perfect sitcom The Wrong Mans ended 2014 on a high, the actor is back on our screens tonight in this Roald Dahl short story.

In this adaptation by Richard Curtis, Corden plays the on-screen narrator.

He stars alongside Dame Judi Dench and, incredibly, Dustin Hoffman, who play Mrs Silver and her love-struck neighbour Mr Hoppy, who lives in the apartment above hers.

It's hardly a stretch for either of their talents, but it's rather sweet to see them both doing something so playful, and to hear Dame Judi reciting Dahl's nonsense dialogue: "Worg Pu! Ffuts Pu! Thoos Pu!"

The story is charming, but so slight, that to reveal even one detail would probably ruin it completely for any viewers who don't know it already.

But after Victoria Wood's That Day We Sang, and the return of Last Tango In Halifax, it's heartening to see that TV no longer views love as the sole preserve of the young.

Curtis has also provided Mr Hoppy with a love rival, but it's a tortoise called Alfie who will provide him with the greatest challenge.

Radio Times review

Esio Trot (it's "tortoise" backwards) is a drama of the type that broadcasters save up for Christmas and New year, when we are all feeling a bit soppy, mellow and disinclined to be too critical.

It's the slightest of stories, a tale as thin as a fairy's wings, which isn't to say it's not heart-warming and rather sweet. There's just not much to it. Still, with Dustin Hoffman and Judi Dench as leads, and James Corden as a cheerful (onscreen) narrator, Richard Curtis and Paul Mayhew-Archer's adaptation of the Roald Dahl book is a starry confection.

Hoffman is lonely, diffident Mr Hoppy, who has long nurtured a secret love for lively, glamorous, rather brassy neighbour Mrs Silver (Dench). The pair exchange polite pleasantries on their balconies and Mr Hoppy thinks he's in with a chance, if only he were bold. Then Mrs Silver buys a tortoise called Alfie, who becomes the object of all of her affections.

Esio Trot: Dustin Hoffman & Judi Dench shine

Although Esio Trot is ultimately quite a lightweight story, I feel that Richard Curtis and co-writer Paul Mayhew-Archer make it work due to some great characterisation and extra narrative touches.

Dustin Hoffman (shy) and Judi Dench (not shy) fluff around in Richard Curtis's soft-as-sponge adaptation of Roald Dahl's twilight romance as two neighbours bonding over a tiny tortoise. James Corden pops in and out to narrate, although to be honest, you'd have to have had a pretty heavy NYE the night before to get lost here.

Love, Rosie review

Love, Rosie plays out a little like a cross between a Richard Curtis film and One Day without ever managing to find its own groove. This is an enjoyable if weightless piece that will please romantic comedy fans, but struggle to speak to the unconverted.

Hugh Grant cringes at Four Weddings

Hugh Grant said "There are certain bits of Four Weddings where I really am very bad and (director Richard Curtis) would admit that and he really had to cut round my bad acting..."

Richard Curtis takes Red Nose Day to the US

Writer and Comic Relief co-founder Richard Curtis is taking Red Nose Day across the Atlantic with a three-hour American live fundraiser.

To celebrate BBC2's 50th anniversary, the channel exhumed an hour of so-called hidden treasures from The Comedy Vaults, including un-aired pilots, cult classics and first television appearances from comedy legends such as French & Saunders, Steve Coogan and Billy Connolly. There was even rare archive footage of Harry Hill with hair.

Monty Python's Eric Idle was also on hand to puncture the general air of self-congratulation, suggesting BBC2 should actually be charged with crimes against humanity for losing or wiping so many tapes containing classic comedy episodes and performances.

One tape the station would have done well to lose featured the band Madness, starring in an eponymous sitcom written for them by Ben Elton and Richard Curtis. It would be hard to pick out one band member for opprobrium, as they were all so dreadful.

Four Weddings and a Funeral - 20 years on

Writer Richard Curtis and producer Duncan Kenworthy look back on the making of Britain's most successful romantic comedy ever - and the heady days of its astonishing reception.

Richard Curtis reveals he may be getting married

Writer and director Richard Curtis has revealed that he may finally walk down the aisle with his long-term partner Emma Freud.