Richard Curtis

The most obvious point about a Richard Curtis comedy is that everybody is quite likeable. This seems pretty basic to me. If you think Bridget Jones has a face like a slapped backside, and a personality to boot, you don't care whether she ends up with Mr Darcy or is left to endure an unhappy marriage with, say, a second-hand car dealer from South Norwood. This was the big problem with Mister Eleven. The heroine, the Bridget Jones of this particular romcom, was absolutely ghastly in every way. She was spoilt, silly, self-absorbed and seemed to be a bit thick, despite being a maths whiz. About 10 minutes into the action, she whipped out her mobile phone and called a convenient shoulder to cry on. "Just this once," said her chosen shoulder, "get over yourself." In our house, there was cheering and high-fiving.

Here is the plot. Saz Paley is a maths teacher who has been obsessed by numbers from a very early age. We know she's a maths teacher because she says "quadratic equations" every so often, and is keen on prob­ability. She tells us, for example, that most women marry the 11th man they sleep with. So Saz, for reasons best known to herself, but essential to getting the show on the road, marries a doctor called Dan for that reason. But, wouldn't you know it, she discovers at the reception that he's not Mister Eleven after all. Mr Nine shows up unexpectedly (as somebody's boyfriend) and reveals that she was too drunk to do anything worthwhile on their one-night stand. Cue collapse of marriage.

What Sazza should probably do next is consult her GP and get something done about her obsessive personality. What she does instead is try to rekindle her relationship with nice Mr Four, who turns out to be married with twins. "Twins?" Saz says. "You must have fantastic sperm." Frankly, it's astonishing that Saz has managed to sleep with four men, let alone 10.

Am I being harsh? Perhaps so, but I suspect that the director also worried about the thin thread on which the plot was attempting to balance. The script works very, very hard to keep us interested. Everything moves quickly, and the action switches every so often to a classroom, which is possibly also Saz's imagination.

Anyway, eventually the inevitable happens. Mr Nine (alias Alex the Australian) meets Saz in a hospital, to which location the plot has inevitably propelled her. You remember, of course, that Saz's husband, Dan, is a doctor. So you'll know what happens next. Alex and Saz embrace passionately. Enter Dan. With non-hilarious consequences.

In the interests of balance, I should warn you that my view of Mister Eleven might possibly be the result of bitterness and middle age. It seems only yesterday that I went to see the film Local Hero and emerged from the cinema as the women in our party swore undying devotion to Denis Lawson, that film's official love interest. In Mister Eleven, he plays an old bloke who is clearly going to have a heart attack or somesuch in episode two. What you have been reading so far could well be a midlife crisis.

Shown on Christmas Day last year, this 60-minute documentary was made to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the sitcom. Rowan Atkinson talks about the development of his character, Edmund Blackadder, plus there are interviews with the core cast (Stephen Fry, Hugh Laurie and Tony Robinson) and writing team (Ben Elton and Richard Curtis).

First shown last Christmas, this tremendous documentary tells the Blackadder story, describing the evolution of the main characters, not least Blackadder's transition from nerdy idiot to suave Elizabethan courtier. Tribute is paid to the vital contribution made by Miranda Richardson in her role as Queenie. Hugh Laurie acknowledges his high levels of stress. Then there are all the tensions that came from having so many creative people fighting their corner. "I remember it like a heart attack," Richard Curtis says.

Who could have foretold, when The Office was first aired in 2001, that Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant's comedy series would go on to be shown in 80 countries, "break" America and win a Golden Globe award? Tonight, BBC Two delights Wernham Hogg fans with a re-airing of the entire first series (six episodes). The programmes are interspersed with interviews with the cast, including Ricky Gervais, Mackenzie Crook and Martin Freeman. Comedy bigwigs - Richard Curtis and Ben Stiller among them - also offer their thoughts on the inimitable series.

Tonight, BBC Two is screening all six episodes of the first series of The Office, the landmark comedy that transformed the sound of fingernails being dragged down a blackboard into laughter. And like the commentary on a DVD, the episodes are interspersed with insights from Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, the co-stars Martin Freeman, Lucy Davis and Mackenzie Crook, and famous fans including Richard Curtis, Ben Stiller and Hugh Jackman.

Does watching Norman Wisdom get floored by a ladder tickle your fancy? Maybe the sight of Basil Fawlty belting his car with a branch has you helpless. Or perhaps it is the observational comedy of Richard Pryor that hits your funny bone. Whatever it is, it is jolly good for you: that laughter is the best medicine is now a proven medical fact. In her deconstruction of laughter, examining its psychology and physiology, Jerry Hall commands the highest quality contributors. Luminaries from the academic field are only outshone by the staggering assembly of comedic talent. Walliams, Lucas, Fry, Henry, Brand, Cleese, Noble and others talk about the styles of comedy that have influenced them and often made them become funny in the first place. She even has access to Hugh Grant, who talks about the challenges an actor faces in comedy films, usually by Richard Curtis. And yes, he's here too.

"This ancient country, 38 times the size of Wales, is in desperate need." So begins BBC correspondent Harry Chambers' piece to camera from a central African republic at the start of this spoof on foreign news reporting. "It wouldn't take much to make a difference here," he adds, "A visit by Angelina Jolie or Fearne Cotton... perhaps even a simple, one-off drama by Richard Curtis." It's one of the better jokes in what turns out to be a rambling farce set under African skies - imagine Drop the Dead Donkey crossed with Evelyn Waugh's Scoop. Martin Jarvis is enjoyable as a John Simpson-style foreign editor who flies in to take over any story when it gets big enough, treading on the toes of local stringers like Harry. But Jarvis and the rest of the cast have to fight with a script that wobbles alarmingly. A running joke about a plump female reporter's troubled bowels is about as unfunny as comedy gets. There's a great satire to be made deconstructing the foibles of the news machine. Sadly, this isn't it.

This could be Drop The Dead Donkey on location as we fly out with the BBC's foreign news pack to report on the strife-ridden African country of Karibu. "It wouldn't take much to make a difference here," junior reporter Harry Chambers (Bruce Mackinnon) explains. "A visit by Angelina Jolie or Fearne Cotton. Perhaps even a one-off drama by Richard Curtis."

A commissioning editor would green-light the script on the strength of that line alone. As the BBC's big guns fly to Karibu to steal Harry's thunder, the laughs come as much from the characters as the situation - like the mumsy World Service lady who compares Africa's roads with pot-holes in Putney.

But the best gags come from TV Centre back in London where producer Nigel (Mackenzie Crook) is busy making Daleks out of his used coffee cups.

How Blackadder changed the history of comedy

The screenwriter and director Richard Curtis talks to The Independent about his enduringly popular creation.

You may think that rock and roll musicians in particular are in no need of being satirised, as they do the job pretty well themselves. Well, that doesn't mean they aren't ripe for a bit of a ribbing. Matt Lucas, himself no stranger to making the michael out of rock gods with David Walliams in Rock Profile on BBC2, hosts this chronological countdown of the best of the mickey-takers.

Step forward Neil Innes with his tales of Rutlemania; Harry Shearer, who turns the amp all the way up to 11 with Spinal Tap (surely the definite send-up/homage) and the Hee Bee Gee Bees... remember Meaningless Songs (in Very High Voices)? They had Angus Deayton among their number but got Richard Curtis to write the lyrics. Not bad.

Quite why Stella Street is here is a bit of a mystery to me - just because Phil Cornwell and John Sessions get to practise their Mick and Keef voices doesn't make it satire.

Plenty of great music, a few lightly tossed anecdotes and - voila! - an hour of high-quality entertainment.