Romesh Ranganathan

The Romesh Ranganathan extended interview

The last twelve months have been incredible for Romesh Ranganathan. He won the prestigious Leicester Mercury New Act Award 2013 and his critically acclaimed Edinburgh Festival Fringe debut show was nominated for Best Newcomer Award 2013. He talks to Martin Walker about fame, the Fringe and touring with Seann Walsh and Ricky Gervais.

This week's new live comedy

Will Franken, Sarah Kendall and Romesh Ranganathan.

Romesh Ranganathan Q&A

Romesh Ranganathan is a rising stand-up comedian who you might recognise from recent appearances on Mock The Week. The former teacher, last year nominated for Best Newcomer in the Edinburgh Comedy Awards, lets us in on his experiences of panel shows, his thoughts on industry awards, his latest show, and plans to tour in the autumn.

Radio Times review

We're now a mighty 13 series into the topical panel show, and Dara O'Briain remains adept at shepherding his guests' reactions to the news - part effective quickfire puns, part Radio 4-friendly cleverness and, yes, part borderline offensive nonsense - into a cohesive whole.

For the comedians who stand in front of Mock the Week's lonely microphone, this isn't a bad summer in which to start a new series. As expectant silence falls around them, the World Cup, immigration rows and the build-up to the Commonwealth Games and Scottish referendum are all there to be clutched at. Tonight, regulars Andy Parsons, Hugh Dennis and our cerebral host are joined by Milton Jones, Ed Byrne and Romesh Ranganathan. Katherine Ryan is the solitary woman.

Radio Times review

Jo Brand applies her mordant wit to the fraught world of child protection as she typecasts herself as "the fat, bad-tempered one", Rose, in an office of social workers. She and her fellow socials, Al (Alan Davies) and Nitin (Romesh Ranganathan), are a fairly disarrayed bunch, as likely to be arguing over who should answer the phones as taking kids into care - Rose herself is a harassed single mum, trying desperately to arrange childcare before she leaves for work in the morning.

It all plays disturbingly naturally, with excellent support from Kevin Eldon, Pulling's Rebekah Staton and Brand's Getting On co-star Ricky Grover. The dark humour fizzes along - with a delicious kick at the end.

BBC Asian Network announces comedy night

On Friday 7 February in London, the station's Breakfast show presenter, Tommy Sandhu hosts an exciting line-up of performers including home-grown rising stars like Abdullah Afzal (Citizen Khan) who makes his stand-up debut; the master of "twerking" Mawaan Rizwan; BBC New Comedy finalist Tez Ilyas, impressionist Anil Desai and critically acclaimed Romesh Ranganathan.

Romesh Ranganathan interview

A teacher who swapped the classroom for life as a stand-up comic is on the rise, after supporting Ricky Gervais and appearing on BBC's Live at the Apollo.

Sean Lock shimmying across the dance floor, Strictly style, sporting a black nylon shirt open to the waist, is the jolly flight of fancy that opens tonight's laughter line-up. Young comedian Romesh Ranganathan brings his Asian DNA into play with a scurrilously hilarious take on racism and a creative approach to telling off other people's kids, which leaves Marcus Brigstocke to supply a cheeky clutch of gags on ageing, safaris, the Greek economy - and some beatboxing.

Host Sean Lock emerges from the clouds of dry ice looking as dapper as always, before launching into a routine about the risks, as a middle-aged man, of ever mentioning that you quite like something. Particularly around this time of year, he points out, expressing a passing interest in anything - a ferry, a bird - can result in ill-advised "experience" presents come Christmas Day.

Lock's longer routines are always good (there's a great one on the discrimination you suffer as a binge drinker), but his quick hits are good, too, including a dark, throwaway one-liner about hearing voices.

Following the host, Asian comic Romesh Ranganathan talks about how, because he has mixed-race kids, he and his wife try to get the kids to pick a side. Then Marcus Brigstocke explains the euro crisis by means of a nightclub allegory and some passable beatboxing. It's as plausible as anything on Newsnight.