Rory McGrath

The Rory McGrath extended interview

After making their Edinburgh Festival Fringe comeback last year, Rory McGrath and Philip Pope return with an hour of sophisticated comedy and song. Expect wit, elegance, clever musical pastiche, silliness and filth in Bridge Over Troubled Lager (Volume 2). Martin Walker talks to Rory about the show.

Rory McGrath interview

Rory McGrath is looking forward to performing his comedy show Bridge Over Troubled Lager at Edinburgh's Assembly venue later this year.

Rory McGrath cautioned over Cornwall assaults

Rory McGrath has been cautioned over three assaults in Cornwall.

Rory McGrath arrested for alleged assault

Comedian and writer Rory McGrath has been arrested in Cornwall on suspicion of assault after a drunken altercation.

Like the wizened face of an old man resembling its childhood self, QI increasingly feels like the radio show it essentially is. The format of a group of people locked in a situation they neither understand nor have control over is still more Come Dine with Me than Sartre's Huis Clos. It's hard to see how, having only got to 'J' in the alphabet, they'll make it to the end without the introduction of a new element, possibly electricity or a vicious beast. In tonight's extended version of last night's series opener, the ghastly Victoria Coren struggles (and does she struggle) to make a dent in the pub-quiz bloke smut, though she's only an also-ran for worst-ever contestant, Rory McGrath having been allowed to keep that particular trophy. It's the unique way the BBC's funded etc etc.

To an entire generation, Griff Rhys Jones might be famous for being the man who takes Rory McGrath and Dara O'Briain sailing, climbs mountains, and presents It'll Be Alright On The Night.

The last in this series of three sees him back at the BBC performing the kind of sketches that made him a household name on Not The Nine O'Clock News and Alas Smith and Jones.

And while the humour is so comfortably old-fashioned your first impression might be that these sketches have been sitting in a drawer since the 1990s, on closer inspection you'll see that there's a whole new bunch of modern obsessions to joke about.

The Reservoir Dogs spoof featuring Griff as Mr Green and former EastEnder Larry Lamb is a lovely mix of the old and the new. But one sketch about firearms in schools, is so mis-judged it wouldn't be a laughing matter in this or any decade.

Griff's other guest stars, Hugh Bonneville, Tom Hollander and Kevin McNally, are well chosen.

But the real draw of the night sees him reunited with his comedy and business partner Mel Smith for a brand new head-to-head sketch - their first together in 16 years.

After resurrecting the comedy of Lenny Henry and Jasper Carrott, there are plenty of other folk who were funny in the 80s who we'd like to see dusted off. More please.

Video: Rory McGrath interview

Comedian and lapsed Catholic Rory McGrath has confessed he feels "guilty about everything" after writing a book about his relationship with religion.

McGrath described The Father, the Son and the Ghostly Hole as a comical journey through his Catholic childhood, atheist teenage years and the uncertainty he now feels as an adult non-believer.

Rory McGrath: 'Look away now, Mum!'

Rory McGrath was brought up in a staunchly Catholic family, but at the age of 16, he turned his back on it all, refusing to get out of bed to go to church. He tells Simon Hattenstone he has never shaken off the guilt, or squared it with his mother.

What I see in the mirror: Rory McGrath

The beard is a snapshot of my life - idleness'.

Women - beware panel shows!

Jo Brand: I used to find They Think It's All Over quite stressful and often locked horns with Rory McGrath over his "all sportswomen have moustaches and are dykes" lines.