Sheridan Smith

As I dozed during Jonathan Creek (BBC1), there was a moment of clarity. Such moments are created by a kindly god so you can finish crosswords or work out whodunnits. It became obvious who decapitated Nigel Planer and stuck the head on a scarecrow's body. It was Rik Mayall. The motive? Payback for those dismal veggie stews Planer's hippy Neil served Mayall's punky Rick in The Young Ones.

When I awoke, it became clear this hypothesis was wrong. The murderer could have been anybody but Mayall. Planer's smug polymath could have been rubbed out by his wife Joanna Lumley. Or terminated by her bit on the side so he could continue to marvel at Lumley's plummy articulation during pillow talk. Or by the usual suspects - sinister villagers, mad nuns, God. But not Mayall. He was the cop investigating the murder, after all. Hold on, though. Wouldn't that be perfect cover?

In any case, there were bigger mysteries. All those household names, all David Renwick's writing talent. For what? The disinterring of a three-years-cold corpse of a TV series whose historic function is to incite couples wending their way up the little hill to Bedfordshire to have exchanges such as the following. "Was it the crazed nun who reached through the portrait of Saint Barnabas to strangle Sheridan Smith?" "You idiot, it wasn't the nun. That was half a century earlier."

Renwick had a lot of fun with his script, though. There really was a character called Jacqueline Hyde, who didn't appreciate why Creek found her name funny. Planer's reading included a book called Cerebral Entropy in the Era of Fox News, though not its companion volume, Brain Shrinkage in the Era of Paranormal Hokum.

Jonathan Creek is a changed man. He's got a fancy new office and a new job to go with it. But he can't shake Sheridan Smith's Joey Ross off that easily. When a dead body vanishes from a locked study, it occurs to her that the mystery would be right up Creek's alley. But can she persuade him to get back in the game?

While we were only able to view a ten-minute taster of this feature-length Easter special, we're guessing she manages it. Featuring guest turns from Nigel Planer, Rik Mayall and Joanna Lumley, this should whet the appetites of the devoted (of whom there are a surprising amount) for the new three-part series planned for next year.

Radio Times review

When we first see Jonathan Creek, there's something horribly wrong. In place of the familiar shabby duffel coat, he's wearing a suit and apparently doing something "grown-up, responsible and creatively challenging" in the world of marketing. However, after Joey Ross brings news of a corpse that's mysteriously disappeared without a trace despite being locked in a study guarded by his wife, the detective is straight back on the case (and in his usual attire).

This locked-room scenario is one that writer David Renwick has employed before, but this time he throws in all sorts of murder-mystery clichés, including a spooky country house; memories of a macabre death at a Catholic girls school 50 years earlier; and a sinister local society. It's a confusion of every Midsomer Murders and Agatha Christie you've ever seen, with elaborate interlocking clues and dead ends.

But alongside Alan Davies and Sheridan Smith is a cracking supporting cast that includes Joanna Lumley, Nigel Planer and Rik Mayall who ham it up beautifully.

Creek creator David Renwick delivers a new feature-length case for the inquisitive illusionist. At the home of a politically charged polymath, a body is discovered which mysteriously appears to be more mobile than your average cadaver. Paranormal investigator Joey Ross tries to coax Creek out of retirement in order to undercover the truth. Alan Davies and Sheridan Smith are joined by a guest cast including Joanna Lumley, Nigel Planer and, making a welcome return to our screens, Rik Mayall.

Alan Davies and Sheridan Smith are reunited for a one-off 90-minute special of paranormal sleuthing.

And the even better news is that they'll be shooting three more episodes in the autumn.

It's been more than eight years since a full Jonathan Creek series - and creator and writer David Renwick has come up with a brain-boggling puzzle and guest stars to tempt viewers back.

A dead man (Nigel Planer, no less) who's been seen and photographed by witnesses vanishes out of a locked room where the door is being guarded by none other than national treasure Joanna Lumley.

Also back in the fray is Rik Mayall as detective inspector Gideon Pryke, who last appeared in an episode called The Black Canary in 2008.

His circumstances have changed too - rather drastically. Since we last saw him, he's been left paralysed from the neck down apart from the use of one finger, which he uses to operate his wheelchair and to search for information on the internet.

For Joey Ross (Smith), who teamed up with Creek for the two specials in 2009 and 2010, the case is too tantalising to pass up.

But when she tracks down her old pal she's amazed at the new life he's carved out for himself since they last tackled a riddle.

And his reaction to the mystery sounds like a lament that could have come from any crime or detective writer.

"There will be an explanation," the sleuth calmly predicts. "It will all be very weird and wonderful and once you've fathomed it, everyone will be deeply underwhelmed and you'll wonder why you bothered."

The last time we met the veteran solver of impossible mysteries was three Easters ago and the intervening years have seen a disconcerting transformation. Suited and booted, his curls now swept back in greying executive waves, it seems Creek (Alan Davies) has sold his soul to Mammon, or the advertising industry at least. But can he resist the lure of his favourite old-style puzzle - yet another locked-room mystery? His on-off sidekick Joey Ross (Sheridan Smith) sums it up: "A dead man in a room, seen and photographed by witnesses, evaporates into thin air. Walls, floors and ceiling are all rock solid. No way could he have got out the window or through the door which was being watched the whole time. And yet..." (No change in the basic plot then.) Creek professes to be uninterested in the affair until he learns that the victim was celebrated intellectual Franklin Tartikoff (Nigel Planer), and the chief witness his famously matter-of-fact wife Rosalind (Joanna Lumley). But meanwhile Creek's paraplegic arch-rival Gideon Pryke (Rik Mayall) has got his sole functioning digit wrapped round the investigation. A starry cast, a festering rivalry, a mind-boggling puzzle; for many the perfect Easter Bank Holiday drama.

Sheridan Smith interview

We chatted to Sheridan Smith about her return to Jonathan Creek on Easter Monday in The Clue Of The Savant's Thumb...

Sheridan Smith: I might not return to Jonathan Creek

The busy star, who plays Joey Ross in the detective drama, could struggle to fit the new series of Jonathan Creek around her other commitments.

NTA: Miranda Hart wins best drama performance

Comedian Miranda Hart beat Karen Gillian, Suranne Jones and Sheridan Smith to the prize for her performance in Call the Midwife.

Amongst the programmes over Christmas this week included a dramatisation of David Walliams' children's novel, Mr. Stink.

The story follows a young girl, Chloe (Nell Tiger Free), the eldest daughter of a vile right-wing mother (Sheridan Smith) who wants to become an MP, and whose main policy is getting the homeless off the streets in any way possible. Chloe encounters a tramp, who goes by the name of Mr. Stink (Hugh Bonneville), so called because of his terrible odour.

Mr. Stink's only companion is his dog the Duchess (Pudsey, the winner of Britain's Got Talent), and so Chloe becomes friends with him and eventually persuades him to move into her shed - all while trying to avoid the wrath of her mother.

It's no surprise that this and indeed all of Walliams's children's books have a heavy influence from Roald Dahl. Much of the humour in Mr. Stink's visual, which for a pre-watershed children's comedy isn't a surprise, but it was good. It ranges from Chloe's younger sister Annabelle (Isabella Blake-Thomas) taking part in a historical re-enactment society dressed in full medieval armour, to both of them giving Mr. Stink a full makeover. There are also the throwaway comments in the show, such as Stink claiming that he is "lice free, but no stranger to worms."

In terms of a children's comedy, this seems to tick all of my boxes. It's inoffensive, it's witty, and it's not too childish so adults can watch it without feeling embarrassed. No doubt that more Walliams novels will be adapted for future Christmases.