Tim Key

Tim Key didn't lose last weeks No More Women

Just so we know where we are, this blog is being written by me (Tim Key). I am a 33-year-old male.

No More Women for T4's Rick Edwards

So, after four tense head-to-heads between Mark Watson (losing) and Tim Key (winning), we thought it was time to take No More Women to the next level with what can only be described as 'An Exhibition Match'...

Constrain your sides with the sturdiest of materials: Tim Key's monologue of a trampled-upon loser is the funniest thing on radio this fortnight, all bar none. And, for once, there's a happy ending.

Tim Key: A man of his words

It's been quite a year for offbeat poet and comedian Tim Key. Now the winner of the Edinburgh Comedy Award is set for stardom.

Tim Key on We Need Answers' No More Women game

Tim Key on the We Need Answers game No More Women, and the distraction and cheating techniques he used to beat Mark Watson.

We Need Answers is now in its second series. This is an excruciatingly student-y comedy quiz hosted by Mark Watson, Tim Key and Alex Horne, which was transferred to television after proving a hit at the Edinburgh Fringe. Two celebrities (in this week's case, Vanessa Feltz and The Inbetweeners' Simon Bird) are quizzed on themed questions originally sent by members of the public to the text message answering service. Watson is the host and link to the audience, Key is the quizmaster (who is spat out into the studio on a railed leather armchair through a concealed door), and Horne provides supportive music cues, sound effects, action-replays, and homespun graphics from a laptop.

It's incredibly cheap, very silly, and not particularly funny. I suspect that by crossing over into my 30s, this kind of comedy has stopped looking hilariously anarchic and intellectual-but-daft, to just become annoying and puerile. That said, the trio behind it are aged 29-33, so maybe it's just me who's stonily bored by Shooting Stars-esque absurdity, particularly when it's in the guise of a cheapo '70s series. We Need Answers ran at the Fringe for two successful years, but I'm guessing it helps if you're a half-drunk festivalgoer attending the show in a live format. On television, it's another matter. There's a distance that Watson, Key and Horne can't bridge.

We get answers from the stars of We Need Answers

Tim Key, Mark Watson and Alex Horne from TV's silliest quiz face the sheer randomness of Wikipedia.

This sketch show didn't attract much attention on its first run earlier this year, but is worth revisiting. Yes, it's frightfully Footlights-y and the quiet, deadpan delivery isn't new, but Tim Key, Stefan Golaszewski, Lloyd Woolf and Tom Basden take just enough risks to set themselves apart. There's a running longform sketch where they all live absurdly together in a caravan, while the highlight of each episode tends to be a wilfully random, spectacularly insulting animation about celebrities' private lives. From these mild surprises come laughs.

Back when this ramshackle quiz was a bonkers night out at the Edinburgh Festival, the site of deadpan comic Tim Key (nearly) falling off his track-rolling quizmaster chair routinely had us in stitches. Now, said quiz, which asks ludicrous questions then asks text-messaging service AQA to answer them, has made the jump to TV. Mark Watson is the host and tonight's baffled guests are Julia Bradbury and Red Dwarf's Robert Llewellyn.

Sketch shows rarely justify the sum of their parts, but there is sometimes an exception. Adapted from the Radio 4 show, the cowards in question are comedians Tim Key, Tom Basden, Stefan Golaszewski and Lloyd Woolf and their act works because the sketches are a blend of the subtle, imaginative and absurd. Scenarios include an excruciatingly dark Russian-roulette dinner-party game.