Top Of The Bill
- Radio factual
- BBC Radio 3
- 2020
- 5 episodes (1 series)
Comedians write and read their own essays on what they find funny. Features Adrian Edmondson, Susan Calman, Mark Watson, Deborah Frances-White and Stephen K Amos
Press clippings
Comedy inspiration was the theme of The Essay: Top of the Bill (Radio 3, Monday to Friday) all last week, as five comedians and writers talked about the defining moment in their lives that made them turn to comedy. The best episode was Susan Calman's.
She recalled the life-changing moment she saw An Audience with Victoria Wood as a young girl: "I don't think a more perfect piece of comedy has ever been produced," Calman said, with awe and joy streaming through her voice as she remembered Wood's famously frisky Ballad of Barry and Freda (Let's Do It). It was delicious to revisit Wood's genius, and the whole series was a warming, invigorating study of laughter and influence. Letting comedians be serious, and to talk at length about their personal heroes, may have been the real risk this week, but it was one worth taking.
Charlotte Runcie, The Telegraph, 26th February 2020