Little Britain

Definitive guide to British comedy since Fawlty Towers

The British are coming, and they want to invade your television. With ... laughter.

Little Britain fake ID fails to convince bar staff

A fake driving license in the name of Andy Scouser featuring a picture of Matt Lucas in the character of Andy Pipkin failed to persuade bar staff to serve an underage customer at a beer festival in Derbyshire.

Should Little Britain change with the times?

David Walliams says Little Britain would be unrecognisable if he made it today, while The Simpson's creators have doubled down on their stereotypical depiction of Apu. Should some shows have their comic licence revoked?

Five classic comedies that owe a debt to TLOG

The taboo-busting grotesques of Royston Vasey were a breath of fresh air when they first appeared on stage 20 years ago quickly followed by appearances on BBC Radio and TV. Here are the shows that might not have existed in the same way without them...

Gallery: 20 politically incorrect 'modern' comedies

Here are 20 recent comedies that wouldn't have been green-lit today.

Little Britain isn't so small-minded now

In saying that he wouldn't black up for Little Britain now, Lucas is an indicator of a society that's kinder than it was 10 years ago.

Matt Lucas: Little Britain was cruel

Actor and comedian Matt Lucas on why he couldn't make Little Britain now, apologising to Gary Barlow - and the shock of his parents' divorce.

7 TV shows that started out on radio

Radio has always been the perfect testing ground for some of the biggest names in comedy today.

Even at the peak of its popularity, Matt Lucas and David Walliams's Little Britain was a PC-baiting nightmare. Especially uncomfortable in its portrayals of disability, it featured characters such as Andy, who pretends to need a wheelchair due to laziness, and Anne, a truly outrageous creation that exists purely to mock those with severe learning difficulties. Yet it is West Country teen Vicky Pollard that makes Little Britain a textbook example of problematic TV. Pollard was a perfect storm of conservative anxieties: she was working class, she was overweight, she was a single mother (of 12 children), she was a criminal. At one point she swapped her child for a Westlife CD.

"People always say 'oh I know a Vicky Pollard' and I think that's when you have a kind of real cultural moment", said Walliams on The South Bank Show in 2005. The "cultural moment" she actually heralded was presumably not the one Walliams was thinking of. Soon, Pollard had become the poster girl for the demonisation of the working classes. She was a character on to which people could project their hatred of poor women, such as journalist James Delingpole, who said Pollard represented "gym-slip mums who choose to get pregnant as a career option; pasty-faced, lard-gutted slappers who'll drop their knickers in the blink of an eye."

Yet Pollard and her real life peers weren't just a punchbag for the press. By the turn of the decade, hostility towards low-income people was so overwhelming that the Tories ran a poster saying "Let's cut benefits for those who refuse work" to help them win votes. Austerity then ended up disproportionately punishing single parents, 86% of whom are women. There's no yeah-but-no about it, Pollard helped fuel the mood that got the UK to that point. Little Britain remains a thoroughly questionable chapter in British comedy because of it.

David Walliams: leaving his Little Britain days behind

Comedian and writer David Walliams talks about writing children's books and why he has to pinch himself every day.