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Jennifer Jane Saunders is an English actress, comedian, singer, and screenwriter. Saunders originally found attention in the 1980s, when she became a member of The Comic Strip after graduating from the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama with her best friend and comedy partner, Dawn French. With French, she co-wrote and starred in their eponymous sketch show, French and Saunders, for which they jointly received a BAFTA Fellowship in 2009. Saunders later received acclaim in the 1990s for writing and playing her character Edina Monsoon in her sitcom Absolutely Fabulous.
Have I Got News for You (HIGNFY) is a British television panel show, produced by Hat Trick Productions for the BBC, which premiered on 28 September 1990. The programme focuses on two teams, one always captained by Ian Hislop and one by Paul Merton, each plus a guest panelist, answering questions on various news stories on the week prior to an episode's broadcast. However, the programme's format focuses more on the topical discussions on the subject of the news stories related to questions, and the satirical humour derived from these by the teams. This style of presentation had a profound impact on panel shows in British TV comedy, making it one of the genre's key standard-bearers.
Porridge is a British sitcom, starring Ronnie Barker and Richard Beckinsale, written by Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais, and broadcast on BBC1 from 1974 to 1977. The programme ran for three series and two Christmas specials. A feature film of the same name based on the series was released in 1979.
The Comic Strip are a group of British comedians who came to prominence in the 1980s. They are known for their television series The Comic Strip Presents..., which was labelled as a pioneering example of the alternative comedy scene. The core members are Adrian Edmondson, Dawn French, Rik Mayall, Nigel Planer, Peter Richardson and Jennifer Saunders, with appearances by Keith Allen, Robbie Coltrane, Alexei Sayle and others.
The Love Boat is an American romantic comedy-drama television series created by Wilford Lloyd Baumes that originally aired on ABC from September 24, 1977 to May 24, 1986. In addition, three TV movies aired before the regular series premiered and four specials and a TV movie aired after the series ends. The series was set on the cruise ship MS Pacific Princess, and revolved around the ship's captain Merrill Stubing and a handful of his crew, with passengers played by guest actors for each episode, having romantic, dramatic and humorous adventures.
The Vicar of Dibley is a British sitcom. It consists of three series, which aired on BBC One from 10 November 1994 to 1 January 2000, and several specials, the most recent of which aired on 23 December 2020. It is set in the fictional Oxfordshire village of Dibley, which is assigned a female vicar following the 1993 changes in the Church of England that permitted the ordination of women. Dawn French plays the lead role of vicar Geraldine Granger.
Comedy Playhouse is a long-running British anthology series of one-off unrelated sitcoms that aired for 128 episodes from 1961 to 1975. Many episodes later graduated to their own series, including Steptoe and Son, Meet the Wife, Till Death Us Do Part, All Gas and Gaiters, Up Pompeii!, Not in Front of the Children, Me Mammy, That's Your Funeral, The Liver Birds, Are You Being Served? and particularly Last of the Summer Wine, which is the world's longest running sitcom, having run from January 1973 to August 2010. In all, 27 sitcoms started from a pilot in the Comedy Playhouse strand.
Thank God You're Here is an Australian television improvised comedy program created by Working Dog Productions, which premiered on 5 April 2006 on Network 10, where it aired for the first three and the fifth seasons; the fourth season aired on the Seven Network.
Not Going Out is a British television sitcom that has aired on BBC One since 2006 and is the second-longest-running British sitcom, behind Last of the Summer Wine. It stars Lee Mack and Sally Bretton with Geoffrey Whitehead, Deborah Grant, Hugh Dennis, and Abigail Cruttenden.
Gavin & Stacey is a British sitcom written by James Corden and Ruth Jones about two families: one in Billericay, Essex; one in Barry, Vale of Glamorgan. Mathew Horne and Joanna Page play the eponymous characters Gavin and Stacey, while Corden and Jones star as Smithy and Nessa. Alison Steadman and Larry Lamb star as Gavin's parents Pam and Mick, Melanie Walters plays Stacey's mother Gwen, and Rob Brydon plays Stacey's uncle Bryn.
Would I Lie to You? is a British comedy panel show aired on BBC One, made by Zeppotron for the BBC. It was first broadcast on 16 June 2007, starring David Mitchell and Lee Mack as team captains. The show was originally presented by Angus Deayton, and since 2009 has been hosted by Rob Brydon.
The Inbetweeners is a British coming-of-age television teen sitcom, which originally aired on E4 from 2008 to 2010 and was created and written by Damon Beesley and Iain Morris. The series follows the misadventures of suburban teenager William McKenzie and his friends Simon Cooper, Neil Sutherland and Jay Cartwright at the fictional Rudge Park Comprehensive. The programme involves situations of school life, uncaring school staff, friendship, male bonding, lad culture and adolescent sexuality. Despite receiving an initially lukewarm reception, it has been described as a classic and amongst the most successful British sitcoms of the 21st century.
The Monkees is an American television sitcom that first aired on NBC for two seasons, from September 12, 1966, to March 25, 1968. The series follows the adventures of four young men trying to make a name for themselves as a rock 'n roll band. The show introduced a number of innovative new-wave film techniques to series television and won two Emmy Awards in 1967, including Outstanding Comedy Series. The program ended in 1968 at the finish of its second season and has received a long afterlife through Saturday morning repeats and syndication, as well as overseas broadcasts.
A sitcom is a genre of comedy centred on a fixed set of characters who mostly carry over from episode to episode. Sitcoms can be contrasted with sketch comedy, where a troupe may use new characters in each sketch, and stand-up comedy, where a comedian tells jokes and stories to an audience. Sitcoms originated in radio, but today are found mostly on television as one of its dominant narrative forms.
The World of Wodehouse is a comedy television series, based on the Blandings Castle and Ukridge stories written by P. G. Wodehouse.
Come Fly with Me is a British mockumentary television comedy series created by and starring Matt Lucas and David Walliams. Narrated by Lindsay Duncan, the series launched on 25 December 2010 on BBC One. A spoof of British documentaries Airport and Airline, the series follows the activity at a major airport and three fictional airlines: low-cost British airline ‘FlyLo’, low-cost Irish airline ‘Our Lady Air’, and major British airline ‘Great British Air’.
Pramface is a British sitcom starring Scarlett Alice Johnson and Sean Michael Verey. Written by Chris Reddy, the first series, comprising six half-hour episodes, piloted on 23 February 2012. The second series, which was commissioned by the BBC before the first series had even aired, began transmission on 8 January 2013 with an hour-long special as the first episode. The remaining six episodes of the series were of the usual half-hour length. A third series was commissioned which began airing on 25 February 2014 with the double episode series finale, which aired on 25 March 2014, bringing the third series to a total of six half-hour episodes. It was confirmed in August 2014 that a fourth series will not be commissioned.
Inside No. 9 is a British black comedy anthology television programme that first aired on 5 February 2014. It is written by Steve Pemberton and Reece Shearsmith and produced by the BBC. Each 30-minute episode is a self-contained story with new characters and a new setting, almost all starring Pemberton or Shearsmith. Aside from the writers, each episode has a new cast, allowing Inside No. 9 to attract a number of well-known actors. The stories are linked only by the number 9 in some way, typically taking the form of a door marked with the number 9, and a brass hare statue that is in the background of all episodes. Themes and tone vary from episode to episode, but all have elements of comedy and horror or perverse humour, in addition to a plot twist. Pemberton and Shearsmith took inspiration for Inside No. 9 from an episode of Psychoville, a previous project, which was filmed in a single room – this in turn was inspired by Alfred Hitchcock's Rope.
Taskmaster is a British comedy panel game show created by comedian and musician Alex Horne and presented by both Horne and Greg Davies. In the programme, a group of five celebrities – mainly comedians – attempt to complete a series of challenges, with Horne acting as umpire in each challenge and Davies, the titular "Taskmaster", judging the work and awarding points based on contestants' performances. The concept for the programme was first created by Horne for the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 2010; he later secured a deal with Dave to adapt it for television with the first episode premiering in 2015. After the ninth series in 2019, the programme was acquired by Channel 4. The programme has completed sixteen series as well as three Champion of Champions specials and four New Year's Treat one-offs by January 2024, and is set to continue for at least five more series until 2026.
References
- Mark Lewisohn, Radio Times Guide to TV Comedy, BBC Worldwide Ltd, 2003
- Comedy Firsts at British TV Comedy