BCG Daily Tuesday 6th January 2015

Stephen Fry to marry partner Elliott Spencer

Stephen Fry has confirmed he is to marry his partner, Elliott Spencer.

Johnny Vegas signs up for Sacha Baron Cohen film

Sacha Baron Cohen's new film Grimsby is still top secret, but St Helens funnyman Johnny Vegas has revealed he's joined the cast.

Radio Times review

Spirited buffoon Count Arthur Strong returns to wade through more malapropisms with his pals from the scruffy café. Arthur, a former actor long past his glory days, carries on like an actor playing himself in a film of his life. He's an acquired taste, a Radio 4 staple where he was adored and derided equally, and now a television presence, whose first series two years ago didn't trouble a mass audience.

This is all irrelevant, of course, if you find Arthur (created and played by Steve Delaney) a joyously funny poltroon very much in the vein of Harry Worth. As we return, Arthur's friend Michael (smashing Rory Kinnear) arrives after six months in Yorkshire, suffering from writer's block. And he finds that Arthur has written a "racist" novel, a "Fifty Crates of Plates for the over-70s".

Radio Times review

Alan Davies returns for more drink-fuelled post-pub-style chewing of fat with his comedy mates. It's a format that makes a virtue out of its lack of structure and for a lot of the time it feels like comedians showing off round a table over a host of topics from cornflakes to the royals to sharing stories about how they were sacked.

Sometimes this can lead to some decent comedy from a line-up that includes Seann Walsh, Holly Walsh, Jimmy Carr and Tommy Tiernan. The latter is especially good, especially when reflecting on the eccentricities of the Ireland of his childhood.

Successful year for Bob Servant creator Neil Forsyth

Bob Servant creator Neil Forsyth has capped off a successful year by selling two new comedy pilot scripts to American television networks.

What do you say to the organiser of a Jewish comedy day

The organiser of this fine upcoming Jewish Comedy Day is Arlene Greenhouse. We met when she came to see a couple of Grouchy Club shows in Edinburgh last August.

Pride director defends US DVD cover as clumsy but valid

Matthew Warchus says the aim is to 'find a mainstream audience' with the film.

Review: Tree by Daniel Kitson, Old Vic

Needless to say, there are plenty of pithy lines tossed back and forth. Kitson, of course, is such a natural performer that even lines that aren't funny on paper are funny when he delivers them while shuffling around high above the in-the-round stage (he is strapped to the trunk, he is not stupid). Key is the perfect counterpoint.

Graham Linehan on US IT Crowd: "Don't do my show"

Graham Linehan has hinted that the upcoming US remake of The IT Crowd will be a departure from the original series.

Mock the Week panels' knob gags just don't stand up

The BBC show's New Year's Eve edition had a parade of dick jokes. They're a mainstay of comedy - but isn't this supposed to be a satirical swipe at the news?

Lest we forget - a Rik Mayall retrospective

It is very difficult to imagine a world without Rik Mayall in it. A staple of the alternative comedy movement of the 1980s, his untimely death at the age of 56 in June 2014 led to an outpouring of tributes for the 'comic genius'. Although such a phrase is often used in the death of a well-known figure, is it an accurate label for the energetic and confident performer that Rik Mayall was?

Lenny Henry's radio dream still distant

In this opinion piece, BBC producer Colin Grant writes that a change of BBC gate-keepers may be needed before we hear black voices on Radio 4 every day of the year, as comedian and actor Lenny Henry wishes.

Stephen Fry: what's wrong with age-gap relationships?

You can bet Stephen Fry's engagement to Elliot Spencer would never have been criticised had this been a case of an older man with a young trophy wife.

Pictures: Stephen Fry and Elliott Spencer to marry

Beaming Stephen Fry and Elliott Spencer leave the actor's London home after announcing they are to marry.

Graham Linehan: why Count Arthur Strong isn't Marmite

Ahead of series two's launch, Digital Spy spoke to the sitcom's co-writer - BAFTA winner Graham Linehan - about the new episodes, the demise of TV criticism and why the studio sitcom is due a comeback.

Alan Davies: Piers Morgan is detestable

He's a fan of Arsenal, Homeland and anything with Sandra Bullock in - but he won't watch EastEnders.

C4 proposed famine comedy: let's judge it by the script

Nobody denies that The Famine (we know it by a much more intimate name than the rest of the world, naturally) is a sensitive subject and an abject tragedy on a worldwide scale. But so was World War One, so was World War Two (Electric Boogaloo), so was the Korean and Vietnam War, all situations the key component of which was involuntary death. And yet there have been terrific, thoughtful, poignant and fantastically funny comedies about all those conflicts too.

Elliott Spence: Who is Stephen Fry's fiancé?

While Elliott and Stephen appear to have been quietly dating for a while, we know very little about the mystery man.

Comedy, health and disability: academic journal

This seminar will investigate the ways in which disabled comedians function within popular Television shows, focussing in particular on Channel 4's The Last Leg and Sky 1's Trollied. Do the formats of the programmes, the comedy chat show and the sitcom, automatically suspend normalcy for the purposes of entertainment, creating a temporary space where values and assumptions are turned upside down? Do these programmes have any relationship to the material produced by disabled comedians outside of the mainstream media?