Rowan Atkinson backs Boris Johnson in burka row

Rowan Atkinson, one of Britain's best-known comedians, has said that Boris Johnson's comments about the burka were funny and urged him not to apologise.

The man behind Blackadder and Mr. Bean defended the former foreign secretary's right to poke fun at religion.

As HIGNFY returns for its 54th series, it's hard to know how to feel about this telly institution. It has undoubtedly lost something of its bite with Ian Hislop and Paul Merton having long since adopted roles they could play in their sleep. Plus, the show is probably marginally to blame for the ascent of Boris Johnson. But, still, in these absurd times, someone's got to take the mickey. The urbane Alexander Armstrong hosts.

Stewart Lee interviewed

Stewart Lee is back with another series of Comedy Vehicle. He tells Simon Price his thoughts on Lenny Bruce, Boris Johnson and Jeremy Corbyn, swimming through piss, Brexit and the pitfalls of being constantly misunderstood.

Grimsby: film review

Back in the late '90s, when Da Ali G Show pulled in big ratings and before the Kazakh clown Borat spun off with his own film, comedian Sacha Baron Cohen was arguably the funniest man in Britain, if you didn't count Boris Johnson (the outgoing mayor of London). In the wake of the disappointment that was 2012's The Dictator, The Brothers Grimsby (which will be called just Grimsby when it opens in the U.K. on Feb. 24) provides further evidence that Baron Cohen, having embarked on a career as a straight actor, is perhaps going a bit soft in his middle age. And that's not something one says lightly about a film featuring jokes about pedophilia, AIDS and people being accidentally anally penetrated by all manner of strange objects.

Stag is 'Bullingdon Club meets The Revenant'

Hitting television screens later this week is a brilliant new dark comedy from BBC Two that evokes the likes of Boris Johnson and David Cameron with Tom Hardy and Leonardo DiCaprio on a nightmare weekend in Scotland.

Politicians and comedy: a rather funny business

Donald Trump tried to be witty on Saturday Night Live, Barack Obama has honed his own standup style and Boris Johnson continues to play the clown. But are politicos' attempts at humour amusing, or even appropriate?

I was wrong about The Jonathan Ross Show

A month ago I wrote a short and not entirely complimentary obituary for The Jonathan Ross Show. Since then though? Jonathan Ross has posted three corking shows in a row for the first time since he moved to ITV in 2011 - and with Boris Johnson to come this Saturday he could even stretch that to four.

Things are looking up for Matt Berry's thwarted thesp: he's got an audition for a role as Charles Dickens, he's having a not-so-secret affair with Ray Purchase's wife, and there's a further opportunity to humiliate Purchase in the annual "celebrities and prostitutes" blow-football match - if Toast can manage to find an escort in time. Add Boris Johnson and an inspired Clockwork Orange reference and you've got an agreeably daft opener of Berry and Arthur Mathews's chaotic sitcom.

Long may Jolyon Rubinstein and Heydon Prowse run riot incognito. Tonight Ed Miliband, Boris Johnson and Nigel Farage fall victim to the politically driven pranksters. Posing as a workman, Prowse also waltzes into the Afghan and Saudi Arabian embassies to install "a glass ceiling" to "protect women from their aspirations".

Not all of the stunts come off: Katie Price is already too much of a joke and Johnson sidesteps a certificate for being The Hardest Working Man In Showbiz. Still, when this viewer wasn't giggling, she was boggle-eyed at their gumption. Best of all is when they sell ice creams to bankers and charge their outraged customers extra for "insurance". The name painted on their cart: PP Ice creams. Geddit?

PPI. Extreme sexism in Saudi Arabia. The spread of betting shops in impoverished towns. The opening minutes of alone of The Revolution Will Be Televised call out all sorts of modern hypocrisies, without drawing breath or offering any solutions. But satire needn't be constructive, provided it's accurate and funny. And if the targets err on the soft side tonight (Katie Price's IQ, Boris Johnson's showbiz inclinations), the laughs keep coming.

Über-banal red-carpet show BBCOMGWTF is spot-on when it wrongfoots its deserving quarries ('Israel or Palestine?' Jerry Bruckheimer, pleased: 'Israel!') and the subtitles telling the truth behind the political soundbites are just so. Scattergun by its very nature - a bit longer spent on fewer issues might have been preferable - but the righteous anger is bracing in what has become a somewhat cowed BBC, post-Savile. To the barricades!