Darren Boyd reluctant to play John Cleese

Darren Boyd talks to Metro about playing the 'iconic' John Cleese in comedy drama Holy Flying Circus.

This Olympic-themed mockumentary's screening in the stadium of BBC Two as opposed to the school athletics track of BBC Four, where it was first shown, magnifies its flaws. John Morton's script isn't ambitious enough to go for the laughs it could wring from the subject matter, despite the actors' best efforts. Tonight, the Olympic Deliverance Team, run by Ian Fletcher (Hugh Bonneville), recruits ex-athlete Dave Wellbeck (Darren Boyd) to tour schools inspiring youngsters, but it turns out he has all the dazzle of a frayed jock strap.

Alan Davies' Whites. Hulu. Now.

Should you find yourself in need of a new British comedy fix, hope over to Hulu and check out Whites, starring Alan Davies, Darren Boyd and Katherine Parkinson.

Meddling with the novels of such a geek luminary as Douglas Adams is a precarious business, so it's no surprise that this reworking of his Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency - first shown on BBC4 last December - had ardent fans up in arms over the deviation from its source novel. But a series has been commissioned, so all their favourite bits of the books have a chance to make it to the screen. For the rest of us there is enough to appreciate in a plot that expands from a case of a missing cat to some surreal flights of fancy. Stephen Mangan is great as the chaotic, evasive Gently, while Darren Boyd does a great line in bewilderment as an unwitting sidekick.

Darren Boyd says there is no mystery in role switch

Darren Boyd is used to deadpan more than dead bodies.

True Olympic buffs won't be able to hear the theme music for this sitcom - Let's Face The Music And Dance - without thinking of Torvill and Dean having to settle for bronze in Lillehammer in 1994.

There's no such fancy footwork here in a series which makes you wonder what percentage of the energy that goes into hosting the Olympics has anything to do with sport itself. This week's debacle concerns a former Olympian called Dave Welbeck (a glorious turn from guest star Darren Boyd).

Dave has been roped in as the figurehead of an inspirational initiative called Raising The Bar, but his presentations to schoolchildren are so bafflingly inept, they're almost an art form in themselves.

All of which presents a major hurdle for the harassed Head Of Brand Siobhan Sharpe (Jessica Hynes) who has a wonderful way of seeming to talk through her eyelids.

Meanwhile, Kay's proposed wind turbine - aka The Angel Of Leyton - which is supposed to be symbolising their commitment to green issues has hit a brick wall.

The 2012 team engages ex-athlete Dave Wellbeck (Darren Boyd) to front their Raising the Bar scheme to inspire young people. Unfortunately, his school assembly presentations in Basingstoke and Warwick soon establish the silver medallist now only bores for Britain. If you're a connoisseur of that tranche of comedy that deals in excruciating embarrassment, you may lap this up. Otherwise, I fear you'll find this week's Olympian effort limp hobbling towards lame. Hugh Bonneville remains peerless as a sort of modern-day Ronnie Barker, and we could do with a bit more screen time for Olivia Colman as Sally, Ian's scuttling, "not a problem" PA.

Siobhan and Ian have another pointless meeting. Jessica Hynes really nails dead-eyed ennui as the half-wit PR consultant and Hugh Bonneville is perfectly pitched as the pleasant but ineffectual executive. And tonight, the superb Darren Boyd plays ex-athlete Dave Wellbeck, now an "Official 2012 Hero" charged with inspiring the nation's youth about sport. Olivia Colman continues to be consummately understated as Ian's PA, Sally. The writing is up there with Morton's other wondrous work, People Like Us, and wholly deserves primetime BBC2, not this hidden nook on digital. Perfection.

Whites to begin on ABC1

New British comedy Whites follows the trials and tribulations of head chef Roland White (actor and comedian Alan Davies) and his long-suffering sous chef Bib (Darren Boyd) at a country house hotel.