Do Not Adjust Your Set / At Last The 1948 Show review

Reviews of pre-Monty Python sketch series Do Not Adjust Your Set (*****) and At Last The 1948 Show. (***)

BBC archive release celebrate Python's 50th anniversary

A new archive of photos and documents has been uncovered which illustrates rarely seen moments from the making of Monty Python, as the ground-breaking comedy show celebrates its 50th anniversary.

It's... Genome's Monty Python 50th anniversary quiz

To celebrate half a century of Monty Python's Flying Circus, Genome indulges in a little light quizzing - how well do you know your Pythons?

Monty Python at 50

In this rare glimpse inside the BBC archives, we reveal the exasperated internal memos, the furious letters from wing commanders - and David Frost's bid to bring them down.

DVD review: At Last the 1948 Show

You've all heard this one: four Yorkshiremen sit round a restaurant table and try to outdo each other with tales of how they had it tough when they were but lads. It's one of the most famous sketches to come from the Monty Python team, and has been restaged several times, including the album Monty Python Live at Drury Lane and the Amnesty International charity show and film The Secret Policeman's Ball. But in fact it's not a Python sketch at all. It first appeared on TV on At Last the 1948 Show.

BBC releases some historic comedy moments

The BBC is making hundreds of clips from its archive available to watch on a new website. Comics featured include Spike Milligan, Pete and Dud, Kenny Everett and Billy Connolly.

Monty Python at 50: The Self-Abasement Tapes is made up of excised sketches from the television show, presented for the first time by Python member Michael Palin. Television now is a lot swearier and shoutier than it was 50 years ago, but I bet it still wouldn't start a Python tribute with the sketch that opened this one: a report from the annual conference of the Fat Ignorant Bastards Party of the USA, whose leader has just become president. "The cult is certainly booming," Eric Idle said in classic old-style Panorama manner.

There followed a court sketch and a school sketch, both subjects dear to Python hearts, as well as the fine country parody song I'm So Worried, exquisitely performed by Terry Jones, with worries that ranged from the Middle East to Heathrow's baggage delivery system and the state of current TV. Palin's linking device, as if he were excavating the material from sewers beneath the Edgware Road while being ironic about that road, its shops and owners, was apt and ingenious.

Python at 50: Silly Talks And Holy Grails, review

A rich collage of chat show appearances, location shoots, guest slots and one-offs worked best when it caught the Pythons in serious mode.

John Cleese: UK journalists write off comedy success

The Monty Python star said the series is not 'going very strong' in the country where it was first launched.

John Cleese is ruining Python's legacy

Is Britain guilty of not showing enough enthusiasm for 50-year-old comedy sketches, or is Cleese just a bit out of touch?