Cleese is wrong: Python's silly walks are still funny

Cleese has said that Monty Python's silly walks sketch was only funny because of the 'brilliance of my performance', while Mick Jagger has called the comedy group 'a bunch of wrinkly old men trying to relive their youth.' But tongue-in-cheek joking aside, this is still a seriously talented bunch of fools.

Mick Jagger try his hand at stand-up comedy

The 68-year-old rocker confirmed today he will host the long-running US show for the first time, as well as performing.

Stand-up almost always fails on radio, simply because at some point during the transfer between stage and studio, a keen comedy producer decides that there should be a concept. Why not have the comedian pretend to be an agony aunt? Or get the audience to shout out news topics? Or - and this is truly shuddersome - how about taking a few jokes and turning them into sketches?

Mark Steel's in Town has the dreaded concept: veteran comic Mark Steel turns up at a nondescript UK municipality, spends time there and creates a bespoke stand-up show. But this concept works because we hear none of the research, nothing of Mark chatting to locals, hanging out in local libraries and pubs. We just get a straightforward stand-up show with a receptive audience. It's great.

On Wednesday, in the first of his new series, Steel took us to Dartford in Kent. The resulting very funny half-hour took in gypsy tart, the pedants' revolt and - I was very impressed by this - an email from Mick Jagger, on holiday in Mustique, comparing the joys of his vacation location to the delights of Dartford, where he was born. Neither snotty nor sycophantic, Steel tied it all together with generous humour. Next week he visits my home town of Wilmslow. I am on tenterhooks (most uncomfortable, I must say).