Neil Morrissey

Martin Clunes & Neil Morrissey reunite for sketch

If you're a child of the nineties your little heart is about to do somersaults - Men Behaving Badly is back in a one off special for this year's Stand Up To Cancer.

Cast rehearse Neville's Island

Rehearsal photos have been released for the upcoming West End transfer of Tim Firth's comedy. Leading the cast of Angus Jackson's production are Adrian Edmondson, who is reprising his performance as Gordon from the original run in Chichester, Miles Jupp, Neil Morrissey and Robert Webb.

Based on its initial airing this week, I hope to God that Over to Bill doesn't return as it was completely flawed from start to finish. The premise sounded promising enough as weatherman Bill Onion (Hugh Dennis) was fired from his job at the BBC and had to look for work elsewhere. His mate Jez (Neil Morrissey) promised to arrange a meeting with a powerful acquaintance but this meant that Bill had to keep his friend's horrible fiancée Selina (Helen George) on side. This wasn't easy as Selina was portrayed as a high-maintenance gold-digger who was only marrying Jez for the money he made selling his dog chewing gum idea.

I was surprised that Over to Bill was written and directed by such an experienced comedy hand as Red Dwarf's Doug Naylor because to me it felt like the work of a first-time writer. Every cliché was trotted out here from Bill accidentally drinking breast milk to him forgetting to bring a wedding gift to Jez's nuptials and having to stop at a petrol station to purchase a replacement.

In addition to the old-fashioned script, the characters were on the whole fairly unlikeable. The only exception to this rule was Bill's wife, played by the lovely Tracy-Ann Oberman, who I felt was far too good for this fool of a man. The fact that the final gag involved Bill and his wife donating bone marrow tells you all you need to know about a programme that more than suited the slot that was recently occupied by such duds as Father Figure and The Wright Way.

Neil Morrissey & Caroline Quentin reunite for play

Men Behaving Badly duo Neil Morrissey and Caroline Quentin reunite for Noel Coward play.

What do you get when you cross Hugh Dennis and Neil Morrissey with an unremarkable script about a weatherman and his woes? This one-off comedy from Doug Naylor, co-creator of Red Dwarf. Dennis stars as Bill Onion, a middle-aged TV weatherman fired from the BBC and trying to claw his way back with the help of his best friend Jez (Morrissey), Jez's hostile wife (Helen George) and his own wife (Tracy-Ann Oberman). It's the first of three new pilot episodes in a revamp of the BBC's Comedy Playhouse strand.

Radio Times review

Hugh Dennis is Bill, a hangdog weatherman who is sacked from the BBC and replaced by a stunning young woman. Infuriated, bitter Bill sets out to find another job, this time with C4. It's not much of a premise for a comedy, but then Over to Bill isn't much of a comedy.

It's supposed to be a comedy (written by Red Dwarf's Doug Naylor) because it's part of a brief revival of the much-loved Comedy Playhouse strand, which produced abiding hits Steptoe and Son, Till Death Us Do Part and The Liver Birds.

But Over to Bill won't trouble the comedy stratosphere like those classics. There are jokes about the accidental drinking of breast-milk, emergency present-buying from a garage and a particularly tasteless routine about bone marrow transplants. Neil Morrissey and Call the Midwife's Helen George co-star as Bill's shallow friends.

Neil Morrissey talks about Amanda Holden affair

Neil Morrissey has opened up about the affair he had with Amanda Holden.

Neil Morrissey talks about Amanda Holden affair

Neil Morrissey, who has never said sorry to Les Dennis for the affair with his wife Amanda Holden, insisted the marriage was already on the rocks before he became involved

When something is rumoured as possibly the worst British film ever, there's a car crash-type need to see it. And when you spy Cliff Richard and Rolf Harris cameoing as buskers during the opening credits you know you're in for a humdinger. This remake of Ray Cooney's 'whoops, where's me trousers?' farce casts Danny Dyer - who else? - as a black cabbie whose bigamist lifestyle is threatened with exposure after a dog food-eating tramp (Judi Dench - what was she thinking?) clocks him one with a handbag. Neil Morrissey sits on a chocolate cake, Richard Briers falls into a hedge, Christopher Biggins pushes Lionel Blair bum-first through a bathroom floor - no one emerges unscathed among the cameo-packed cast that reads largely like a roll-call for Brit TV legends you'd previously suspected deceased.

In this farce, Danny Dyer plays a man with more than one wife. Does that mean he's a Mormon? No, this is a Dyer movie so there is one too many Ms in that description.

When I was a kid, my parents took me to see the stage version of Run For Your Wife. I don't remember much about it but the audience definitely laughed.

This adaptation must surely be very different, then, because there are no funny jokes.

The closest it got to making me guffaw was when Lionel Blair's bottom fell through a bathroom ceiling.

Playing spot "so-and-so off the telly" will help pass the time as there are plenty of actors of Lionel's level in the cast, such as Neil Morrissey, Denise Van Outen and Christopher Biggins.

They are all more convincing than Danny attempting to play a loveable London bigamist covering his tracks.

I appreciate Run For Your Wife is supposed to be dumb, but rarely has a film aimed so low and missed its target so woefully.