The Museum Of Curiosity. John Lloyd. Copyright: BBC
The Museum Of Curiosity

The Museum Of Curiosity

  • Radio panel show
  • BBC Radio 4
  • 2007 - 2023
  • 106 episodes (17 series)

Radio panel show in which John Lloyd and his curators try to fill up their museum with curious objects. Also features Bill Bailey, Sean Lock, Jon Richardson, Dave Gorman, Jimmy Carr and more.

The Museum Of Curiosity. John Lloyd. Copyright: BBC

Key details

Genre
Panel Show
Broadcast
2007 - 2023
Channel
BBC Radio 4
Episodes
106 (1 pilot + 17 series), plus 1 unbroadcast pilot
Creators
John Lloyd, Richard Turner and Dan Schreiber
Stars
John Lloyd, Bill Bailey, Sean Lock, Jon Richardson, Dave Gorman, Jimmy Carr, Humphrey Ker, Phill Jupitus and more
Writers
Jade Gebbie and Cameron Loxdale
Producers
Richard Turner, Dan Schreiber, James Harkin, Anne Miller, Sam Holmes, Leying Lee, Victoria Lloyd, Julia McKenzie and James Robinson
Company

The Museum of Curiosity is a vast (albeit fictitious) building with a mission statement of housing everything in the universe that is in some way curious (including, as it happens, the entire universe itself).

Each week, a panel made up of entertainers and academic experts put forward their curiosities to the head of the museum John Lloyd, the Professor of Ignorance at the University of Buckingham (later Southampton-Solent) and his curators. In the first series the curator was Bill Bailey, followed by Sean Lock in the second, Jon Richardson in the third, Dave Gorman in the fourth, and Jimmy Carr in the fifth. Humphrey Ker was the 6th curator, Phill Jupitus was the seventh, Sarah Millican starred in the eighth series, Noel Fielding in the ninth, Jo Brand for the tenth, Romesh Ranganathan for the eleventh, Sally Phillips the twelfth, Lee Mack the thirteenth, Bridget Christie the fourteenth, Alice Levine the fifteenth, Holly Walsh the sixteenth and Anna Ptaszynski the seventeenth.

The only rule for donation is that the exhibit has to be in some way curious. It doesn't matter if something is gigantic, microscopic, hughly expensive, or even if it doesn't exist.

Current exhibits in the Museum include the Big Bang when it was the size of a grapefruit, the urge to press red buttons that should not be pressed, and a wildlife reserve containing 10,000 tigers (even if there are only 3,000 in the wild).

Catch-up

Additional details

Also known as
  • TMOC (Acronym)
  • The Professor Of Curiosity (Working title)
Production
Studio
Soundtrack
Series 1: All music on the programme played live by Bill Bailey. The same theme tune was used for series two, but is performed by Dan Neeson, Ash Gardner and Hugo Shepard from House of Strange.

Website links

Broadcast details

First broadcast
Monday 16th April 2007 on BBC Radio 4
Most recent repeats

Recording details

  • The Institute of Physics - Pilot
  • Pleasance Theatre (London) - Series 1
  • BBC Radio Theatre - Series 2 onwards
  • The Tabernacle - Other location

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