Classic UK TV sitcoms transfer to stage - and thrill the superfans

Fawlty Towers, The Fast Show, Only Fools And Horses ... the vogue for screen-to-stage shows taps into our need for nostalgia.

'1990s excesses now look mild': inside the improbable return of Drop The Dead Donkey

Andy Hamilton and Guy Jenkin's on-the-nose topical comedy is returning as a play. But in the 24hr media world, can it keep its edge?

'Great sitcoms are missing from our TV screens and our lives - we need them in these times'

Even if "we're all doomed" under the Tories, as Dad's Army's Pte Frazer would say, shows like George And Mildred, Are You Being Served?, Robin's Nest and Three's Company still make us laugh.

Inside the wild creation of Drop The Dead Donkey

Ahead of a new stage revival, the creators and cast of Channel 4's classic 90s newsroom sitcom remember close encounters with future Bond stars, writing episodes at the last minute and the meaning between that mysterious title.

Comfort classic: Drop The Dead Donkey

Steve Clarke alternately giggles and squirms at a biting satire on media mendacity.

All of life can be found in a good sitcom

Highbrow dramas and earnest documentaries are often held up as mirrors but shrewd historians know to look at comedy.

How Drop The Dead Donkey broke the news - and its cast

The comedy almost known as Dead Belgians Don't Count was a unique mix of office humour and topical jokes. But staying current came at a cost.

Andy Hamilton and Guy Jenkin's long-running Channel 4 comedy dwelt on the staff of GlobeLink News, constantly fending off the attentions of Gus Hedges (Robert Duncan), hatchet man for their (unseen) new owner, Sir Roysten Merchant.

Hedges, a management droid speaking exclusively in jargon, is determined to make GlobeLink more sensationalist and tabloid but embattled editor George Dent (Jeff Rawle) sticks to his guns. Stephen Tompkinson and Neil Pearson brought a plausibly worn quality to their hack characters.

A brilliant satire on the commercialisation of news in the era of Rupert Murdoch and Robert Maxwell, Drop the Dead Donkey must surely have been an inspiration behind W1A (2014-) in its targeting of mind-boggling managerial interference.

Drop the Dead Donkey's why I wanted to be a journalist

A rapid interface in the chin-wag department.