Rob Brydon & Steve Coogan's Italian trip

After their Yorkshire gastro-odyssey in The Trip, Rob Brydon and Steve Coogan set off for the next series - around Italy in a Mini, to stuff themselves silly (again). Here, Brydon gorges on the glamour of it all...

Steve Coogan & Rob Brydon: What makes a good road trip

We cornered Rob Brydon and recent Oscar nominee Steve Coogan in a Park City eatery, and asked them for a few road-trip tips. They were all too happy to oblige.

Video: The Trip to Italy with Coogan and Brydon

One of the more eagerly awaited films at the Sundance Film Festival has been The Trip to Italy - a sequel to Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon's 2010 adventures.

Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon reunite for Italian job

Three years on from 2010's The Trip, Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon have reunited with director Michael Winterbottom for a sequel The Trip to Italy. According to Coogan, "it's exactly the same but sunnier."

Steve Coogan & Rob Brydon take The Trip to Italy

The gastronomic TV comedy The Trip is returning. We join its two stars during filming in Italy and find their relationship has blossomed - with the help of some more fine dining.

The Trip: box set review

Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon bicker, bond and compare Michael Caine impressions in this poignant and unusually honest comedy.

'Are you friends?' 'No, we work together.' p]Rob Brydon]'s response to the receptionist at Lancashire's famous Inn at Whitewell is at the crux of what this hugely entertaining collaboration with Steve Coogan and Michael Winterbottom (first shown in 2010) is all about. Winterbottom's McGuffin is to send Brydon and Coogan - playing variations on their personas from A Cock and Bull Story - motoring off around the north of England, reviewing rustic restaurants for The Observer.

But really, it's a chance for the two comedians (sorry, comic performers) to riff on their reputations (Coogan: chippy and ambitious; Brydon: warm and eager to please), with near-suicidal ruthlessness, for our delectation. This opening episode is a treat. Slightly pathetic one-upmanship abounds as Brydon tears relentlessly through his impressions from A(l Pacino) to R(onnie Corbett) - much to Coogan's derision. The erstwhile Alan Partridge, meanwhile, gripes about feeling unappreciated by all and sundry, flirting haplessly with bar staff while Brydon turns on his unthreatening charm.

Winterbottom's direction is unobtrusive but occasionally telling, while the landscape makes a backdrop spectacular enough to force its way into the foreground in later episodes. All sorts of themes are bubbling under the surface - the ever-evolving nature of male friendship, the dying of the creative light, the relative merits of road maps and satnavs - but you may well be laughing too much to care. Series two is currently in production in rural Italy, and we can't wait.

US version of The Trip could be on the way

Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon comedy The Trip could be remade with American comedians in the US.