Social & External
The people behind it
Michiel Romeyn
Various
Herman Koch
Kees Prins
A groundbreaking, splendidly silly, surreal sketch comedy series written by and starring The Goodies' Tim Brooke-Taylor, Monty Python's Graham Chapman and John Cleese, and comedy legend Marty Feldman.
A British comedy television series with turns of phrase and elaborate wordplay, written by and starring former Cambridge Footlights members Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie.
In the fictional town of Fernwood, Ohio, suburban housewife Mary Hartman seeks the kind of domestic perfection promised by Reader’s Digest and TV commercials. Instead she finds herself suffering the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune: mass murders, low-flying airplanes and waxy yellow buildup on her kitchen floor.
Investigative reporter Chris Morris puts modern Britain under the spotlight, and smacks the issues of the day till they bleed. He tackles weighty issues including animals, drugs, sex and skewered celebrities and politicians alike - and in a later episode in 2001, paedophiles.
A snobbish housewife is determined to climb the social ladder, in spite of her family's working class connections and the constant chagrin of her long suffering husband.
The Armando Iannucci Shows is a series of eight programmes focused on specific themes relating to human nature and existentialism, around which Iannucci would weave a series of surreal sketches and monologues. Recurring themes in the episodes are the superficiality of modern culture, our problems communicating with each other, the mundane nature of working life and feelings of personal inadequacy and social awkwardness. Several characters also make repeat appearances in the shows, including the East End thug, who solves every problem with threats of violence; Hugh, an old man who delivers surreal monologues about what things were like in the old days; and Iannucci's barber, who is full of nonsensical anecdotes.
A musical extravaganza that breathes new life into some of the country's most defining stories, by giving them the full musical treatment they've always deserved.
Dolly is a television variety show that ran on ABC during the 1987-1988 season featuring Dolly Parton.
Absolutely is a popular UK television comedy sketch show shown on Channel 4 between 1989 and 1993. The cast and crew were mainly Scottish; the principal writers and performers were Moray Hunter, Jack Docherty, Peter Baikie, Gordon Kennedy, Morwenna Banks and John Sparkes. It was directed by Phil Chilvers, Alan Nixon, Alistair Clark, and Graham C Williams. The show's producers were Alan Nixon, and David Tyler
Clarissa Darling is a teen girl dealing with typical pre-adolescent concerns such as school, boys, pimples, wearing her first training bra and an annoying little brother Ferguson.
The Amanda Show is an American live action sketch comedy and variety show that aired on Nickelodeon from October 16, 1999 to September 21, 2002. It starred Amanda Bynes, Drake Bell, and Nancy Sullivan, along with several performing artists who came and left at different points, such as John Kassir, Raquel Lee, and Josh Peck. The show was a spin-off from All That, in which Bynes had co-starred for several years. The show was unexpectedly cancelled at the end of 2002, according to creator Dan Schneider's blog. Writers for the show included John Hoberg, Steven Molaro, Andrew Hill Newman, and Dan Schneider. Two years after the end of The Amanda Show, Dan Schneider created a new series, called Drake & Josh, featuring Drake Bell, Josh Peck and Nancy Sullivan.
A zany comedy show with Matt Lucas and David Walliams, featuring characters from all over Little Britain.
The Kumars at No. 42 is a British comedy show. It won an International Emmy in 2002 and 2003. It ran for seven series totalling 53 episodes.
Quadruple Professor Adonis Cnut is the cleverest man in Britain and Oxford's leading moral philosopher. He is paid huge amounts of money for his views, consulted by the government, but he is bored and wants adventure, so he joins the shadowy organization The Council which controls everything going on in the world.
Sketch comedy show with black comedians.
The Elegant Gentleman's Guide to Knife Fighting aspires to take sketch comedy in a different direction. With longer-form scenes, less traditional material, and surprising cast, it will be at times random, often ridiculous and occasionally surreal.
The Mario Rosenstock Show is an Irish topical sketch comedy show that first aired on RTÉ Two television in Ireland on 12 November 2012. The show features Mario Rosenstock's performing as characters from the world of sports, politics and entertainment. A second series of the show had been confirmed in December 2012. The second series began on Monday 16 September 2013.
Sledge Hammer! is an American satirical police sitcom produced by New World Television that ran for two seasons on ABC from 1986 to 1988. The series was created by Alan Spencer and stars David Rasche as Inspector Sledge Hammer, a preposterous caricature of the standard "cop on the edge" character. Al Jean and Mike Reiss, best known for their work on The Simpsons, wrote for the show and worked as story editors.
Mock the Week is a British topical celebrity panel game hosted by Dara Ó Briain. The game is influenced by improvised topical stand-up comedy, with several rounds requiring players to deliver answers on unexpected subjects on the spur of the moment.
A British television comedy series of the 1970s and early 1980s, combining surreal sketches and situation comedy.
The free world is in danger, and only one man can help. Jack Decker has sworn to defend America from foreign terrorists regardless of which spineless president is in charge. This is Decker: The Series.
A spoof of the British news — including ridiculous stories, patronising vox pops, offensively hard-hitting research and a sports presenter clearly struggling for metaphors. Adapted from Radio 4 series 'On the Hour'.
This partially unscripted comedy brings viewers into the squad car as incompetent officers swing into action, answering 911 calls about everything from speeding violations and prostitution to staking out a drug den. Within each episode, viewers catch a "fly on the wall" glimpse of the cops' often politically incorrect opinions, ranging from their personal feelings to professional critiques of their colleagues.
In this cult parody of cop dramas, replete with farce and sight gags, Lieutenant Frank Drebin and his fellow officers from Police Squad bungle their way though crime investigations.
A zany sketch comedy featuring many wacky characters hosted for kids and by kids.
LOOK AROUND YOU. Look around you. Just look around you. What do you see? A tree. A weather-vane. A discarded lollipop-wrapper. A traffic shop. All of these things, and any other things you may care to mention, have one thing in common. Can you work out what it is?
Classic sketch comedy show satirising the news and culture of the late 70s and early 80s which introduced Rowan Atkinson, Mel Smith, Griff Rhys Jones and Pamela Stephenson.
An American sketch comedy television program hosted by comedians Dan Rowan and Dick Martin.
The big-collared comic gives his own spin on TV clips from recent programmes, plus contributions from a set of regular characters
A sitcom set in the offices of "GlobeLink News" after its acquisition by media mogul Sir Roysten Merchant. Led by editor George Dent, the staff of GlobeLink battle to maintain the company as a serious news organization against Sir Roysten's right-hand man, Gus Hedges, who wants to make the show more sensationalist and suppress stories that might harm Roysten's business empire.
A comedy sketch show featuring David Mitchell and Robert Webb.
French and Saunders is a British sketch comedy television series written by and starring comic duo Dawn French and Jennifer Saunders. It is also the name by which the performers are known on the occasions when they appear elsewhere as a double act.
Second City Television is a Canadian television sketch comedy show offshoot from Toronto's Second City troupe that ran between 1976 and 1984.
Spitting Image is an award winning British satirical puppet show, created by Peter Fluck, Roger Law and Martin Lambie-Nairn. The series was produced by Spitting Image Productions for Central Independent Television over 18 series which aired on the ITV from 1984 to 1996. The series was nominated and won numerous awards during its run including 10 BAFTA Awards, including one for editing in 1989, and even won two Emmy Awards in 1985 and 1986 in the Popular Arts Category. The series featured puppet caricatures of celebrities famous during the 1980s and 1990s, including British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and fellow Tory politicians, American president Ronald Reagan, and the British Royal Family. The Series was the first to caricature the Queen mother.
Ted, a successful but morally conscious man, runs a research and development department at a morally questionable corporation, Veridian Dynamics. No achievement is too far fetched and no invention too unorthodox for Veridian. Ted loves his seemingly perfect job; he loves his superhuman boss, Veronica, and colleagues Lem, Phil and Linda, but he's starting to take a closer look at the company's extremely questionable practices... especially when they try to cryogenically freeze one of Ted's scientists for testing purposes.
The New Statesman is a British sitcom of the late 1980s and early 1990s satirising the Conservative government of the time.
