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The Independent
22-03-2025
- Entertainment
- The Independent
Red Nose Day tops £34 million raised for Comic Relief
Red Nose Day helped raise more than £34 million for Comic Relief during its 40th anniversary, the BBC has revealed. The charity fundraiser, hosted at Salford's MediaCity, saw sketches from some of the biggest shows on the BBC, including Strictly Come Dancing, Gladiators and Beyond Paradise. It was announced that £34,022,590 had been raised for the charity, which helps support communities by providing food, healthcare and shelter to those who need it most. Samir Patel, chief executive of Comic Relief, said: 'On behalf of us all, I want to say a heartfelt thank you. Your extraordinary efforts have helped raise £34,022,590 that will help tackle some of the most urgent problems facing millions of people here in the UK and across the world. 'The kindness we've seen is nothing short of incredible, and every donation, big or small reminds us that when we come together, we can help inspire real and meaningful change. 'Forty years on, the power of laughter to change lives remains as true today as it did in 1985.' At the helm of the event were TV presenters Joel Dommett, Rylan Clark, Alison Hammond, Jonathan Ross, Davina McCall, Tom Allen, Alesha Dixon and AJ Odudu. The Inbetweeners stars James Buckley and Joe Thomas recreated the moment Oasis decided to reunite for a tour in one of the featured sketches. Liam Gallagher, played by Buckley, and Noel Gallagher, played by Thomas, were advised to call each other after their managers told them they were broke. It comes after the feuding Gallagher brothers announced their long-awaited reunion in August 2024 with a worldwide tour taking place this summer. The actors also recreated 'that ticket fiasco', when fans saw ticket prices soar thanks to the use of dynamic pricing on Ticketmaster. Broadcaster Piers Morgan played the 'Ticket Master' who could be seen meeting the brothers in a dark and spooky castle. 'Let me reassure you personally, everyone will be treated completely fairly,' he told them. Elsewhere, comedy character Chabuddy G from sitcom People Just Do Nothing told the Gladiators he was joining them as a new superhuman member of the show called Girth, Wind And Fire. The character, played by Asim Chaudhry, managed to win a challenge against Bionic (Matty Campbell) but CCTV confirmed 'foul play' and Chabuddy G was banned for life from the show. Comedians Russell Kane and Rachel Parris portrayed Strictly's first amateur professional dancers, Melissa and Johnny, in another sketch. The dancing duo had been selected thanks to the BBC One show's 'inclusivity rules, which require a certain percentage of professionals to be amateurs'. While hosting, McCall became emotional as she reflected on what was 'quite possibly the hardest thing I've ever been through'. 'I had a pretty mad year this year. Doctors found a benign brain tumour, by chance, and after a lot of deliberating, I had it removed,' she said. The 57-year-old then began to cry and took a moment to pause as she reflected on the support she had received from her family and partner Michael Douglas. During the BBC One programme, popular sketches from across the years were shown, including when James Corden's Smithy, from Gavin And Stacey, stumbled into an England football meeting. Also on the show, Rock Choir performed Somewhere Only We Know by Keane while Sugababes sang their hit Stronger. Former One Direction star Liam Payne and drag queen The Vivienne were among the celebrities remembered in an in memoriam-style segment. Comic Relief co-founder Sir Lenny Henry, who hosted his final Red Nose Day last year after almost four decades at the helm, reflected on the charity's 40th anniversary. 'I can't believe Comic Relief is turning the big 4-0. In some ways it feels like 1985 was, like, yesterday,' he said in a pre-recorded video. He spoke about how the charity had started following 'a devastating famine in East Africa' in the 1980s and said the Noughties brought Sport Relief while the 2010s saw money funnelled towards helping those with malaria. After reviewing the highlights, Sir Lenny added: 'Please keep doing what you can to help, because doing good never gets old.' Communities, workplaces, schools and families have helped raise more than £1.6 billion over the last 40 years, which has supported more than 100 million people, according to Comic Relief. Sir Lenny co-founded the charity with Love Actually screenwriter Richard Curtis in 1985.
Yahoo
22-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Red Nose Day tops £34 million raised for Comic Relief
Red Nose Day helped raise more than £34 million for Comic Relief during its 40th anniversary, the BBC has revealed. The charity fundraiser, hosted at Salford's MediaCity, saw sketches from some of the biggest shows on the BBC, including Strictly Come Dancing, Gladiators and Beyond Paradise. It was announced that £34,022,590 had been raised for the charity, which helps support communities by providing food, healthcare and shelter to those who need it most. Samir Patel, chief executive of Comic Relief, said: 'On behalf of us all, I want to say a heartfelt thank you. Your extraordinary efforts have helped raise £34,022,590 that will help tackle some of the most urgent problems facing millions of people here in the UK and across the world. 'The kindness we've seen is nothing short of incredible, and every donation, big or small reminds us that when we come together, we can help inspire real and meaningful change. 'Forty years on, the power of laughter to change lives remains as true today as it did in 1985.' At the helm of the event were TV presenters Joel Dommett, Rylan Clark, Alison Hammond, Jonathan Ross, Davina McCall, Tom Allen, Alesha Dixon and AJ Odudu. The Inbetweeners stars James Buckley and Joe Thomas recreated the moment Oasis decided to reunite for a tour in one of the featured sketches. Liam Gallagher, played by Buckley, and Noel Gallagher, played by Thomas, were advised to call each other after their managers told them they were broke. It comes after the feuding Gallagher brothers announced their long-awaited reunion in August 2024 with a worldwide tour taking place this summer. The actors also recreated 'that ticket fiasco', when fans saw ticket prices soar thanks to the use of dynamic pricing on Ticketmaster. Broadcaster Piers Morgan played the 'Ticket Master' who could be seen meeting the brothers in a dark and spooky castle. 'Let me reassure you personally, everyone will be treated completely fairly,' he told them. Elsewhere, comedy character Chabuddy G from sitcom People Just Do Nothing told the Gladiators he was joining them as a new superhuman member of the show called Girth, Wind And Fire. The character, played by Asim Chaudhry, managed to win a challenge against Bionic (Matty Campbell) but CCTV confirmed 'foul play' and Chabuddy G was banned for life from the show. Comedians Russell Kane and Rachel Parris portrayed Strictly's first amateur professional dancers, Melissa and Johnny, in another sketch. The dancing duo had been selected thanks to the BBC One show's 'inclusivity rules, which require a certain percentage of professionals to be amateurs'. While hosting, McCall became emotional as she reflected on what was 'quite possibly the hardest thing I've ever been through'. 'I had a pretty mad year this year. Doctors found a benign brain tumour, by chance, and after a lot of deliberating, I had it removed,' she said. The 57-year-old then began to cry and took a moment to pause as she reflected on the support she had received from her family and partner Michael Douglas. During the BBC One programme, popular sketches from across the years were shown, including when James Corden's Smithy, from Gavin And Stacey, stumbled into an England football meeting. Also on the show, Rock Choir performed Somewhere Only We Know by Keane while Sugababes sang their hit Stronger. Former One Direction star Liam Payne and drag queen The Vivienne were among the celebrities remembered in an in memoriam-style segment. Comic Relief co-founder Sir Lenny Henry, who hosted his final Red Nose Day last year after almost four decades at the helm, reflected on the charity's 40th anniversary. 'I can't believe Comic Relief is turning the big 4-0. In some ways it feels like 1985 was, like, yesterday,' he said in a pre-recorded video. He spoke about how the charity had started following 'a devastating famine in East Africa' in the 1980s and said the Noughties brought Sport Relief while the 2010s saw money funnelled towards helping those with malaria. After reviewing the highlights, Sir Lenny added: 'Please keep doing what you can to help, because doing good never gets old.' Communities, workplaces, schools and families have helped raise more than £1.6 billion over the last 40 years, which has supported more than 100 million people, according to Comic Relief. Sir Lenny co-founded the charity with Love Actually screenwriter Richard Curtis in 1985.
Telegraph
21-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
Comic Relief 2025, review: The weakest telethon in recent memory
It was that time of year again. Comic Relief: Funny for Money (BBC One) celebrated its 40th birthday not, as host Joel Dommett suggested, 'by getting grey hairs everywhere and contemplating Botox'. Instead it marked the milestone with the weakest schedule-filler in recent memory. Live from Salford's Media City, the backslapping luvvies were out in force. The resulting red-nosed epic sprawled across almost five hours, alternating between disappointing sketches and heart-tugging stories to get viewers digging deep. Why not exploit the country's plentiful comedic talent, rather than rely on tired repeats? Why not have it helmed by stand-ups, rather than generic rent-a-presenters? What was once must-see TV has been reduced to a shadow of its former self. No wonder ratings and donations are down. Nodding to its 1985 origins with a loose 'Back to the Eighties' theme, the telethon kicked off with a medley of period-appropriate pop acts. Kajagoogoo's Limahl, T'Pau's Carol Vorderman and Roachford busted out doddery renditions of their signature hits as if on the cruise ship circuit. Hardly catnip for younger viewers. A slow start became a painful one when the first skit saw Chabuddy G from People Just Do Nothing, aka actor Asim Chaudhry, joining the Gladiators. He gave himself the Gladiator name of 'Girth, Wind & Fire', cracked copious flatulence gags and beat Bionic in a Duel but forgot to include any actual jokes. I dread to think how many viewers switched off before festivities had barely begun. As always, plentiful BBC properties received the skit treatment. A Strictly Come Dancing spoof saw the ballroom blockbuster's professional line-up fall victim to inclusivity quotas and forced to let amateurs join its ranks. Rachel Parris and Russell Kane landed the gig and delivered a game enough routine, even if Claudia Winkleman and Craig Revel Horwood taught them a thing or two about timing. The night's comedic high point was 'Not Going Beyond Paradise', a mash-up between sitcom Not Going Out and detective drama Beyond Paradise. Starring both of actress Sally Bretton's on-screen husbands, Lee Mack and Kris Marshall, it was a playfully daft tale of doppelgängers, slapstick and cosy crime tropes. The much-hyped Oasis reunion was lampooned with Inbetweeners stars James Buckley and Joe Thomas donning bushy monobrows to portray the Gallagher brothers. Piers Morgan popped up to play the villainous, demonically cackling CEO of a certain ticketing site. Talk about typecast. It was the most heavily trailed segment but fell flat, repeatedly relying on swearing as a punchline. Munya Chawawa attempted to become Brian Cox's understudy in West End play The Score. The no-nonsense Succession star gave him short shrift, possibly exacerbated by the underpowered script. It was hard to tell how much of the ensuing awkwardness was intentional. The feeble quality of the fresh sketches was only emphasised by reruns of Comic Relief classics starring Rik Mayall, Mr Bean, French and Saunders, Smithy from Gavin & Stacey and Billy Connolly's bare bottom. Less light-hearted but equally worthy was a five-minute mini-episode of EastEnders, focusing on Phil Mitchell. In recent months, the gravel-throated hard man has been suffering from depression and psychosis. The storyline reached crisis point on the soap's 40th anniversary when he attempted suicide and was sectioned. A stagey playlet set at the mental health unit saw Phil bond with a fellow patient. Produced in collaboration with the Brandon Centre, another Comic Relief-funded charity, it was quietly powerful and sensitively handled. This was the first Red Nose Day since the departure of the charity's co-founder but Sir Lenny Henry popped up in a VT package, reflecting on the past 40 years. Catching up with some people helped by Comic Relief-funded projects in Africa, he trotted out his now-familiar catchphrase: 'Forget geography. These are your neighbours. This is your doorstep.' Highlights from celebrity charity challenges tackled over the past week included double amputee Billy Monger's Ironman triathlon in the Hawaiian heat and Radio 1 DJ Jamie 'Biscuits' Laing completing five ultra-marathons by running 150 miles from London to Salford. Laing limped on-stage to hear that he'd heroically raised more than £2m. Proceedings were steered by a tag-team of eight co-hosts. Talk about BBC over-staffing. Lined up on-stage, they looked more like an ageing chorus line than a coherent presenting team. Dommett, Rylan and Davina McCall were the pick of the bloated bunch. Musical interludes punctuated proceedings with the regularity of commercial breaks. The Sugababes wowed but were Rock Choir and Titanique really the best the bookers could do? Come the 10 O'Clock News, the action switched to BBC Two for edgier post-watershed material. Tom Allen and AJ Odudu oversaw a 'late 'n' live'-style cabaret beset by technical glitches. Pontypridd stand-up Paul Hilleard, winner of last year's BBC New Comedy Award, delivered a fitfully amusing deadpan set. This was followed by a return to the flagship channel for 40 Years Of Funny, a retrospective romp through the archives with Emma Willis and Asim Chaudhry. Comic Relief reached its 40th year with too many creaking joints and too few aching sides. This frustratingly flat spectacle might have raised millions of pounds for charitable causes. It just didn't raise many laughs.
Yahoo
13-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Black Mirror season seven to air next month with ‘mind-expanding' tech story
Black Mirror season seven is to air next month with a story about 'mind-expanding' technology and a follow-up to the show's popular USS Callister episode. The new series will launch on April 10, with Guardians Of The Galaxy's Will Poulter, Hard Truths' Michele Austin and People Just Do Nothing's Asim Chaudhry among the latest cast members to be announced. In a new trailer released on Thursday, characters can be seen putting on technology which alters their 'neural structure', playing violent video games and working with artificial intelligence (AI). The clip also shows the USS Callister ship from the show's fourth series, which will be part of a new story, having been at the centre of a tale about a sci-fi video game and misuse of power in its first appearance. Further cast members announced on Thursday include Ben Bailey Smith (Andor), Josh Finan (Say Nothing), James Nelson-Joyce (A Thousand Blows), Jay Simpson (The Day Of The Jackal), and Michael Workeye (This Is Going to Hurt). Speaking about the new series of the dystopian show at a Netflix event in September last year, creator Charlie Brooker said: 'You can expect a mix of genres and styles. 'We've got six episodes this time, and two of them are basically feature-length. Some of them are deeply unpleasant, some are quite funny, and some are emotional.' Season six of the Netflix show included episodes such as Joan Is Awful, which saw a woman discover that the events of her life were being retold in a TV show, and Beyond The Sea, about astronauts who are able to transfer their consciousness to replicas of their bodies on Earth when not needed in space. Famous faces including Salma Hayek, Aaron Paul, Kate Mara, Rob Delaney, Michael Cera, John Hannah, Josh Hartnett and Zazie Beetz appeared in Black Mirror's sixth series.
The Independent
09-02-2025
- Entertainment
- The Independent
Big Boys' sucker-punch final season proves it's one of the finest British comedies of the past decade
There is an old joke, dating back to the mists of the 19th century, about a man who visits his doctor, gripped by the terrible dread of existence. The doctor prescribes a simple remedy: the circus is in town and its lead clown is the toast of Europe. Go see him and your despair will be healed. The twist, of course, is that the man is that clown. Sometimes the laughter is a mask; sometimes the comedy gives way to tragedy. That, too, is the fundamental truth that allows the sitcom format to occasionally elevate itself to true art, as in the final season of Jack Rooke 's superb Big Boys on Channel 4. University life is coming to an end for Jack (Dylan Llewellyn). He and his fellow 'blue shed' residents – charismatic ladies' man Danny (Jon Pointing), his powerful girlfriend Corinne (Izuka Hoyle), and flamboyant fashionista Yemi (Olisa Odele) – will soon say goodbye to Brent Uni and enter the big, scary real world. But before that they'll, once again, have to navigate academic and career decisions, as well as the usual dollop of family and identity crises. Can Danny and Corinne's nascent romance survive the turbulence of student life? Will Yemi's bold professional ambitions be fulfilled? And when will Jack find his calling, and end up being the Jack who, a decade later, is writing this show? On the face of it, Big Boys looks a fairly conventional sitcom, in the vein of Fresh Meat or Community. An odd couple – one gay, one straight; one anxious, one confident – discover their similarities and learn how their differences complement each other. And it is that kind of show. 'I don't think you ever realised,' the older Jack narrates to Danny, 'you were the only older male figure I ever loved.' It is a sweeping, cinematic love story – a platonic romance for the ages. And yet while it was doing this on the surface, playing with conventions established in the broad comic traditions of The Inbetweeners and People Just Do Nothing, it was also, slyly, telling a different story. Not a coming-of-age story, but a story of coming to an end. The bait and switch of Big Boys has been to make viewers think they are watching a show about Jack, when really it's a love letter to Danny. Jack grows up to be Jack. We know that – there's no tension. As for Danny? Sweet, sensitive, depressive Danny – it's not so simple. And throughout its three-series run, Big Boys has known just when to pull back the farce and lace the show with a bittersweet realism. 'I love you all,' Yemi tells his flatmates, as he prepares to leave for Paris. 'But we're going to grow and find new friends.' Life, after all, is more complex than a performance poetry recital; its decisions more difficult than choosing whether to write your thesis on anal sex or the Scottish independence referendum. This might not read like the review of a funny show (and Big Boys is funny, as fans of its first two seasons will know). And that's because this final chapter of Rooke's semi-autobiographical saga is an emotional sucker punch. Only the rarest of comedic shows can manage that transcendent moment, where the quest for laughs is shelved in favour of some emotional – existential even – truth. Think the final moments of Blackadder, the heartbreaking vigil of Seymour in Futurama, or the slow shot of numb surgeons after Henry Blake goes down over the Sea of Japan in M*A*S*H. It is comedy that exquisitely captures the interplay between light and dark, that begs us not to dispose too quickly of our feelings. 'Wait,' Jack implores Danny. It is an instruction to his audience, too. Moving between comedy and drama is tricky. Your audience arrives for the farce – for Katy Wix's tragic student rep Jules or Harriet Webb's effervescently delusional Shannon – but it's the moments of poignancy that last longer. 'There's nothing too big that we can't fix,' Jules tells Danny. It is a moment of naïve optimism in a show that always acknowledges, head on, how irreparably messy life can be. But at times, great television can arrive at truths that feel like existential answers. And this last goodbye to Big Boys – one of the finest British comedies of the past decade – feels like one of those moments.
