Comedy News Round Up
Taskmaster's Latest Line-Up, Slow Horses Surprise Casting, Tour News And More
It’s pretty obvious what the biggest news is this week. Taskmaster has just announced its latest line-up. The next series will feature Chloe Petts (Have I Got News For You, BBC One); award-winning comedian, writer, songwriter and actor Isy Suttie (Peep Show, C4); BAFTA winning actor, author, comedian, presenter, Matt Lucas (Gladiator II); actor, comedian, and ventriloquist Nina Conti (director of comedy feature Sunlight); and multi-award-winning comedian, actor, writer and director Richard Ayoade (Photographer at wedding in The Life & Death of Peter Sellers). Like so many before them, they all believe they can impress the Taskmaster, but only one can take home the glory. Chloe Petts has been a favourite of mine ever since I first saw her doing stand-up so my smart money is going on Petts to win prizes. More here.
And talking of Taskmaster, Alex Horne revealed a few new thoughts about the future of the series and what he’d like to happen to the show in an interview with Richard Herring to promote his new children’s novel, The Last Pebble. Read more about Horne, listen to the interview and buy the book here.
Not quite laugh-out-loud comedy but an interesting plot development for the next season of Slow Horses. The brilliant Lenny Rush is joing the cast of the compelling spy thriller starring Gary Oldman. Sorry, Sir Gary Oldman. more cast details here.
Sad news that Anthony Head died aged only 72. The tributes flooded in from fans of his work, which ranged from Buffy and Ted Lasso to Little Britain and The Gold Blend TV ads. Natalie Haynes spoke for many when she wrote on Facebook: "Sending all our love to Tony Head's daughters, Emily and Daisy, tonight - their father was an absolute superstar, as we all know. I only met him a handful of times, and he was just lovely - funny and silly and had the absolute best and most generous laugh.” Read more tributes here. Picture below is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.
And talking of Ted Lasso, the football comedy’s star Brett Goldstein is the romantic lead in a new movie. If you want an escapist romcom to get you through an evening check out Office Romance on Netflix, co-starring Jennifer Lopez. Review here.
BTJ went to a great gig at a great venue this week. Suzi Ruffell filmed her latest show The Juggle at Wilton’s Music Hall in East London. There are still a few more live dates on the tour. Read our review and check if she’s coming to your town here.
And finally lots of tour news. Ed Byrne has announced a new tour, while Sue Perkins and Sindhu Vee have extended their tours and Hasan Minhaj and Ronny Chieng are coming over for a special one-off.
And in case you hadn’t noticed, it’s the World Cup. Here’s comedian Rosco McClelland’s attempt at a Scottish World Cup anthem. Enjoy!
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