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March 28, 2024, 12:22:35 PM

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Just a minute

Started by Bigfella, September 27, 2021, 07:16:49 PM

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Bigfella

Good call getting Sue Perkins as the new host.  Thought tonight's episode was really sharp, some lovely little bursts of quick wit.  A few people in here think that Paul Merton is just going through the motions these days but I'd say he still has his moments. I always watch out for comedies on Radio4/4Extra - often crap, an occasional gem.

Mr_Simnock

the sort of show that realy needs to be brought to an end asap, the whole of radio 4 just wallows in a sort of shitty 1950's vibe that is mainly now for 60 something former city workers and old middle class housewives.

Ignatius_S

Quote from: Bigfella on September 27, 2021, 07:16:49 PM
Good call getting Sue Perkins as the new host.  Thought tonight's episode was really sharp, some lovely little bursts of quick wit.  A few people in here think that Paul Merton is just going through the motions these days but I'd say he still has his moments. I always watch out for comedies on Radio4/4Extra - often crap, an occasional gem.

Not a just accusation - the last two decades is nearer the mark.

dissolute ocelot

Sad thing is Paul Merton going through the motions is often better than the other competitors. Unless he's given an excuse to talk about silent film.

DrGreggles

Quote from: Bigfella on September 27, 2021, 07:16:49 PM
Good call getting Sue Perkins as the new host. 

I'd rather they hadn't replaced Parsons.

idunnosomename

Quote from: Mr_Simnock on September 27, 2021, 09:13:51 PM
the sort of show that realy needs to be brought to an end asap, the whole of radio 4 just wallows in a sort of shitty 1950's vibe that is mainly now for 60 something former city workers and old middle class housewives.
they could've quietly ended it, but Radio 4 is so out of ideas they didn't dare. even when the "classic years" are so tainted by confirmed nonce Clement Freud (and also that I don't think they got the guests to sign away copyright for their appearance). I'm not going to sneer if you still like JaM, I loved it early 00s, but got increasingly fed up with it, and by this point it's just poison to me

Anyone hear that "Guess the celebrity birthday" thing? jesus fucking christ. here's a celebrity name, their birthday is the week this show goes out. how old are they. thats the whole show. absolute gash.

gilbertharding

Quote from: Bigfella on September 27, 2021, 07:16:49 PM
Good call getting Sue Perkins as the new host.  Thought tonight's episode was really sharp, some lovely little bursts of quick wit.  A few people in here think that Paul Merton is just going through the motions these days but I'd say he still has his moments. I always watch out for comedies on Radio4/4Extra - often crap, an occasional gem.

Sue Perkins and the new guests have improved it quite dramatically - but it was running on empty for ages; this might wring a few more years out of it.

Surely it's time to put I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue out of its misery too. The show itself is passable, but the way the audience *reacts* to every catchphrase and running joke makes me retch. And when they have the singing rounds and it turns out these new people can actually sing (and don't they want you to know they can fucking sing!)... AAArrrgh. Maybe wait until Barry Cryer and Graeme Garden buy the farm, then do it.

idunnosomename

I think Clue might end eventually because it hasn't bred many new regulars unlike JaM, which now has none left. Apart from Jack Dee, Jeremy Hardy is the only one I can think of (cant stand Clue basically for the reasons you state)

JaM will last until the heat death of the universe though

BeardFaceMan

Quote from: idunnosomename on September 28, 2021, 12:08:44 AM

Anyone hear that "Guess the celebrity birthday" thing? jesus fucking christ. here's a celebrity name, their birthday is the week this show goes out. how old are they. thats the whole show. absolute gash.

I fucking hate Osman's "I hope you're all playing along at home" shtick. What about you, readers, did you get the same answer? We're all so involved!!!

letsgobrian

Quote from: idunnosomename on September 28, 2021, 11:15:22 AM
I think Clue might end eventually because it hasn't bred many new regulars unlike JaM, which now has none left. Apart from Jack Dee, Jeremy Hardy is the only one I can think of (cant stand Clue basically for the reasons you state)

JaM will last until the heat death of the universe though

Tony Hawks & Miles Jupp became the go to panellists for the Clue non-radio tours in the absence of Cryer, Garden & Hardy. What that line-up looks like without Tim Brooke Taylor, I don't know, but I've a horrible feeling it would feature Marcus Brigstocke.

shiftwork2

Quote from: gilbertharding on September 28, 2021, 09:42:57 AM
Surely it's time to put I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue out of its misery too. The show itself is passable, but the way the audience *reacts* to every catchphrase and running joke makes me retch

This is all true.  Clue's just about nostalgia now, which is pointless given the huge number of shows in the archive.

gilbertharding

Quote from: BeardFaceMan on September 28, 2021, 11:29:08 AM
I fucking hate Osman's "I hope you're all playing along at home" shtick. What about you, readers, did you get the same answer? We're all so involved!!!

Have you heard about his best selling book? Apparently it's really good, and it wasn't only published because of who he is, at all.

Absolute arsehole.

gilbertharding

If we're broadening this thread out to other Radio 4 comedies, how about My Teenage Diary, hosted by centrist melt Racist Rufus Hound?

Just about bearable if there's an interesting guest, but apparently Hound has started doing a song at the end of the episode and sorry I can't type anymore the thought is making me furious.

idunnosomename

always amazed that many repped by Avalon have a teenage diary. although we're getting to the point that you can be old enough for your livejournal to count.

jobotic

I haven't listened to Radio 4 for years. I don't need to hear government/Blairite propaganda anymore and the comedies IO liked have long gone stale (as discussed here).

What is good on Radio 4?

dissolute ocelot

Quote from: idunnosomename on September 28, 2021, 12:46:47 PM
always amazed that many repped by Avalon have a teenage diary. although we're getting to the point that you can be old enough for your livejournal to count.
I've not listened to it for a while, but they very quickly ran out of people who actually had a long-running teenage diary, and seemed to invite on anyone who'd written a letter or school essay before 2010 and were prepared to discuss it.

MojoJojo

Quote from: jobotic on September 28, 2021, 12:49:55 PM
I haven't listened to Radio 4 for years. I don't need to hear government/Blairite propaganda anymore and the comedies IO liked have long gone stale (as discussed here).

What is good on Radio 4?

The Unbelievable Truth is good - the format as a game actually makes sense, unlike Would I Lie to You? *

Anything by John Finnemore.

That's it. I pretty much stopped listening completely during lockdown, as it was horrifying how flat and dead everything was without an audience.


(* yes, I know that's missing the point a bit but it can be a bit annoying in WILTY)

idunnosomename

Those and Ed Reardon's Week

gilbertharding

Last Word (the Obit show).
More Or Less is probably regarded as piffle hereabouts, but I think it's OK.
Great Lives, depending on who's on - Parris is a turd, obviously.
The News Quiz was good with Miles Jupp, and is still good with Andy Zaltzman I think.

jobotic

Yeah a couple I forgot there.

I always liked From Our Own Correspondent - is it still on Radio 4?

Listen to the World Service when there's no football or cricket on 5 these days. Generally better than 4, although there is too much fuss about what's "trending" and the problem of hearing the same news over and over again*


* so what? I didn't fucking kill him!

idunnosomename

In Our Time is good but Melvyns slowly losing his marbles a bit

AllisonSays

I think Melvyn's as sharp as ever and it's always a treat to hear him upbraid verbose, circumlocutory or pompous academics. Apart from that, fuck Radio 4. I dread to think who they'll replace him with, probably a rolling chair between Stephen Fry and Anne Widdecombe.

Mr_Simnock

In Our Time is the only thing worth keeping on radio 4. Once Melvin goes then so should the programme. I do love it when he makes someone go back and explain/simplify something or give a reason why something just mentioned is important.

gilbertharding

It's good that they repeat it in the evening, so if you miss Melvyn Bragg after breakfast you can hear him Bragg after dinner instead.

Johnny Foreigner

I attended a recording of Just a Minute in Edinburgh a few years ago. It was a very cosy affair. From my recollection, Nicholas Parsons was clearly ancient, but of sound mind; he was just an affable, chatty old man. Paul Merton won the episode, of course, but for some reason, at the end of the show, the audience refused to clap for Josie Lawrence. Whereupon Nicholas had to remind them all that they had 'clapped for everyone else, why not for her?', and they did a new take.

I am not a great Josie Lawrence fan, but she was certainly not any worse than the other contestants. I have never quite understood the reason for the audience's taciturnity.

bos

Quote from: Johnny Foreigner on September 28, 2021, 05:53:21 PM
I attended a recording of Just a Minute in Edinburgh a few years ago. It was a very cosy affair. From my recollection, Nicholas Parsons was clearly ancient, but of sound mind; he was just an affable, chatty old man. Paul Merton won the episode, of course, but for some reason, at the end of the show, the audience refused to clap for Josie Lawrence. Whereupon Nicholas had to ...

Bzzzt. Repetition of Nicholas.

Just a Minute is a dented pocketwatch found for 50p in a jumble sale, an oxidized heirloom, a memento mori, the morbid feeling that the seconds are ebbing away, Just a Minute is an ivory back scratcher that once belonged to your grandfather, the wife hates it, doesn't want that bloody thing in the house, but you still use it sometimes when you have a particularly itchy posterior, Just a Minute is the ...

Gurke and Hare

Quote from: bos on September 28, 2021, 07:56:05 PM
Bzzzt. Repetition of Nicholas.

Just a Minute is a dented pocketwatch found for 50p in a jumble sale, an oxidized heirloom, a memento mori, the morbid feeling that the seconds are ebbing away, Just a Minute is an ivory back scratcher that once belonged to your grandfather, the wife hates it, doesn't want that bloody thing in the house, but you still use it sometimes when you have a particularly itchy posterior, Just a Minute is the ...

Repetition of "is". *audience jeers*

If you want the very worst of R4 comedy, 4 Extra at 8.30am when my alarm goes off is the slot for the gentlest of the gentle sitcoms, mostly Simon Brett ones. Absolutely stinking.

Quote from: idunnosomename on September 28, 2021, 12:08:44 AM

Anyone hear that "Guess the celebrity birthday" thing? jesus fucking christ. here's a celebrity name, their birthday is the week this show goes out. how old are they. thats the whole show. absolute gash.

I hadn't heard of it, but switched the radio on halfway through it.  It was so weak that I thought I had tuned into a sketch show, with the current sketch being about an awful quiz show.  After a couple of minutes I started thinking they were stretching it out a bit, and wondering when they'd get to the punchline, then came the realisation that it actually was a quiz show and yes it was that shit.  Calling it gash is an insult to gash.

Consignia

Quote from: Gurke and Hare on September 28, 2021, 08:33:30 PM
If you want the very worst of R4 comedy, 4 Extra at 8.30am when my alarm goes off is the slot for the gentlest of the gentle sitcoms, mostly Simon Brett ones. Absolutely stinking.

8:00-9:00 is the classic slot. There's some good stuff there, I discovered Hancock's Half Hour, but there's a real of amount of stinkers from the "archive". "This contains dated humour" indeed.

Worst comedy I've heard lately was Paul Merton and his wife in a sitcom called 'my obsession'.  Either it was truly dreadful or I was missing something.