Walliams & Friend to return | ...as his book Ratburger comes to Sky1 © BBC/King Bert

Walliams & Friend to return

...as his book Ratburger comes to Sky1

Walliams & Friend is to return for a second series.

David Walliams revealed the news today as he announced he will star alongside Sheridan Smith, Nigel Planer, Miranda's Sarah Hadland and Ben Bailey Smith, aka stand-up and rapper Doc Brown, in Sky 1's adaptation of his children's novel, Ratburger.

Speaking to the What'sOnTV website to promote the show, Walliams said: ’I’m also doing another series of BBC1’s Walliams and Friend. So I’ve got my work cut out for a while – I’m not going to starve just yet!'

Smith was one of the guest stars on the first series of the Walliams & Friend sketch show, alongside Harry Enfield, Jack Whitehall, Meera Syal, Miranda Richardson and Hugh Bonneville, following a pilot with Joanna Lumley.

The seven episodes averaged around five million viewers but critics were lukewarm after positive notices for the 2015 pilot.

The Guardian thought the sketches were 'defiantly old-fashioned' but weren't 'sure if they're satirising cliche or indulging in it '.

The Telegraph suggested that the scripts 'reeked of being dashed off' and that even the best sketches 'went on too long', saying of the Enfield episode that it 'served only to remind us of how good sketch shows (such as the sort made by Enfield in the Nineties) used to be’.

Morgana Robinson and Mike Wozniak co-starred in the series, which was  written by Walliams with the Dawson Brothers trio.

A BBC spokesperson said: ‘We are in discussions over a couple of projects with David for later this year. He is currently busy working on other shows, including a special sketch planned for this year’s Red Nose Day.'

Walliams also shared with WhatsOnTV his thoughts on being one of the rotating hosts on ITV's new late-night entertainment show The Nightly Show, saying 'it’s scary thinking I’ve got to host a chat show five nights for a week, but you’ve got to get over those worries and see what happens. It is a talk show, but also an entertainment show with lots of sketches.' 

And he posted an image of himself on Twitter as Ratburger's villain, Burt of Burt's Burgers, who wants to turn the heroine Zoe's pet rat into fast food.

- by Jay Richardson 

Published: 22 Feb 2017

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