The best of the week's comedy on TV and radio

How strong is TV comedy at the moment? Even without plunging into Netflix, broadcast channels will this week be airing new episodes of This Time With Alan Partridge, Fleabag, Derry Girls, Jerk, Home, Bounty Hunters, White Gold, Timewasters and Porters. Here’s our guide to the week’s offerings:

Monday March 11

TIMEWASTERS: The second series of award-winning time-travelling comedy Timewasters returns with a double bill.  This time round the 21st Century band are  transported to 1950s London to encounter the birth of the teenager, slick-haired Teddy Boys, the vibrant Windrush crowd, box-fresh televisions and - crucially - the dawn of rock n’ roll. It stars Daniel Lawrence Taylor , who created the series, with Kadiff Kirwan, Adelayo Adedayo and Samson Kayo - while this series’s cast also including Anna Chancellor, Javone Prince, Ellie White and Daniel Rigby. ITV2, 10pm

SPEECHLESS:  In this US comedy, Minnie Driver stars as a no-nonsense mum, Maya DiMeo, who will do anything for her husband, Jimmy and kids Ray, Dylan and JJ – who has cerebral palsy. He communicates by using headgear with a laser pointer to indicate words, letters, and numbers on a board attached to his wheelchair, while others read aloud what he says.   Episodes will be stripped across the week at the same time every day. E4, 7.30pm

BBC ONE: Apart from the eminently missable Warren at 9pm, BBC One continues its strong Monday night comedy offering with This Time With Alan Partridge at 9.30pm, looking at  aggressive Scottishness, vegetarianism and the abolition of corporal punishment; Fiona Waller-Bridges Fleabag undergoing a revelatory counselling session at 10.35pm; and Tim Renkow posing as a refugee to score some free food in Jerk at 11pm, see below.

Tuesday March 12

DERRY GIRLS/HOME: And tonight it’s Channel 4’s turn for two great back-to-back comedies: Derry Girls at 9.15pm and Home at 9.45pm

BLOCKBUSTERS: Dara O Brian takes the reins of the latest revival of the cult quiz show. Dave, 8pm

HENRY NORMAL: A NORMAL NATURE In the fifth instalment in this occasional series, writer and former TV producer Henry Normal uses poetry, stories and comedy to looks at our relationship with nature from the point of view of a busy urban human. Radio 4, 6.30pm

TELLING TALES: More  poetry, stories and comedy as this archive show looks at the work of Tim Key, former Edinburgh Comedy Award winner and current sidekick to Alan Partridge on This Time. Radio 4 Extra, 11am

Wednesday March 13

BOUNTY HUNTERS: Jack Whitehall and Rosie Perez return as the bumbling antique dealer Barnaby and no-nonsense bounty hunter Nina in the second series of this Sky comedy-thriller. The action picks up where the last series left off, with the unlikely duo in Mexico with a bag full of narcotics and an angry drug lord in the boot of their car, while Barnaby’s sister Leah is locked up in a Mexican prison. And Steve Pemberton joins the cast this season. Read an interview with Whitehall here and with Perez here. Sky One, 10pm

HYPOTHETICAL: Darren Harriott, Victoria Coren-Mitchell, Roisin Conaty and Phil Wang  are the subjects of Josh Widdicombe and James Acaster’s diabolical thought experiments this week. Dave, 10pm

Thursday March 14

PORTERS: The odd hospital-based sitcom returns, with Line Of Duty’s Daniel Mays joining the cast as a new porter, whom he describes as a complete and utter bullshitter’. Ed Easton, Rutger Hauer, Susan Wokoma and Jo Enright co-star. Dave, 10pm

Friday March 15

COMIC RELIEF: As the Red Nose Day telethon takes over the airways, highlights include Alan Partridge,  Jennifer Saunders’s Mamma Mia parody, a Bodyguard spoof, the Four Weddings And A Funeral reunion, a  performance from the cast of Only Fools And Horses The Musical, a sketch from the cast of BBC Three’s Famalam and a magic trick gone wrong from Mischief Theatre. Comic Relief takes over BBC One all night, except for the 10pm to 10.35pm slot occupied by the news, when BBC Two takes over for a celebrity version of  University Challenge, with contestants including Jason Manford, Emily Atack, Kerry Godliman, Martin Freeman, Luisa Omielan and Darren Harriott.  7pm, BBC One

Published: 10 Mar 2019