A tight 5: January 22

Rowan Atkinson is developing a new animated series based on Mr Bean. He is working on a number of sketches for an online series, trade website Broadcastnow reports. Mr Bean is hugely popular on YouTube, with the official channel featuring clips from the original live action show and the 2001 animated series. Its most popular clip has 33million views.

FILMING is due to start next month on Bill, the William Shakespeare film from the team behind Horrible Histories and Yonderland. The movie will give an account of the Bard’s ‘lost years’ before he became a playwright and will involve murderous kings, spies, lost loves, and a plot to blow up Queen Elizabeth. As Chortle reported last year, the film will star Mathew Baynton, Simon Farnaby, Martha Howe-Douglas, Jim Howick, Laurence Rickard and Ben Willbond, and has been written by Rickard and Willbond. The cast will play 40 roles between them.

THE BBC Asian Network is hosting another Big Comedy Night. Hosted by breakfast show presenter Tommy Sandhu, the line-up will include Abdullah Afzal, who plays Amjad Malik in Citizen Khan, making his stand-up debut, plus Mawaan Rizwan, Anil Desai, Tez Ilyas and Romesh Ranganathan. It will be recorded in Broadcasting House, Central London, on February 7. Apply for tickets.

DEVIN RATRAY, the actor best known for playing Buzz McCallister in Home Alone, has joined the cast of the US remake of Jack Whitehall's Bad Education. He will play history teacher Jeff Gelman in the ABC pilot, which also stars Whitehall.

RASHIDA JONES is reuniting with her former Office co-star Steve Carell for a new sitcom. The actress has signed on to take the title role in Tribeca, a show co-written by Carell and his wife Nancy about a veteran of the LAPD's Really Heinous Crimes Unit.

Published: 22 Jan 2014