The comedy week ahead

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Here are the highlights of the comedy week ahead...

Sunday March 1

TV: Pompidou, Matt Lucas's ambitious new comedy starts on BBC Two. Largely wordless, except for nonsense, Lucas plays an eccentric old duffer aided by his his butler Hove and their Afghan Hound Marion who gets into various slapstick scrapes. And it has the catchiest theme tune ever. BBC Two, 6.30pm

LIVE IN LONDON: Simon Munnery presents something of a career retrospective at Canal in Hoxton with excerpts from his characters Alan Parker: Urban Warrior and The League Against Tedium, after which he will be in  conversation about his role with the legendary Cluub Zarathustra and 'alternative comedy' in general.

LIVE IN SALFORD: One Man Breaking Bad, which is the very definition of 'does what it says in the title' starts a month-long UK tour at the Lowry tonight. Dates.

LIVE IN CAMBRIDGE: The latest heat of the Chortle Student Comedy Award takes place in Clare College tonight; then we're off to Leeds on Wednesday and Bristol on Thursday.

Monday March 2

TV: The lovely Moone Boy, recently crowned best sitcom at the British Comedy Awards, returns for a third series. Guest starts this series include  Sir Terry Wogan and, in this opening instalment, Sharon Horgan. Sky 1, 9pm

Tuesday March 3

LIVE IN LONDON: This would be a strong line-up for a theatre gig, let alone a pub in South London. One-liner maestro Stewart Francis shares a bill with Tim Key, double Chortle nominee Nish Kumar, Harriet Kemsley and Mike Wozniak for an evening of offbeat fun at the Camberwell Arms.

LIVE IN LONDON:  Impressive young comic Ahir Shah presents his accomplished Edinburgh Fringe show, Texture, about his strides into adulthood at the Soho Theatre tonight and tomorrow.

Wednesday March 4

RADIO: Australian comedian Hannah Gadsby puts her love of art history to use with a new series of lectures about four masterpieces, kicking things off with Édouard Manet's Olympia. The show also features QI creator John Lloyd as the Quotebot, who knows every quote that's ever been written about art. This is the first in a four-part series. Radio 4, 11pm.

LIVE IN DUNDEE: Entertainingly misanthropic Dylan Moran is back on the road for his first UK stand-up tour for four years, with astute philosophies wearing the disguise of a befuddled, if whimsical, Irishman.  Dates.

LIVE IN SALFORD: Beth Vyse's intensely bonkers show Get Up With Hands, about a deranged breakfast TV show, gets a run-out at the Kings Arms.

Thursday March 5

LIVE IN MANCHESTER: A strong bill a the Comedy Store this weekend features Adam Bloom, Joe Lycett and John Fothergill.

Saturday March 7

THEATRE IN BROMLEY: It's Springtime For Hitler! Fresh from gatecrashing the Ukip conference, the touring production of The Producers gets under way in Bromley. Jason Manford heads as the Broadway impresario Leo Bloom; with Phill Jupitus playing the Nazi-sympathising writer Franz Liebkind until May… when Ross Noble takes over.

LIVE IN LONDON: The cream of their generation of stand-ups play the Union Chapel in Islington with Bridget Christie, James Acaster and Sara Pascoe being compered by Alex Horne. You don’t want to count how many Edinburgh Comedy Award nominations that lot have between them…

Published: 1 Mar 2015