October 2019 - Tourist Trap Series 2

 
Tourist Trap is back! The semi-improvised sitcom/sketch-show* returns on Monday 28th October at 10.35pm on BBC One Wales and runs for six weeks - But all six episodes will be available on BBC iPlayer website afterwards.

And if you're the sort of person who enjoys a peek-behind-the-curtain, Sian Harries, Tudur Owen and I gave an interview to the British Comedy Guide about how we write the show which raises existential questions about what even is a script. You can find it here.

I have also been working behind the scenes on the first two editions of this series of The Now Show as well as helping out on Gary Slaymaker and Debra Humphries' show The Joy Of Text - all of which are now available on BBC Sounds.

*I co-write it and I'm not quite sure which it is.

October 2019 - The Goodies in The Big Ben Theory

If you head over to Audible now you can find a brand new audio episode of The Goodies. The Goodies - The Big Ben Theory is written by John-Luke Roberts and me - with Graeme Garden and Bill Oddie and based on a plot by Barnaby Eaton-Jones.

In the show The Goodies return to run the country in a plotline which seems even more relevant now than when we first sat down to write it. They're joined by Jon Culshaw, Kate Harbour, Philip Pope, Barnaby Eaton-Jones and Joanna Lumley. It's produced by Barnaby Eaton-Jones and directed by Dirk Maggs

If you head to the show page now you can hear a small audio-sample from around the opening of the show - and you can hear the whole thing for free if you sign-up for Audible's 30-day trial which, by my maths, should let you listen to it 720 times.

I also recently appeared on James King's podcast Cinema Stories in which guests chat about their three favourite cinemas - and as someone who once worked in a cinema (The Coliseum in Brecon) I was more than happy to provide a peek behind the heavy, red curtain.

Before long I found myself admitting to a professional film critic that I have seen the first Pirates Of The Caribbean film over 26 times as well as covering The Piglet Movie and a Rugrats film that was scratch-n-sniff. 

The whole show is currently available on Acast, Spotify and Apple... And once you've listened to the show, it might be worth you checking out this BBC Radio 4 documentary by Michael Sheen in which he provides an altogether more positive spin on the Port Talbot Plaza than the one I was able to provide.

July 2019 - Y Dynion Diarth

Back in 2016 Sian Harries, Ben Partridge and I wrote a pilot for S4C which Zipline Creative packed with legends and shot on a shoestring. Y Dynion Diarth didn't get picked-up, but we've popped it online should anyone be interested - After all, once you've gone to the bother of organizing a wedding in a service station, you want to show that off.

It stars Siw Hughes, Sian Harries, Dafydd Hwyel, Sara Gregory, Rhodri Evan, Carys Eleri and Gareth J Bale - with Ben and myself popping up in there too. It's in Welsh, with English subtitles available.



And July also saw the final episodes of Jolyon Rubinstein's topical discussion podcast We Need To Talk About... appear on Spotify. 

I've worked on the show since it began, back in September 2017, and we've played host to some incredible guests and talked about Brexit a lot. The full back catalogue - including a Best Bits compilation of the last 6 months, is available on Spotify now.

May 2019 - Live At Eleven

On the 23rd May, I took part in Live At Eleven, a brand new topical comedy show for BBC Radio 4. 

With no election coverage on the night of EU polling day here in the UK, I built one myself, filling-in the gap by playing clips of old elections from the BBC archive. My bit, and the rest of the show, is currently available on BBC Sounds (as, despite the show's name, it is actually available to listen to online for about a month).

Hosted by Toby Foster and Lou Conran, the show was produced by Ed Morrish and features Raul Kohli, Jennifer Williams, me and a real-life clown.

I also recently took part in Danielle Ward's podcast Any Stupid Questions. Danielle herself wasn't actually there, so Carrie Quinlan stood-in as host as Olivia Lee and I asked very stupid questions to experts Rick Muir (of the Police Foundation) about the Police and Claer Barrett (of the Financial Times) about Banks. Both shows, and the rest of the Any Stupid Questions back catalogue are available to download now.

And talking of podcasts, I am also a regular writer on We Need To Talk About…, Spotify’s topical comedy podcast, presented by Jolyon Rubinstein. There’s a new episode out every Friday morning and the whole back-catalogue of the show (including special one-to-one interviews and one-off documentaries) is available online now.

March 2019 - Give Wales A Try

The Tourist Trap Rugby Special will be broadcast on Friday 8th March at 10.35pm on BBC One Wales, and will then be available on BBC iPlayer shortly afterwards.

February 2019 – So You Think You Know About Europe? (Or Rugby?) (Or Cars?)

On BBC Sounds now, you can hear my most recent appearance on BBC Radio 4’s The Now Show. My set is all about how the UK has viewed the EU or, given the age of some of the clips I was fished out, the EEC.

The whole show is on BBC Sounds now. I start at 8 minutes 30 seconds, but listen to the whole show to hear Jake Yapp and Suzi Ruffell both on top form.

Links to my previous appearances on The Now Show are available on the Watch/Listen section of my website, and the Radio Times listing for the 1979 quiz show “So You Think You Know About Europe?” (which, once you’ve heard my set, you’ll definitely want to check out) is available on the BBC Genome website.

Also available on the BBC website is Gareth Gwynn’s Alternative Archive (which I’ve written about elsewhere on the blog) and also series 26 of Top Gear, on which I did a little bit of work behind the scenes... Not the exotic, far-flung bits - The cold, Dunsfold, aircraft-hanger bits - But nevertheless, it was a lot of fun.

A considerably warmer gig is We Need To Talk About…, Spotify’s topical comedy podcast, presented by Jolyon Rubinstein, on which I’m a regular writer. There’s a new episode out every Friday morning and the whole back-catalogue of the show is available online now.

And finally, we are currently putting the finishing touches to the Tourist Trap Rugby Special, which will be broadcast on BBC One Wales on 8^th March, the eve of Wales vs. Scotland. Once again I’ve worked with Sian Harries and Tudur Owen on the plots and scenes for this semi-improvised one-off which sees the whole team return ahead of a second series later in the year.

January 2019 - Alternative Archive

This Saturday Gareth Gwynn's Alternative Archive will be broadcast on BBC Radio 4 as part of the Archive On 4 strand. Kicking-off with an actual scientist explaining the Many Worlds theory it is (to my knowledge) the first Archive On Four to look, not backwards, but sideways - as we listen-in to radio stations from alternative universes.

We'll be covering a universe in which the UK is two foot underwater, where Russia won the space race and we'll be finding out how a BBC Radio 5 Live presenter caused a financial crash. We'll meet a British Pope, a Pan Pipe Playing Paul McCartney and a clutch of politicians doing day jobs you wouldn't expect. 

Of course, the best part about it all is that I can legitimately refer to it as an "award-winning show". I don't even need to wait and see if it will win an award. In a universe, somewhere, it will win one. That's how this works. The show will be broadcast on BBC Radio 4 on Saturday 19th January at 8pm - and will be available afterwards on BBC Sounds. 

In other news, Jolyon Rubinstein's topical podcast We Need To Talk About... is returning to Spotify - and I'll be back on the writing team. The new series starts on 25th January and will feature comedians, journalists, politicians and musicians discussing the week's news. If you've never heard it before, head to Spotify now where you can find the whole back catalogue - plus four "Best Bits" episodes covering Brexit, Trump, Russia and the rest of UK Politics.