8 Out of 10 Cats (TV Series 2005– ) - IMDb IMDb There was an error trying to load your rating for this title. Some parts of this page won't work property. Please reload or try later. X Beta I'm Watching This! Keep track of everything you watch; tell your friends. Error 8 Out of 10 Cats 24min A topical news panel show with Jimmy Carr as host, and team captains Sean Lock and Jon Richardson. Stars: a list of 28 titles created 07 Jun 2011 a list of 30 titles created 05 Oct 2013 a list of 25 titles created 16 Mar 2014 a list of 47 titles created 15 Apr 2014 a list of 24 titles created 4 months ago Title: 8 Out of 10 Cats (2005– ) 7.9/10 Want to share IMDb's rating on your own site? Use the HTML below. You must be a registered user to use the IMDb rating plugin.

An edition of Countdown (1982) with the stars of 8 Out of 10 Cats (2005). Stars: Jimmy Carr, Rachel Riley, Susie Dent Mock the Week (TV Series 2005) Comedy | Game-Show A comedic look at current events. Stars: Dara O'Briain, Hugh Dennis, Andy Parsons Two teams, lead by their team leader (either Lee Mack or David Mitchell), have to try and make the other team believe their crazy stories. Stars: David Mitchell, Lee Mack, Rob Brydon A comedy panel game in which being Quite Interesting is more important than being right. Stephen Fry is joined each week by four comedians to share anecdotes and trivia, and maybe answer some questions as well. Stars: Alan Davies, Stephen Fry, Bill Bailey Hilarious, totally-irreverent, near-slanderous political quiz show, based mainly on news stories from the last week or so, that leaves no party, personality or action unscathed in pursuit ... See full summary » Stars: Ian Hislop, Paul Merton, Angus Deayton British comedian Russell Howard shares his views on the topical news of the previous week.

Stars: Russell Howard, Colin Hoult, Sadie Hasler An edition of Deal or No Deal? (2005) with the stars of 8 Out of 10 Cats (2005). Director: Ollie Bartlett Edit Storyline A topical news panel show with Jimmy Carr as host, and team captains Sean Lock and Jon Richardson. 3 June 2005 (UK) See more » Also Known As: 8 из 10 кошек See more » Filming Locations: Did You Know? Trivia The name 8 out of 10 cats come from the old Whiskas advert '8 out of 10 cats prefer Whiskas to any other cat food' See more » Connections Fantastic bit of British game-show comedy! 11 August 2005 | by Reilly_4 (United Kingdom) – See all my reviews 8 out of 10 cats is a game show in which two teams answer questions linked to opinion polls answered for by the general British public. Hosted by the terrific Jimmy Carr, it features Sean Lock and Dave Spikey (both also brilliant) as the team captains, and a host of famous faces to be the other team members.

The comedy comes thick and fast, especially from Lock and Spikey, with regular quips from the guests, most of which are surprisingly funny! With a host like Carr, and team captains who know what they're doing, this programme is an absolute treat and should not be missed. This programme has become one of my favourite comedy game shows, up there with Have I Got News For You, Shooting Stars, and Never Mind the Buzzcocks. Don't Miss! 26 of 34 people found this review helpful. Was this review helpful to you? Yes 8 Out of 10 Cats - All 4 8 Out of 10 Cats Home Jimmy Carr hosts with captains Rob Beckett and Aisling Bea. Guests Jermaine Jenas, Denise Van Outen, Michelle Wolf and Sam Simmons discuss the most talked about Brits of 2016.

First shown: 18 Jan 2017 Strong language and adult humour This programme is subtitled 8 Out of 10 Cats - Show News, Reviews, Recaps and Photos - TV.com 8 Out of 10 Cats Follow Tuesday 10:00 PM on More4 Premiered Jun 03, 2005 In Season USER EDITOR EDIT Channel 4's topical panel quiz show, see's two teams (made up of the team captain and two celebrity guests), who are then asked questions relating to opinion polls and statistics based on the week's events in the news and media. It's currently airing its seventeenth series. 8 out of 10 Cats is presented by Jimmy Carr, with team captains Rob Beckett and Aisling Bea. The voice of John Pohlhammer introduces the panel at the beginning of each episode. Originally Dave Spikey was the team captain against Lock for the first four series, he was then replaced with Jason Manford from series 5 to 10 who was replaced by Richardson from series 11. Starting from series 20 Sean Lock and Jon Richardson are replaced by Rob Beckett and Aisling Bea.

8 Out Of 10 Cats Does Countdown - C4 Panel Show - British Comedy Guide 8 Out Of 10 Cats Does Countdown 8 Out Of 10 Cats Does Countdown Like this show Channel 4 panel show based on the words and numbers game. 92 episodes (11 series), 2012 - 2017. Stars Jimmy Carr , Sean Lock , Jon Richardson , Joe Wilkinson and others .

8 Out Of 10 Cats Does Countdown Like this show See Also 8 Out Of 10 Cats Does Countdown The 8 Out Of 10 Cats regulars play the famous words and numbers quiz with the help of guests Recent news Jimmy Carr , Sean Lock , Jon Richardson , Joe Wilkinson , Rachel Riley and Susie Dent Writers Richard Valentine , Simon Staffurth and Barbara Wiltshire Producers Damian Eadie , Karen Murdoch , Lisa Kirk , Richard Cohen , Adam Hutchinson , Rose Hanson , Stephanie McIntosh , Christopher Barbour , Carol Baffour-Awuah , Alex Gilman , Emily Howe , Mia Cross , Adam Copeland , Adeel Amini , Arron Ferster , Jodie Krstic and Mark Barrett In 2012 , two of Channel 4 's most popular quizzes - the topical hit 8 Out Of 10 Cats and the cerebral words-and-numbers game Countdown - came to metaphorical blows as the anarchic comedians of the former took on the brainbox format of the latter. Jimmy Carr was the host, with Sean Lock and Jon Richardson as the contestants. Jimmy was helped by Countdown regulars Susie Dent and Rachel Riley , and hindered by Joe Wilkinson .

The gang returned to play Countdown a second time later in 2012 . In January 2013 , as part of the next Channel 4 Mash Up, Jimmy Carr , Jon Richardson and Sean Lock hijacked an episode of Deal or No Deal. A number of comedians joined in, plus Rachel Riley and Susie Dent again. Joe Wilkinson acted as the Banker's assistant. Since 2013 , the show has run regularly with multiple-episode series. Panel Game - TV Tropes Panel Game You need to login to do this. Get Known if you don't have an account Share — Richard Ayoade very sincerely introduces Never Mind the Buzzcocks A Panel Game or Panel Show is a variation on the Game Show in which celebrities and comedians compete in teams to win points. Panel games are a mainstay of British television, perhaps due to the continued UK popularity of radio entertainment, from which the format was adapted; or to accommodate lower UK production budgets . The games are a useful way for up-and-coming — or fast-descending — comedians to pay the bills.

The celebrity contestants are usually paid an appearance fee, but there is rarely a prize as an incentive to win, although the contestants may still be highly competitive. The focus is on comedy ; The Points Mean Nothing , and some shows feature a joke prize that is mundane ( Have I Got News for You ), bizarre ( Shooting Stars ), or non-existent ( I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue ). Panel games feature a host who asks the questions and adjudicates, and often some of the panelists are regulars who appear every week. The host makes jokes between the rounds, of which there are up to six, some more gimmicky than others, including video clips and minigames. Not to be confused with Celebrity Specials of a Game Show , where the celeb accrues prize money and donates it to a charity of their choosing. Examples: Live-Action TV The one that is most familiar to American viewers is Whose Line Is It Anyway? , which had four comedians who would perform improv comedy to win points from host Clive Anderson (later replaced by Drew Carey for the somewhat-louder American version).

A long-running British panel show is Never Mind the Buzzcocks , which is based around music and generally features pop and rock stars as well as comedians. After most of the original cast started having other commitments, the show bounced back with a very successful format of rotating guest hosts and temporary team captains. Phill Jupitus has appeared in every episode but one, making him pretty much the face of the show. The show is currently hosted by Rhod Gilbert, and the other team captain is Noel Fielding . Another mainstay of British panel games is Have I Got News for You , a political and satirical panel game that generally attracts politicians, journalists, and businessmen as its panelists, as well as more politically-minded comedians. A similar show is Mock the Week , basically Have I Got News For You meets Whose Line. One of the oldest British panel games is A Question of Sport , which — since it typically features sportsmen — is generally regarded as more niche and less funny than its competitors (there were a lot of restrictions on how funny they could be when Princess Anne turned up). It's headed a bit more towards the comedic in recent years (ever since Sue Barker took over the chair), which meant that...

They Think It's All Over , also a sporting panel game but with more emphasis on the funny (each side had a regular sportsman, a regular comedian and one other random, usually a sportsman), was rendered slightly redundant. A change of panelists didn't kill the show; a change of hosts did. Rampantly most famous for the Feel The Sportsman round, where contestants were blindfolded and had to identify a sportsperson (or, in several cases, a team of sportspersons) by touch alone. The format was taken to its logical conclusion in Shooting Stars which dispensed with rules, order and sense, and featured questions such as "True or False: Bill Cosby was the first-ever black man" (the answer was false; it was actually Sidney Poitier ). It also featured dream sequences, sketches, and other distractions from the boring business of actually hosting a show. The guests are more of an afterthought than anything. Subverted in Annually Retentive , a Two For One Show which shows both a traditional panel game and the (fictional) behind-the-scenes backstabbing that happens behind it.

As far as the celebrities are concerned, it's a 'proper' panel show, and only the host and captains act in the behind-the-scenes bits. Wild N Out is an urban-themed improv comedy show. The players, who seem to be regulars with a single exception (the special celebrity guest), are divided into the Red Squad (led by host Nick Cannon) and the Black Squad (led by the special guest). They compete mostly for pride, as well as the opportunity to hold the pro wrestling -style "improv champion" belt. This format was once common on North American prime time; the tone was more serious, although there was still some joking going on. The best known of these were CBS's To Tell the Truth , I've Got A Secret , and What's My Line? (all of which later went into syndication) and CBC's Front Page Challenge, which ran for 37 years (1958-95). Australia also has its fair share of these, many differing from their British counterparts only so much as is necessary to avoid paying the BBC for the rights. There have been two Never Mind the Buzzcocks-alikes.

SBS 's Rockwiz is considered the more musically credible; it has the feel of a stage show that just happens to be on TV, being filmed in an actual pub and with the scores displayed on cardboard placards. It is trumped in popularity by ABC 's Spicks And Specks , which is closer to Buzzcocks in format but (being hosted by Adam Hills) with a more positive attitude and less likely to go Off the Rails . Good News Week was originally a carbon copy of Have I Got News For You, but its political satire didn't survive the move to commercial television. After a ten year hiatus, the rebooted show focuses more on oddball stories, celebrity news and musical guests. Also Australian is Talkin' 'bout Your Generation , hosted by Shaun Micallef and featuring comedians Baby Boomer Amanda Keller , Generation X Charlie Pickering , Generation Y Josh Thomas , and their celebrity guests, in an attempt to determine the superior generation. QI , themed around general knowledge ignorance, has become one of the biggest. (And funniest.) Notable for having no captains but a regular panelist in Alan Davies, who acts as a foil to host Stephen Fry and keeps things from getting too serious.

You Have Been Watching , themed around television shows, hosted by Charlie Brooker . 8 Out of 10 Cats , about statistics, hosted by Jimmy Carr , regular team captain Sean Lock (either of whom tend to be CMOF-worthy separately), relatively new team captain Jon Richardson, and the occasional somewhat thematic celebrity (such as Chris Hoy, after he won Olympic gold). Dave Gorman's Genius, which is also a radio show, involves more audience participation than usual: the general public mails suggestions which could improve the world (or are just funny), and the best ones get invited onto the show to defend their idea to a guest, who is in charge of deciding whether or not the idea is genius. Ideas that have been declared genius before include breeding an elephant that is small enough to be a house pet, helium filled bubble wrap to make parcels lighter and postage cheaper, and to make parliament discuss things under the rules of Just a Minute . Would I Lie to You? , hosted in the first two seasons by Angus Deayton, currently hosted by Rob Brydon, with team captains Lee Mack and David Mitchell .

Slightly more emphasis on the game part of panel game, the contestants read out a card that either contains an unlikely truth about themselves or a lie made up by the researchers of the show, and they have to defend it as true, while the other team prods them for additional facts and then says whether it's the truth, or a lie. ( A video link explains it better than that description.) There are also various other rounds, such as each member of one team claiming to know a mystery guest. It's one of the best panel shows on today, with very little scripted material, lots of funny stories and plenty of good-natured ribbing. The Bubble, hosted by David Mitchell isolates 3 celebrities in a country house for a week and shows them a variety of News Stories from the week, some real, some faked and the celebrities have to guess which is which. It's better seen than read about. Notable for the fact that while it's a BBC show they are banned from faking news from the BBC. Here's an interview about the program. Ireland has The Panel which dispenses with the quiz format altogether, while still attempting to feel like a panel game show.

It used to work, until Dara Ó Briain left . The format is quite popular in the Netherlands, although not quite as mainstream as it is in the UK. Popular Dutch panel shows include: Waku Waku, a classic charity show with a focus on wildlife trivia. Although it was extremely popular for quite a number of seasons, it was cancelled well over a decade ago. It's the one panel show that all others take their cues from. Dit Was Het Nieuws (This Was The News), a carbon copy of Have I Got News for You . The Mike And Thomas Show, a rapid, very musical show not unlike Shooting Stars. It consists of the two titular hosts basically just messing about in the guise of a gameshow. And two grand pianos. Wie Ben Ik? (Who Am I?), a panel show based around celebrities trying to guess the object, character or concept they've been labeled as. The show made great use of its simplistic rules, letting the comedians run loose and never pretending to be more than it was, resulting in one of the most celebrated light entertainment shows in Dutch TV history. New Zealand's local programme Seven Days follows this format, focusing on news stories that happened in the last week.

The amount of points awarded per round tends to reference recent news stories, often at impressively different scales (Team one, you can have the number of women that claim to have slept with Tiger Woods; Team Two, you can have the cost of repairing Qantas' air fleet. Team Two wins!). Figure It Out has four panelists try to figure out what a contestant's secret talent is before all three rounds are up. Being a Nickelodeon show, lots of slime is expected. Bunk , an IFC mock-gameshow with a panel of 3 comedians competing at strange tasks to win strange prizes. Comedy World Cup , hosted by David Tennant , which ran for only 7 episodes. In a twist of the normal formal, there were no regulars but four different teams that consisted of the same comedians. The teams were pitted against each other to answer questions regarding comedy history and trivia, and the winner would advance to the next level. Comedy Central 's @midnight is a U.S. take on the concept themed around internet culture and social media.

It still carries all of the hallmarks of a panel game, although it is thematically inspired by the format of traditional quiz shows Radio I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue is a parody of the panel show genre (featuring many intentionally surreal rounds where scoring points would be completely impossible even if they tried) and has been broadcast with most of the original panelists since 1972. The 99p Challenge is a radio panel show that offers up a prize of 99 pence (currently equivalent to US$50,000) to its winners. American example: NPR 's Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me! . Not a pure panel game, as it also features segments in which listeners play to win an actual prize, but as the prize is an answering machine greeting from newscaster Carl Kasell, these are played for laughs as much as the ones with only the panelists. More panelly American example: NPR's Says You! where a regular cast, consisting mostly of media writers and producers, plays a series of games dealing with trivia and English vocabulary.

Just a Minute , which, over the years, has placed more and more emphasis on joke-telling than on trying to speak for a minute without repetition, hesitation, or deviation, with the panel now generally composed of stand-up comedians (the original regulars included columnist Clement Freud and comic actors (but not stand-up comedians) Peter Jones, Derek Nimmo, and Kenneth Williams). Host Nicholas Parsons does insist that it is the contributions and not the point-scoring that is most important, but this has not stopped many panelists over the years from taking the "game" aspect very seriously. The Unbelievable Truth , hosted by David Mitchell. The four guests give a lecture on a particular subject that is full of lies, except for five truths scattered throughout, and the others have to pick out the truths as they go. The News Quiz , something of a radio counterpart to Have I Got News for You (which it predates by thirteen years). In its early years, it was a relatively straight panel game about the week's news, with the panel largely comprising journalists and politicians, but since around the mid-1990s there has been more emphasis on comedy. The Museum of Curiosity, which has been described as a sister show to QI .

A very early example would be Information Please, first broadcast in 1938. Particularly interesting in that the listening public was responsible for sending in the questions asked of the panel members, and they were the ones paid if the panelists got the answer wrong. Fighting Talk, which airs every Saturday morning during the football season on BBC Five Live. More competitive than most examples, it features four panelists; usually sportspeople, comedians or journalists, discussing topical sporting news with points awarded for good punditry and passion as well as comedy. So Wrong It's Right, another panel show hosted by Charlie Brooker . Comedians (including several regulars such as David Mitchell , Rob Brydon, Holly Walsh, and Lee Mack ) compete to tell the "worst" stories, such as the worst thing that happened to them at a party or the worst idea for a restaurant. Because News , a CBC radio panel game that first aired in 2015. New Media David Firth of Fat-Pie.com doesn't appear to much like panel shows, as displayed in a cartoon he made for Charlie Brooker's show Screenwipe that mocks the pre-written jokes many of them use. It also makes a few jabs at internet videos .

See the cartoon here. Ironic, considering that Charlie Brooker is credited as a joke writer on some episodes of 8 Out Of 10 Cats, and has been a panelist on Have I Got News for You and Would I Lie to You? twice... 8 Out of 10 Cats - Episode Guide - All 4 8 Out of 10 Cats Series 1 Series 1 Episode 11 Jeremy Edwards, Liza Tarbuck, Derek, Science, Maxwell, Michelle, Nasty Nick, Jade, Victor and Kemal join host Jimmy Carr and team captains Sean Lock and Dave Spikey. Series 1 Episode 10 Kate Garraway, Frankie Boyle, Vic Reeves and Alan Carr join host Jimmy Carr and team captains Sean Lock and Dave Spikey. Series 1 Episode 9 Rob Rouse, Johnny Vegas, Jayne Middlemiss and Scott Capurro join host Jimmy Carr and team captains Sean Lock and Dave Spikey. Series 1 Episode 8 Sarah Beeny, Iain Lee, Simon Amstell and Ralf Little join host Jimmy Carr and team captains Sean Lock and Dave Spikey.

Series 1 Episode 7 Trisha Goddard, Lee Mack, Janet Street Porter, Patrick McGuinness join host Jimmy Carr, with team captains Sean Lock and Dave Spikey. Series 1 Episode 6 Two teams of fearless, hard-hitting celebrity analysts compete to see who best understands what's really going on in Britain today. With contributions from Frankie Boyle, Rob Rouse and Iain Lee. Series 1 Episode 5 Laurence Llewellyn Bowen, Mel Giedroyc, Debran Stevenson and Scott Capurro discuss the American psyche, identity cards and catchphrases, among other things... Series 1 Episode 4 Ghandi's self-control, and Russell Crowe's lack of it, come under discussion. Guests include June Sarpong, Sue Perkins and Paul Kaye. Series 1 Episode 3 This week's analysts include Eamonn Holmes, Claudia Winkleman, Lee Mack and Alan Carr. Series 1 Episode 2 A Guide to the Hilarious World of British Panel Shows - Splitsider Splitsider By Elise Czajkowski July 28, 2011 For American comedy fans, British comedy calls to mind Monty Python and The Office.

But in the UK right now, stand-up is front and center (centre, actually). The hugely popular observational comic Michael McIntyre is expected to pull in £20 million ($32.5 million) next year when he tours arenas around the UK and Ireland. While stand-up can increasingly be seen on British TV, it’s on comedy panel shows that many comedians make their names. The format of the panel show is nothing new, nor particularly British. A group of comedians and celebrities are brought together to crack wise about a topic or theme, and then points are handed out occasionally to fashion the enterprise into a game. Anyone who watched the Game Show Network in the late 1990s (just me?) will have seen endless repeats of 1970s panel shows like The Match Game and Password, where the likes of McLean Stevenson and Charles Nelson Reilly made suggestive jokes while members of the public attempted to win prizes. The modern day British versions of these games have mostly gotten rid of the regular people and prizes.

In his history of British entertainment, Turned Out Nice Again, author Louis Barfe describes panel shows as “the televisual equivalent of the Victorian parlour game, in which the only reward was the approval of the host and the audience, not to mention the sense of a job well and wittily done.” Panel shows don’t dominate the primetime TV schedules in the US, but they can be found. NPR’s Wait, Wait…Don’t Tell Me is a classic panel show. Whose Line Is It Anyway? was a form of panel show, with regular rounds and useless points that kept the action moving. When The Marriage Ref was remade in the UK, it was advertised as a panel show (it wasn’t any more popular there — The Guardian’s TV critic called it “perplexingly bad”). Even a show like ESPN’s Around the Horn has elements of a panel show, with journalists discussing current sporting news and being awarded points for good answers. Part of the reason that panel shows have become so popular in Britain is that the topical panel shows are the primary source of satire.

Late night talk shows don’t exist in Britain (their chat shows are weekly, instead of daily), and as such, panel shows are the place where Brits turn for a funny look at current events. One such example is BBC Radio 4’s The News Quiz, which airs at 6:30 on Friday evening, and offers a somewhat genial comedic look at the week’s news. The even more popular TV version, Have I Got News For You (HIGNFY), has become the beloved elder of the television panel shows. Other topical shows have popped up in it’s shadow, including it’s younger, swearier BBC Two cousin Mock the Week, and the survey based 8 Out of 10 Cats on competitor Channel 4. But part of the appeal of the panel show to TV and radio executives is that almost anything can be made into a quiz. There are games about sports (BBC One’s Question of Sport), literature (Radio 4’s Quote…Unquote), even television itself (Channel 4’s You Have Been Watching). A quick look through the British Comedy Guide’s Panel Shows page shows the quantity and variety of the shows on offer.

There was even talk about a panel show based on Sudoku, although it doesn’t appear to have materialized. Panel shows are both a cause and effect of the current comedy boom in Britain. Most shows feature a regular host and team captains, who are established comedy personas that draw in audiences week after week. But the shows are then filled in with other comedians, often allowing younger comics their first TV and radio appearances. Many of the biggest comics in the UK at the moment made their names on panel shows, and have gone on to sell out major theatres and arenas. This increased appetite for comedy has lead to even more shows being commissioned, and more openings for rising comics to find spots on TV or radio. Another reason for the success of panel shows is that they are particularly suited to the British broadcasting schedule. In the UK, it’s common for one season of a TV and radio show to only last six episodes, and a season of more than 13 episodes is almost unheard of. This means that big names in British comedy, like Jimmy Carr and Peep Show’s David Mitchell, can participate in panel shows for part of the year, while continuing to work on other things.

This is particularly true of non-topical shows, which can be recorded in blocks in just a few weeks, and aired over several months. From an American perspective, one of the most amazing things about British panel shows is just how mainstream they are. HIGNFY regularly pulls in five million viewers, an impressive number in a country of 60 million. Despite, or perhaps because of their popularity, panel shows do have critics, many who charge them with being too mainstream and safe. Others accuse them of being too male-dominated, and of featuring the same comedians over and over again. There are have been attempts at making panel shows for American audiences, with little success. An American version of the music quiz show Never Mind the Buzzcocks ran for five episodes in 2002 on VH1, hosted by Marc Maron, and a US pilot of Have I Got News For You? was made in 2009. It might be that there simply isn’t the need for panel shows in the US. After all, anyone wanting topical comedy in the US has a plethora of late-night options to choose from every night. But the recent boom in comedy podcasts suggests that there may be an appetite for comedy in different formats.

The games featured on podcasts like Doug Loves Movies and Comedy Bang Bang are like panel shows — accessible, silly, and always open to funny diversions and digressions. In the US, a panel show might work well as a summer replacement, given that the shows are inexpensive, light-hearted, and endlessly repeatable. Until that time, here’s a quick primer to British panel shows: Have I Got News For You — After 21 years, Have I Got News For You has become a part of British culture. One of the most notorious moments in the show’s history came in 2002, after the show’s host, Angus Deayton, was caught in a sex and drugs scandal that ultimately forced him out. The episode following those revelations is still one of the show’s funniest, if meanest, episodes. Mock The Week — Unlike HIGNFY, which regularly features politicians and various celebrities, Mock the Week is a comedian’s den, with six comics vying every week to get in as many jokes as possible. It’s also been known to court controversy, especially after 2008 joke about the Queen by Scottish comedian Frankie Boyle caused a media furor. Here, they discuss funeral arrangements for former prime minister Margaret Thatcher.

8 Out Of 10 Cats — Channel 4 has its own topical panel show, 8 Out of 10 Cats, a show ostensibly about “opinion polls, surveys, and statistics”. That format allows the panelists to discuss pretty much anything that happens in the news and the world. Here’s a clip from last year after the Papal visit to Britain. QI — Premiering in 2003 and hosted by uber-genius and national treasure Stephen Fry, QI has become the smart, grown-up panel show that is universally loved. Instead of focusing on news and pop culture, topics on QI, which stands for Quite Interesting, read more like a liberal arts curriculum: science, art, literature, law, maths (math), and anything else that the production team finds curious. Never Mind The Buzzcocks — One of the most enduring panel shows is pop music quiz Never Mind the Buzzcocks. Alongside the comedians, it features current and past pop stars, who appear knowing they will be mercilessly mocked.

Following the departure of snarky host Simon Amstell in 2009, the show has been hosted by a series of guest presenters, and British comedy fans will recognize The Mighty Boosh’s Noel Fielding as one of the team captains. Regular rounds include the often cruel Identity Parade and Intros, where panelists sing the beginning of a song and another team member must identify the tune. Would I Lie To You? — The relatively young BBC One show Would I Lie To You? is a classic parlor game, wherein celebrities and comedians tell stories about themselves, and the other team questions them to determine if they’re telling the truth. It’s not a complicated or edgy idea, but it’s become an increasingly popular show, winning the British Comedy Award for Best Comedy Panel Show in 2010. Just a Minute — One of the classics of the format, Just a Minute premiered on BBC Radio 4 in 1967 with its current host, Nicholas Parsons. The premise is basic: speak for one minute on a certain topic without repeating any words, hesitating, or deviating from the subject.

If another panelist notices any repetition, hesitation, or deviation, he or she buzzes in for a point, then takes over the subject. It sounds simple, but it’s much harder than it seems. Here, Paul Merton and Ross Noble debate a deviation. I’m Sorry I Haven’t a Clue — Another reliable panel show on Radio 4 is I’m Sorry I Haven’t a Clue, which started in 1972 as “the antidote to panel games”. Rounds are silly, such the nonsensical tube-based game Mornington Crescent and the self-explanatory One Song to the Tune of Another. Here’s a collection of the latter by Rob Brydon, star of The Trip and Gavin and Stacey, and one of the rare panelists who can actually sing. Elise Czajkowski is a freelance journalist and comedy nerd. She gets unreasonably excited when she gets a mention on Twitter.

8 Out Of 10 Cats - More4 Panel Show - British Comedy Guide 8 Out Of 10 Cats 8 Out Of 10 Cats Like this show 8 Out Of 10 Cats Like this show Trivia 8 Out Of 10 Cats Topical Channel 4 comedy panel show hosted by Jimmy Carr. The questions are based on survey results and statistics Recent news Jimmy Carr , Rob Beckett , Aisling Bea , Sean Lock , Jon Richardson , Dave Spikey and Jason Manford Writers Barbara Wiltshire , Chris Howe and Richard Valentine Producers Derek McLean , Karen Murdoch , Ruth Wallace , Darren Smith , Ruth Phillips , Andrew Westwell , Stu Mather , Fiona McDermott , Richard Cohen , Adam Hutchinson , Lisa Kirk , Danny Carr and Alex Gilman A weekly topical panel show based around 'opinion polls, surveys and statistics'. It is hosted by Jimmy Carr , and the regular team captains are now Aisling Bea and Rob Beckett . The teams thrash out the hot topics of the week by examining surveys, opinion polls and statistics; discussing both silly and serious stuff. Subjects include showbiz gossip, world politics and even the weather.

8 Out of 10 Cats - UKGameshows 8 Out of 10 Cats Contents bbc.co.uk webcast, 5 to 6 March 2011 ( 24 Hour Panel People ) Synopsis It's not often you'll see the phrases "involves Jimmy Carr" and "actually quite entertaining" used about the same show, so the following sentence may shock and amaze you. Even though "8 Out of 10 Cats" involves Jimmy Carr, it's actually quite entertaining. Comparisons to Have I Got News for You are somewhat inevitable given that it's a comedy panel game and the first round is simply an excuse for jokes about the biggest news stories of the week. So yes, it's a bit like Have I Got News For You. The show does have some good ideas of its own, though. The whole thing is based on opinion polls and there are various different games played with them. The first round is normally "What Are You Talking About", based on a poll of what British people have been talking about over the last week.

There's a distinctly HIGNFY-esque "fill-in-the-blanks" round, an entertaining game in which six disparate personalities are ranked in order on various questions (who would you rather have perform heart surgery on you - Chewbacca or the Pope?), guess-the-poll-from-the-top-answers, and inevitably guess-the-top-answers-from-the-poll. Making a virtue of necessity, the first show after the London bombings dispensed with the "What Are You Talking About?" round, and actually worked all the better for it. The show's most obvious similarity to HIGNFY returned after a couple of weeks, though we still think that dropping the round altogether from any future series might not be a bad idea. Jimmy Carr with team captains Sean Lock and Jason Manford Jimmy Carr is remarkably bearable as a host. Until now, his main TV exposure has been on nostalgic clip shows where he has tended to be snide and hugely unfunny. (Oh yes, and Distraction , which is better not dwelt upon.) Fortunately he's much better here, where he can bounce off other people.

There were hints of this in some of Carr's other appearances, on QI and in Dictionary Corner , when for a few seconds at a time he let his aloof comedy persona slip, revealing a knowledgeable, intelligent and even likeable human being underneath. 8 Out Of 10 Cats allows his natural personality to come out a bit more, and it's a welcome development. Just the fact that he laughs at the other comedians on the show helps. Much of this laughter is prompted by Sean Lock who rapidly emerged as the real star of the show. His name has been bandied about by the cognoscenti for some years, and his disgracefully-scheduled sitcom 15 Storeys High is a classic-in-waiting. None of which guarantees a good performance on an unscripted panel game, but luckily he shines in this environment too. Dave Spikey was less to our taste, wheeling out Victoria Wood-school product naming comedy ("What is Cillit Bang?"), but he did have his moments as well. Spikey's replacement as team captain Jason Manford meanwhile, has more than filled the shoes of his predecessor.

One grating aspect is the woeful set, which doesn't really serve any purpose whatsoever other than make it extremely difficult to read the names of the round titles, being projected on huge screens along the length of the studio. The grunge guitar theme music is needlessly depressing and anonymous, and the whole thing's been edited together with a welding torch instead of an Avid. Arguably it's more comedy than quiz (though not to the extent of, say, Bognor or Bust ) but it's a pleasant enough diversion despite its faults. It's hard for any comedy panel game to avoid living in the shadow of the mighty HIGNFY, and 8 Out Of 10 Cats is probably doomed to death by a thousand comparisons. But until then, it's a welcome addition to the genre. Theme music Mat Osman Trivia Somewhat inevitably, the first advert during the break in the first show was for Whiskas (even though they don't use the famous tagline anymore). Comedian Frankie Boyle has been a guest on the show, even though he's one of the "Programme Consultants" (read: gag merchants). Surely he knew all the answers anyway!

The script editor is Charlie Skelton, actor "Charlie" from the other infamous Zeppetron show, Space Cadets . On 2 January 2012, as part of celebrations to mark Channel 4's thirtieth year of broadcasting, there was an evening of special programmes. In The Channel 4 Mash-Up, the presenters of different Channel 4 series took over each other's shows. 8 Out of 10 Cats Does Countdown saw the 8 Out of 10 Cats regulars pop up in the Countdown studio. Presenter Jimmy Carr took over hosting duties, and captains Sean Lock and Jon Richardson played against each other. This special proved popular, and the programme has since become a series in its own right. Web links

Question: Who is the host of British television panel show ‘Eight Out of Ten Cats’?
Answer: Jimmy Carr