Showing results by narrator "Marcus Brigstocke" in All Categories

Meet the hapless management consultants of Unthinkable Solutions - idealistic team leader Ryan, sociopathic Sophie and hippy-dippy Daisy. Enthusiastic and enterprising, they’re strong on jargon (and always ready to ‘imaginate, reincentivise and skin the leopard’), but short on practical ideas - unfortunately for the unsuspecting corporations that come to them for help. 

Welcome to the all-encompassing Museum of Everything – feel free to take a wander round our infinite gallery of strange exhibits, stranger exhibitors, disgruntled guides and obsessed visitors. The items on display range from the Elgin Tiddlywinks to the birds and the bees, and you can learn about the history of wicker and the origins of scampi, enjoy a display featuring the worst-selling author of Victorian times, get inducted into the Mock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame and discover the real identity of Jack the Ripper.

Marcus Brigstocke persuades his reluctant guests to try new experiences: things that they've perhaps always meant to try but haven't had the time, the courage or possibly the inclination. Enjoy hearing some famous names embrace new challenges, such as Phill Jupitus drinking absinthe, Mark Steel constructing flat-pack furniture, Esther Rantzen finally joining Facebook, Kelly Holmes trying her first deep-fried Mars bar, Giles Coren having a go at being vegan, and Frank Skinner getting a spray tan.

In the first series, Armando Iannucci and his guests pull apart the news with a heady mix of topical comedy, messed-about archive, chat and outrageous fibs, recorded in front of a live studio audience. Across the complete six episodes, they start a new religion and update some Cockney rhyming slang, and as the strike by BBC workers starts to bite and the army steps in, we hear a debate on breastfeeding from 'Woman's Hour' hosted by Gunner-Sergeant Harry Donaldson of the 5th Norfolk Fusiliers.

Giles has been grounded! Budleigh Salterton’s most famous citizen has been forced to stay at home by the Home Office - and his father. But something minor like that won’t dent Giles’s enthusiasm, so in this fourth series, he sets up GWH Travvel ("two ‘m’s, two ‘g’s, two ‘v’s - bit of a mix up at the printers"). Run from his bedroom, GWH Travvel is a one-stop Travel/Advice/Events Management/Website service, which always stays true to its motto: "We go there so you won’t want to".

He’s back! Budleigh Salterton’s most famous citizen is off round the world on another five adventures. Meet Giles Wemmbley Hogg. 2m’s, 2g’s. Traveller, backpacker, ethnologist, fearless investigator of cultural diversity, and upper middle-class student ponce from Budleigh Salterton. And this time, Giles has graduated from University, with a first! He’s actually the first person ever to have finished a course in Canadian Studies, and now he’s on the job market and looking for anyone who’ll have him.

Michael and Maxine Wilson and their teenage daughters, Lola and Cat (plus their bearded dragon, Chomsky, and about 150,000 bees), have resolved to live a cleaner, greener, serener life. They are attempting to live ethically...whatever that means. The Wilsons conscientiously tackle tricky situations and dilemmas, from balancing the need of hot sun on holiday to a carbon-neutral campsite, explaining the pitfalls of online relationships to their daughter by drawing parallels to Brexit or protesting library closures when, according to Cat, everything can be found online anyway. 

As broadcast on BBC Radio 4, Giles Wemmbley Hogg is a traveller, ethnologist, connoisseur of all Eastern culture and philosophy, and an upper middle class student ponce! In his gap year, he is backpacking along the student trail to the exotic East, soaking up the culture and recording his experiences on a DAT machine.

Uh-oh - Marcus Brigstocke has been put in charge of a thing! In each episode, Marcus finds he's volunteered to be in charge of a big old thing - a hospital, the railways, British fashion, a prison. And in each episode he starts out by thinking "Well, it can't be that difficult, surely?" and ends up with "Oh - turns out it's utterly difficult and complicated. Who knew...?"

This first series of the BBC Radio 4 comedy won a Silver Award at the Sony Radio Academy Awards, and stars Marcus Brigstocke as team leader Ryan ('Imagine you are square pegs and we are round holes. Try to think of me as a round hole'), Emma Kennedy as the sociopathic Sophie, Catherine Shepherd as dopey Daisy, and David Mitchell as Owen: 'Alright, losers!' It's time to think the unthinkable as Longleys Bank needs to transform its image. So what can the team of consultants bring to the table?

In the complete second hit series from the people who brought you Cabin Pressure and Giles Wemmbley Hogg Goes Off, stand-up comedian Marcus Brigstocke has been put in charge of a thing! Each week, Marcus finds he’s volunteered to be in charge of a big old thing - the European Union, Social Media, the banking system, the farming industry - and each week he starts out by thinking “Well, it can’t be that difficult, surely?” and ends up with "Oh - turns out it’s utterly difficult and complicated. Who knew...?".

‘There's probably no God ... but I wish there was. I've got some things I need to ask him.' Based on Marcus Brigstocke's award-winning Edinburgh and West End show, God Collar focuses on the ‘God-shaped hole’ that opens up in Marcus’s life following the death of his best friend.

Four of the funniest 2018 episodes from the much-loved BBC Radio 4 panel game chaired by Nicholas Parsons. Among the talented and humorous players in this sparkling quartet are Paul Merton, Gyles Brandreth, Jo Caulfield, Julian Clary, Stephen Fry, Jan Ravens, Rebecca Front, Marcus Brigstocke, Sheila Hancock, Fern Britton and Graham Norton. 

He's back, and this time he's muddy. You can follow the exploits the guru of Budleigh Salterton as he enjoys the sights, the smells, and the sheer footling misery of Glastonbury 2007. With his ever-unhelpful fiancée Bella, played by Catherine Tate, and a ragtag assortment of hippies and hummous, Giles shows you that all you need for the perfect festival is 4000 Cornish pasties, Shirley Bassey, and a hat in the shape of a muppet. That's Giles Wemmbley Hogg Goes Off...To Glastonbury.

In the complete third series of the multiaward-winning show, from the makers of Cabin Pressure and Armando Iannucci’s Charm Offensive, Marcus Brigstocke examines different facets of life by being put in charge of them. Each week he starts out by thinking, Well, it can’t be that difficult, surely and ends up with, Oh, turns out it’s utterly difficult and complicated. Who knew...?

Comedian Marcus Brigstocke presents a two-part special focussing on the great British press. In the first episode, he plunges headfirst into the contents of the great British newspaper and comes up smelling of Daily Mail. Plus he reveals the headline of the year that you'll never get to read.... In the second episode, there's sex, scandal and saucy secrets on offer as Marcus examines how the great British press combine the difficult jobs of both selling newspapers and ruining peoples' lives.

Chain Reaction is the entertaining BBC Radio 4 tag talk show where this week's guest is next week's interviewer. Famous names from the world of show business choose who they would like to chat to, and must submit to being questioned in their turn the week after. In this eighth series, guests (and hosts) include Catherine Tate, David Tennant, Richard Wilson, Arabella Weir and Paul Whitehouse.

He's back! Budleigh Salterton's most famous citizen, traveller and worldly guru knows nothing about football or Germany, but from the moment he decides to book a strolling holiday in the Schwarzwald ("because it'll be nice and quiet this time of year"), he pitches headlong into the thrilling arena of the World Cup. He may never have played football, but, he was Sports Monitor at school, (or as he puts it, "I was the only one allowed to touch the Master's ballbag at Charterhouse").

Chain Reaction’ is the entertaining BBC Radio 4 tag talk show where this week's guest is next week's interviewer. Famous names from the world of showbusiness choose who they would like to chat to, and must submit to being questioned in their turn the week after. In this seventh series, guests (and hosts) include Marcus Brigstocke, Clive Anderson, John Lloyd, Phill Jupitus, John Hegley, Jack Dee and Jeremy Hardy.

In this second series, Marcus Brigstocke invites his guests to try things they've never done before. Whether the experiences are banal or profound, the show is all about getting out of our comfort zones and embracing the new. Brigstocke's guests in I've Never Seen Star Wars: Series 2 are Barry Cryer, Arthur Smith, Dame Joan Bakewell, Jan Ravens, Suggs, and Sandi Toksvig.