News about Rik Mayall

Modern mums and dads, bored youngsters in a rural village or unlikely flatmates in their twenties, there are plenty of quirky characters to get to know in classic TV sitcoms. So our critics have selected some of the best of them to watch On Demand right now - sifting through hundreds of options to save you the bother. Can't decide what to watch tonight? Read on to find out which sitcoms will keep you laughing...

CHRISTOPHER STEVENS: Full marks for honesty. 'It was a long time ago - 30 years,' said actress Lisa Coleman, with a smile and a shrug. 'I can't really remember.' Lisa, best-known for the long-running Tracy Beaker series in the Noughties, played Doreen Hedgehog in a single episode of the cult BBC2 sitcom Bottom. Her only recollection of the show, on the retrospective Bottom: Exposed, was that the gags all involved explosive flatulence. Anyone who ever caught five minutes of the sitcom, written by its stars Rik Mayall and Ade Edmondson, could have guessed that. Running out of things to say, Lisa admitted, 'I'm just making this up for biscuits and a travelcard.' If only every contributor to these combinations of hindsight and rose-tinted reminiscence were so frank.

Adrian Edmondson met Rik Mayall during their first year of studying drama at Manchester University. They hit it off instantly and formed a double act, performing their own material every week. When anarchic sitcom Bottom exploded onto our TV screens just over 30 years ago in 1991 starring both of them, it was to a mixed reaction. Critics branded its chaotic characters, unemployed flatmates Richard Richard and Edward Elizabeth Hitler (Rik and Adrian), 'childish' and 'puerile' but viewers loved it, with six million per episode tuning in. That criticism was one of the reasons Adrian was initially reluctant to take part in the retrospective TV tribute Bottom: Exposed.

In the 'tempestuous and anarchic' 90s comedy Bottom, a new documentary will explore why Adrian Edmondson and Rik Mayall's friendship became a hit among audiences. Adrian and Rik, two hapless and disgusting flatmates in the slapstick comedy that lasted from 1991 to 1995, were Adrian and Rik, who attended Manchester University. Adrian, 67, will revisit the show in Gold's Bottom: Exposed, which features footage that has never been broadcast, reports from filming, and an examination of the two lead actors' friendship.

Nigel Planer of the Young One has returned to Bristol, 41-years after the show's legendary BBC sitcom fist fist aired. For the first time since filming stopped, the actor, 70, who starred hapless hippy Neil Pye in the series from 1982-1984, paid a visit to the museum. The show was staged in North London and followed four students, as well as Rik Mayall, Adrian Edmondson, and Christopher Ryan, but the exterior shots were taken in Bristol.

GRIFF RHYS JONES: I've just passed the national speed limit. The biblical allocation. The latest two scores and ten are the same, although you may gibber that three scores are incorrect and ten are the same. These are 'the best years,' you could tell me. That at least I'm not 80, that I can wear purple and yell at the traffic, that I can become a regular contributor to the Oldie magazine, and that it's little more than being able to outlive Rik Mayall, Mel Smith, and Robbie Coltrane. However, I can't be positive about being 70. I hadn't planned for this. Despite a portly appearance, thin white hair, and age spots, my father told me that the bloke inside him was still essentially a student. The one was 20 years old at the time.

The actor has confirmed that he no longer needs glasses, which he has worn since he was eight years old, and he claims he'caught up with and cancelled out' the long-sightedness that can occur later in life, which he claims is coming 'at the opposite direction.' When appearing to an audience at The Bath Forum earlier this month, Edmondson, star of television shows including The Young Ones, Bottom, and The Comic Strip films, made the admission.

Adrian Edmondson has outlined how fame, alcohol, and a quad bike accident all contributed to his departure from his longtime comedy partner Rik Mayall. The 66-year-old actor and comedian rose to fame thanks to his appearance on television's The Young Ones in the 1980s and 1990s. Mayall, a university acquaintance, appeared on television's The Young Ones in the 1980s and 1990s. However, Edmondson decided after the pair's last stage tour in 2003 that he did not want to move on, despite the fact that Mayall never understood his decision to leave. Following a big quad bike accident in 1998 that left him in a coma for several days, Mayall suffered from memory loss, which Edmondson said meant he would have to explain his decision to end the relationship each time they met up for lunch. Edmondson also described how Mayall'fell in love with fame and was "not very good at drinking" in the 1990s, becoming 'belligerent, morose, and then unconscious.' The two acts did get together in 2012 to write a TV version of their 1997 Hooligan's Island tour for the BBC, but Edmondson pulled out due to a disagreement over jokes in the script. Mayall died of a heart attack in 2014 at the age of 56.

ADRIAN EDMONDSON: She's incredibly ill. Perhaps she's pouring some of her rage toward Dad onto me. If so, she's furious with him, and it appears that she intends to kill him. I'm getting woozy right now. Is she shouting?Is everyone shouting? I can't tell you. Well, maybe. My hands have developed a ligature around my neck, and my ears are brimming with blood. I can only hear my own heart thumping.

ADRIAN EDMONDSON: On my first day of university, I'm puffing on a fag on the roof deck of a bus in Manchester, when I see a young bloke standing in front of me. He's wearing a dreadful denim jacket, has greasy shoulder-length hair, and is constantly lifting his head to get this hair out of his eyes. He grabs a cigarette from a packet of No.6 and ostensibly taps both ends against the box; it's something you only need to do with the unfiltered end to prevent loose tobacco from falling out. This is how I know this bloke is an idiot. He lights it, inhales deeply, and blows six perfect smoke rings - thick circles of rippling, tightly arranged smoke, which are all perfectly equidistant from one another. This doesn't endear him to me, either because I haven't been able to do it, so I'm jealous. He and I are getting off the same stop as me. We both make our way to the drama department, where I learn that Rik Mayall's name is on the same track as his undergraduate days, top right in Young Ones, and bottom right in their comedy 'Bottom').

Lorna Rose Treen as a schoolgirl would be able to watch Anarchic BBC comedy The Young Ones (lower inset) with her father as a reward. And although Rik Mayall and Ade Edmondson may have been unlikely heroes for some, the eight-year-old girl they inspired would spark something remarkable two decades later. Lorna (right), 28, is the recipient of Edinburgh Fringe's most coveted best joke award (left) - and her sell-out show Skin Pigeon has received accolades around the globe.

For Channel 4's one-off anniversary special appearance of the show that made him popular, Friday Night Live, the producer of UK classics Blackadder and Upstart Crow has just received a BAFTA. Ben Elron is about to do something new and exciting, appearing and singing in a brand new production of We Will Rock You, the musical he wrote with members of the band Queen. It's a project that's very close to his heart, dating back to when he was a schoolboy, feeling hungry and alone, but it's finding solace in the songs of his favorite band.

The convicted double murderer made it seem that Leah Ware, his victim, was still alive by obtaining her prescription drugs (main) and using her bank card. A jury convicted him of killing two mothers, the first Ms Ware and Alexandra Morgan just six months later. After meeting the Browns at a remote farm near St Leonards in East Sussex through a sex work website, they set their bodies in an oil drum.