David Jason stars with John Bird, Rory Bremner and Jan Ravens in David Renwick's dark sketch comedy that takes a post-apocalyptic and distinctly counter-factual look at the history of laughter....

JP Doom interviews Viktor Schmelling about his career in comedy from his humble beginnings as a joke writer for the Queen through to his current role as Emeritus Professor of Princeton University's Faculty of Laughter. His message - life is horrible - you better learn to see the funny side.

Among the classic comedy sketches Schmelling singles out for posterity are the atheist episode of Sunday Worship; an old lag and his pet orang-utan; and 1950's cult The Demob Mob's remarkable episode on Hitler, liquorish allsorts and the awesome power of the non-sequitur.

With:

David Jason
John Bird
Jan Ravens
Rory Bremner
Christopher Timothy
Adie Allen
James Lailey
Nick Underwood

Producer: Gareth Edwards

A BBC Studios production for BBC Radio 4 first broadcast in December 2016. Show less