Category: Radio 4
Date: 25.06.2006
Printable version
Harry Shearer, star
of Spinal Tap and the voice of Mr Burns in hit television comedy The Simpsons,
makes his ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ debut in Not
Today Thank You, a new comedy series on ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½
Radio 4 starting
on Tuesday 22 August at 6.30pm.
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Veteran phone-in presenter Brian Hayes plays Brian Hughes, a preening, washed-up radio presenter.
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Hughes falls on hard times and is forced to share his
grandmother's house with six self-centred tenants whilst trying to
present a radio show from a studio in his basement.
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Harry Shearer plays Nostrils, one of Hughes' preposterous tenants who convinces himself that he's so ugly he cannot bear to be seen by anyone - not even himself.
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Harry says: "Having grown up listening to the Goons,
Hancock and many of the seminal Radio 4 comedy projects in the years
since, I'm honoured to be doing a ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ comedy. I hope it means I get
to be Steve Coogan when I grow up!"
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Andrew McGibbon, writer, producer and ex-Morrissey drummer, who created and wrote Not Today Thank You, signed Harry to the cast after meeting him earlier this year.
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After Andrew summoned up the courage to send Harry
some scripts, he says: "I couldn't believe it when he agreed to
take part!"
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Brian Hayes also makes his comedy debut in the new series that is part sitcom
and part sketch show.
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Brian says: "Apparently somebody thinks I can be amusing,
so I find myself in a comedy show. Luckily multi-talented Hollywood veteran
Harry Shearer is in it too. That should do it."
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Caroline Raphael, Commissioning Editor for Radio 4 Comedy, says: "It
is a big thrill to have Harry Shearer, one of America's cleverest and wittiest
comedy actors, working alongside one of the UK's top speech broadcasters making
his comedy debut on Radio 4. It should be a heady mix."
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The cast also includes Sheridan Smith, star of ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½
THREE's Two
Pints of Lager & a Packet of Crisps and Grown
Ups, and Mark Perry of ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½
TWO's Dead Ringers.
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Not Today Thank You will be recording in front of live audiences at the Drill
Hall in London from mid-July.
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