Comedy star Ben Miller weighs in on UK Saturday Night Live

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The Death in Paradise star fancies a return to sketch comedy. Report by Nelsonj. Like us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/itn and follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/itn

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00:00Do you ever look back on that and kind of long for the days of Death in Paradise,

00:03seeing what kind of a national treasure of a show it became and how the longevity it's had?

00:09Well, the Paraverse that it's created. Have you heard? That's what they call it.

00:12The Paraverse, yeah. So there's Death in Paradise and then there's Return to Paradise

00:18and then there's going to be a Death in Paradise set in Australia as well.

00:22Oh, wow.

00:23Yeah, so it's competing with Marvel, I think, really.

00:26I'd like to see another spin-off with you, maybe as a ghost, coming back.

00:33Solving Ghost Crimes. I think people would watch it. I'd watch it.

00:35Is that too much of a jump?

00:37I don't think it's too much of a jump. I mean, there's been quite a few jumps in that show.

00:40I think people will accept it by now.

00:42There have been enough.

00:43What I would also like to say, I know you're both very busy men,

00:46but I would like to see more Armstrong and Miller at some point

00:49because I absolutely adored those shows.

00:53Well, I'm very excited.

00:53I mean, there does seem to be a little bit of a return to sketch comedy.

00:57I don't know if you've heard, but there's going to be a Saturday Live.

01:00There's going to be a sketch show.

01:01I have heard. I've heard of that.

01:03I mean, obviously, the great lineage of kind of, there was the, what was it,

01:07Friday Night Live in the kind of the 80s.

01:09I brought like the Ben Elton's and stuff through.

01:11And there's the question of would it work in the UK.

01:13From your learned hands, do you think we have the right thing here?

01:19Yeah, I do. I do.

01:19I think by starting the show, you create, I mean,

01:23that then starts to create all the, you know, the acts and the writers to sort of feed it.

01:29We did do a kind of version of Saturday Live in the 90s.

01:35And we are, you know, Alexandra Armstrong and I were on it.

01:40As were, you know, Harry Hill and Al Murray.

01:42And it was brilliant, brilliant fun.

01:43And I loved it.

01:44So the idea that there might be something like that again, I think is fantastic.

01:47It is interesting that, like, we talk about these other shows

01:50and because they didn't have the longevity of, like, Saturday Night Live,

01:52you're like, oh, you almost think of them as things that didn't work.

01:55But you talk about the people like yourselves who came from it

01:57and the Brian Lurie, Harry Enfields and all these people.

02:01You're like, these are iconic names of comedy.

02:04And that's the thing.

02:05It is like a kind of, it is a sort of breeding ground

02:08for character comedians and sketch comedies.

02:10So I think it's a really, really exciting thing.

02:13I also did hear a showbiz rumour that Mitchell and Webb might be getting back together.

02:19For an actual...

02:20I heard that as a rumour.

02:21I don't know if that's true or not.

02:24But I heard that as a rumour.

02:25I don't know about other audience members,

02:26but for me, Mitchell and Webb and Armstrong and Miller,

02:29your shows kind of go hand in hand.

02:31Like, those, I would watch those shows kind of back to back.

02:34Before Comic Relief, we once did a, we once did a show called,

02:37I think it was called Mitchell and Webb and Armstrong and Miller.

02:40Perfect.

02:41So you never know.

02:42You know, that might be our way in.

02:44But yeah.

02:45Well, thank you.

02:45And tell me through what else you've been kind of getting into this year.

02:48So on ITV, a show on ITV called Professor T,

02:51which we're very, very excited about.

02:52The fourth season is coming out very soon.

02:56And I also have a show on right now called Austin,

03:00which is a comedy show.

03:02It's the first time I've done comedy, well, since Armstrong and Miller.

03:05Wow.

03:05And it's a really, really amazing show.

03:11So for the reason that the main character is autistic and played by Michael Theo,

03:17who is himself autistic.

03:18And he's an absolute brilliant comedy actor.

03:22So, yeah.

03:22And he's from, is he from like Australia?

03:24Love on the Spectrum.

03:25Yeah, it's Australian.

03:26It's from Love on the Spectrum.

03:26We've shot the show in Australia and it's on iPlayer now.

03:30And yeah, it's, have a look because I think it's great.

03:34I'll check that out.

03:35And was there anything else that you've been watching this year?

03:37Anything you're excited to kind of see the people from today?

03:39Oh my goodness.

03:39Very excited about Baby Reindeer.

03:41Oh, of course.

03:42Very excited about Billy Piper.

03:43I think Gavin and Stacey, I really, really, really hope Ruth Jones wins Best Comedy Actress.

03:50And I mean, there's so many brilliant, brilliant shows.

03:54Wild Horses and other really, slow horses.

03:56Slow horses, yeah.

03:56Another really wild horses.

03:58Wild horses.

03:58The Rolling Stones.

03:59It's one of my favourites sometimes.

04:00No, I think, yeah, I really hope that, yeah, there's so many really great shows.

04:08Well, I'll be crossing my fingers for more Armstrong and Miller.

04:11I'll be crossing my fingers for another Johnny English down the line at some point.

04:14It's always time to make one of them.

04:15Yes, yes, yes, please.

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