The Comedy Café - 28/05/2010

Always the warm up guy, never the headliner. What are the challenges of being the curtain raiser for someone else's comedy act? Comedian Arnab Chandra tours with Simon Amstell, and soon to be star of his own BBC show, rising stand-up Daniel Sloss, has primed TV sitcom audiences - they share their experiences on this week's Comedy Cafe. From comedy curtain raisers to the audience themselves - how much input does the audience have to the recording of a comedy TV show? And what happens when they steal the scene? New act on the comedy scene Stuart Mitchell shares the moment he got a standing ovation from the celebrity panel during the recording of Frank Skinner's Opinionated. John Cleese is going on tour to fund his alimony fees - but what are the best motivations to continue touring? And should there be a 'sell by' date, even for legends like Cleese? We put it to massive Cleese fan and comedian Jojo Sutherland. And we continue to delve into BBC Radio Scotland's rich archive for our series from the online Comedy Zone. Focusing on stand-ups, this week we hark back to the Fringe Festival 2008 with the lovely Alex Horne. All that plus our Joke of the Week and our comedy DVD recommendations no home collection would be complete without.