Stephen Fry and Lee Evans to appear on first Jonathan Ross show since Manuelgate
Thursday, January 8th, 2009
Comedians Stephen Fry and Lee Evans will be the first guests to appear on Friday Night with Jonathan Ross when it resumes later this month, marking the end of the presenter’s three month suspension from the BBC over obscene messages left on the voicemail of former Fawlty Towers actor Andrew Sachs.
Fry is one of the show’s most frequent guests, having appeared on the chat show five times since it started in 2001. He and Evans will be joined by Scottish band Franz Ferdinand who will be performing their new single ‘Ulysses’. One further guest, yet to be confirmed, will be added to the line up before the show is broadcast.
The show will return to its regular 10.40pm slot on BBC1 on 23rd January. Ross is expected to open with an irreverent monologue poking fun at his enforced suspension. The basic format will remain the same; however, Ross’s return comes with stringent conditions, including cutting back on lewd jokes, sexual references and swearing. The show will also be pre-recorded so that any potentially offensive comments can be scrubbed out before its broadcast.
Previous to the Manuelgate scandal, the show attracted a modest 4 million viewers per episode, but the BBC is expecting the re-launch to bring with it a massive boost in ratings.
Ross’s Saturday morning show will also return to Radio 2 on 24th after three months off air, whilst his other regular show, Film 2009, will return to BBC1 two days later.
The controversial radio broadcast in which Ross and Russell Brand left messages on Sachs’s answerphone prompted over 40,000 complaints, and led to the resignation of Brand, as well as BBC Radio 2 head Lesley Douglas and head of compliance Dave Barber.
January 9th, 2009 at 4:07 pm
“Ross’s return comes with stringent conditions, including cutting back on lewd jokes, sexual references and swearing…”
Christ, there’ll be nothing left after the edits!