Andy Zaltzman’s Greatest of All Time is released today by Audible.
The podcast series sees Andy Zaltzman attempt to reclaim the much-misused term ‘Greatest Of All Time’ by delving through the 13 billion years of archival material knocking around the universe.
Andy invites an expert and a comic on each episode to help him find the Greatest of All Time for each explored. From the Greatest Interior Designer with Chris Addison to Most Spectacular Failed Invention with Nish Kumar. They and Andy’s robot assistant will determine who wins the week’s Golden GOAT. Other comedians featured include Desiree Burch, Miles Jupp, Cariad Lloyd and Catherine Bohart.
The series is a positive and uplifting listen, with nostalgia sprinkled throughout and facts held lightly amongst the laughter. This is a history programme with jokes, and Andy Zaltzman’s inimitable presenting style and sketch writing tone takes the listener from the Greatest Least Deserved Statue to the Greatest Formidable Non-Violent Weapon of War with ease.
Episodes are as follows:
Episode 1: Greatest Interior Decorator
Chris Addison and historian and creator of 'Whores of Yore' Kate Lister find the greatest interior decorator of all time. From prehistoric cave painters to TV's Nick Knowles, we find the person or people or thing that has or have done most to improve the great indoors.
Episode 2: Least Deserved Statue
Nish Kumar and writer and historian Subhadra Das debate the least deserved statues of all time. From the Greek god Zeus to famously tumbled Edward Colston, the team ask which statues deserve a good toppling or at least a good should-not-have-built-in-the-first-place-ing.
Episode 3: Best Failed Invention
Catherine Bohart and inventor Tom Lawton discuss the greatest failed inventions of all time. From the first wingsuits to Google Glass, the team decides which inventions, and their respective inventors, have made the world worse with their attempts to make the world better.
Episode 4: Peak Rivalry
Desiree Birch and veteran podcaster and Andy’s own womb rival (aka sister) Helen Zaltzman uncover history’s greatest rivalries. Covering not only human rivalries, but history’s greatest conceptual conflicts, the team debate everything from Oasis vs Blur to Religion vs Science in this showdown of showdowns to select the GROAT (Greatest Rivalry of all Time).
Episode 5: Most Skilled Thief
Cariad Lloyd and journalist and heist enthusiast Marcus Webb investigate the greatest thief of all time. Not limited to mere mortals, the team discuss everything from Museums to the people who rob them, in their quest to find the lightest fingered lawbreaker of all time.
Episode 6: Ultimate Non-Violent Weapon of War
Former News Quiz host Miles Jupp, and historian and broadcaster Ella Al-Shamahi uncover the greatest non-violent weapon of war of all time. They'll consider things that are not only painless, but can be just as militarily fruity as any of the tools of devastation with which our great species has brutalised itself over the millennia. From the Internet to the Russian Winter the team attack, or rather viciously debate, the weapons that aren’t weapons from all of history.
Andy Zaltzman is also about to record a new series of the News Quiz. You can apply to be in the remote audience here.
