Starting on 29th November, comedy fans will be able to enjoy a new addition to Radio 4’s Friday Night Comedy lineup: The Naked Week, presented by podcast host and satirist Andrew Hunter Murray and co-written and produced by The Skewer’s Jon Holmes.
The Naked Week is a fresh way of dressing the week’s news in the altogether and parading it around for everyone to laugh at. Host Andrew Hunter Murray (No Such Thing As A Fish) and Chief Correspondent Amy Hoggart (Almost Royal, Full Frontal With Amy Hoggart) will strip away the curtain and slide into not only the big stories, but also across the way in which news is packaged and presented. Recorded in front of a live audience, imagine if Private Eye, TV Burp, and Popbitch had a lovely, if slightly demonic, baby. From multi-award-winning writers and a crack team of contemporary satirists, The Naked Week delivers a weekly (consensual) news nude straight to your ears.
Following its successful pilot last year, the first full series of The Naked Week will be broadcast in Radio 4’s popular Friday Night Comedy slot, along with Dead Ringers and The News Quiz. Each episode of The Naked Week will be available exclusively on BBC Sounds for 7 days after broadcast and then available wherever you get your podcasts. Friday Night Comedy is hugely popular on BBC Sounds, regularly appearing in the top ten on-demand programmes. Other recent additions to the Friday Night Comedy stable include TL;DR with Catherine Bohart, which will return for a second series next summer.
Julia McKenzie, Comedy and Entertainment Commissioner, BBC Radio 4 says, “Friday Night Comedy is an integral part of the Radio 4 comedy offering and I know it’s a highlight of many listeners’ weeks – so I’m thrilled that another brilliant topical comedy is joining the lineup. Andrew, Jon and the team have got a unique take on dissecting the news and listeners have a lot to look forward to.”
Andrew Hunter Murray, presenter of The Naked Week, says, “The news has been mad for some years now and it's a privilege to be given time on Radio 4 to attempt to work out what is going on, who’s responsible, and whether there is possibly any compensation money in it for us all. Consider this show a support group, albeit one that offers stupid jokes instead of therapy.”
Jon Holmes, co-writer and producer of The Naked Week, says, "The news has had its own way for far too long, so it’s about time someone came in and showed it who’s boss. We’ll be prodding around its inner workings with a mix of forensically dissected footage, rigorous journalism, and a healthy disrespect for authority. Oh, and jokes. There will be lots of jokes.”
