Cult classic Blackadder has been voted the favourite British comedy of BBC Entertainment viewers across Europe and the Middle East.

A Christmas Comedy Countdown poll was held between 3rd November and 9th December 2012 to determine the top ten from a choice of 30 shows, with viewers casting more than 1,000 votes. In the end, there was less than 3.9 per cent between the top three programmes, but Blackadder - co-written by Richard Curtis and starring Rowan Atkinson, who played one of the Doctors in the 1999 Comic Relief spoof The Curse of Fatal Death, written by Steven Moffat - came out on top, with 12.2 per cent of the vote.

Tony Robinson, who played Baldrick in the show, said: The top ten as voted for by viewers were:

• 1: Blackadder (with Rowan Atkinson and Tim McInnerney)
• 2: My Family (with Zoë Wanamaker)
• 3: Fawlty Towers (with John Cleese)
• 4: Keeping Up Appearances (with Clive Swift, Geoffrey Hughes, and David Griffin)
• 5: 'Allo 'Allo (with Guy Siner, Hilary Minster, and Carmen Silvera)
• 6: Little Britain (with David Walliams and Anthony Head, and narrated by Tom Baker)
• 7: Gavin & Stacey (with James Corden, Ruth Jones, Adrian Scarborough, Russell Tovey, Margaret John, and Sheridan Smith, who played the Eighth Doctor's companion Lucie Miller in the Big Finish audio dramas)
• 8: As Time Goes By (with Geoffrey Palmer and Joan Sims)
• 9: One Foot In The Grave (with Richard Wilson and Annette Crosbie)
• 10: 2point4 children

The other 20 shows in the poll were: After You've Gone, Beautiful People, Big Top, The Cup, Dad's Army, dinnerladies, Getting On, Him & Her, Ideal, Jam & Jerusalem, Last Of The Summer Wine, Lead Balloon, The Old Guys, Rev, Roger And Val Have Just Got In, The Royle Family, Supernova, Taking The Flak, Twenty Twelve, and Two Pints Of Lager And A Packet Of Crisps.

Blackadder ran for four series between 1983 and 1989. There were also three specials, one of which - Blackadder's Christmas Carol - featured Nicola Bryant and Denis Lill as well as another Curse of Fatal Death Doctor, Jim Broadbent, among the cast.

The life and career of comedian Dave Allen is to be celebrated by a documentary for BBC Two.

The one-hour programme, entitled Dave Allen Night, will feature rare and often previously-unseen archive footage plus interviews with family, friends, and colleagues.

Together with Allen's family, other interviewees include Dame Maggie Smith, Stephen Frears, and Steven Berkoff. It will also feature archive interviews with Bill Cotton - the former head of light entertainment at BBC TV who went on to become the controller of BBC1 - conducted shortly before the television executive's death in 2008.

In addition, the cast and crew of the triple-BAFTA-winning Dave Allen At Large - the comic's best-known, long-running BBC show - unite to talk about their memories of working with Allen, who often courted controversy with his views on politics and religion.

The documentary - whose broadcast date is yet to be confirmed - is a Vera production and has been executive-produced by Geoff Atkinson. It was commissioned by BBC Two controller Janice Hadlow and entertainment commissioning executives Gilly Hall and Mark Linsey. Hall said: Allen - who won the Variety Club's ITV Personality of the Year Award for his comedy/chat series Tonight With Dave Allen - died in March 2005 at the age of 68.

A video showing a scene from the BBC One series Sherlock in five languages has been made to promote the show at a global market.

ACC Liverpool is currently playing host to some 700 TV buyers from around the world at the BBC Worldwide Showcase.

The video shows a clip from the first episode of Series 1 - A Study In Pink, first broadcast on 25th July 2010 - and starts in English then flows seamlessly into Italian then Russian, Spanish, and French before finishing back in English again.

It also highlights the fact that the show has won more than 26 international awards, been sold to more than 180 territories, been the highest-rating drama on France 4 for more than a year, and been the highest-rating programme for TNT in Germany since 2007.

Filming on Series 3 of Sherlock is due to start next month.

The upcoming episode of Death In Paradise sees a mini-Primeval reunion when Hannah Spearritt and James Murray appear in the BBC One crime drama series starring Ben Miller.

Poole is played by Miller, Anderson by Neil Pearson, Teague by Ralf Little, Stuart by James Murray, and Palmer by Matilda Ziegler, while Spearritt plays Lily Shaw and Kim Thomson is June Anderson.

The episode - the sixth of the current eight-part series - airs on Tuesday 12th February at 9pm. Written by Colin Bytheway, it is directed by Alrick Riley.

Murray played the ultimately-doomed Stephen Hart in the first two series of Primeval, while Spearritt and Miller were, respectively, Abby Maitland and James Lester throughout all five series.

Meanwhile, Sean Pertwee will be one of the guest stars in the concluding episode of the current series of Death In Paradise. He will play charity fund-raiser - and murder victim - Malcolm Powell in the story, which is scheduled to go out on Tuesday 26th February at 9pm.

The BBC lost the TV revival of political sitcom Yes, Prime Minister to digital channel Gold because it demanded a pilot episode, it has been revealed.

Both Yes, Prime Minister and its antecedent, Yes, Minister, were originally BBC series, and BBC In-House Comedy has made the six new episodes, based on the stage play. However, co-writer Jonathan Lynn has told Chortle that when he and Antony Jay were looking to bring the show back to TV screens, following an approach by Gold, the duo decided to give first refusal to the BBC "as a courtesy" but the corporation told them to write a pilot first.

Lynn said that they pointed out to the BBC: In response, a BBC spokesman said: Yes, Minister ran for three series of seven episodes each from 1980 to 1982, winning BAFTAS for Best Comedy Series in 1980, 1981, and 1982. An hour-long Christmas special called Party Games in 1984 paved the way for Yes, Prime Minister, which comprised two series of eight episodes each, airing between 1986 and 1988. Nigel Hawthorne won the Best Light Entertainment Performance BAFTA four times - in 1981, 1982, 1986, and 1987 - for his portrayal of Sir Humphrey Appleby.

The new series of Yes, Prime Minister - starring David Haig as the premier Jim Hacker, Henry Goodman as Permanent Secretary Sir Humphrey Appleby, and Chris Larkin as Principal Private Secretary Bernard Woolley - starts on Gold on Tuesday 15th January at 9pm. It co-stars Zoe Telford as political adviser Claire Sutton, and will guest-star Robbie Coltrane.

The first episode - called Crisis At The Summit - will be followed at 9.40pm by the documentary Yes, Prime Minister: Re-Elected, which will celebrate the phenomenon of the show and reveal how influential it was in its 1980s heyday.

A bumper crop of pictures was released by the BBC today for the final adventure in the current series of Wizards vs Aliens.

Written by Phil Ford and directed by Joss Agnew, The Last Day guest-stars Jennifer Hennessy as Helen.



Part one will air on Monday 3rd December, with the second and concluding part going out on Tuesday 4th December, both at 5.15pm, bringing to an end the 12-part first series.

A second series comprising 14 episodes has been confirmed for next year. It will reportedly include an adaptation of a story originally to have been in Series 5 of The Sarah Jane Adventures. The adventure, called The Thirteenth Floor, written by Phil Ford, ultimately was not made for The Sarah Jane Adventures as the show ended following the death of Elisabeth Sladen.