Taskmaster

Revision as of 21:00, 20 May 2021

Host

Greg Davies

Co-hosts

Umpire: Alex Horne

Broadcast

Avalon Television for Dave, 28 July 2015 to 6 November 2019 (72 episodes in 9 series + 2 specials)

Avalon Television for Channel 4, 15 October 2020 to present

Synopsis

Comedians are given very strange things to do.

Alex Horne's mind is a strange place. All of the usual elements are there, but they're all mixed up. He makes hot toothpaste pies. He plays golf with hen's eggs. He draws horses while riding horses.

But a problem shared is a problem halved, so Horne has invited some comedy friends to perform these surreal dreams. Greg Davies hosts the programme, ranks the performances, and the best player over the programme (and over the series) is the winner.

The players from Series 1: Ranganathan, Skinner, Conaty, Widdicombe, Key (seated) Davies and Horne

Taskmaster is theatre of the absurd, sensible people doing insensible things. The atmosphere was heightened by the filming location - almost all the tasks took place in a hired cottage, decorated as a shrine to the Taskmaster. There was no narration over the films, just the natural sound of the players talking.

Fans of bizarre television flocked to this show, and it gained audience as the first series went on, and as each subsequent series aired. Taskmaster turned into a massive hit for Dave, their first since Argumental about five years earlier. After five years, during which the format was honed to perfection, UKTV's contract expired and the show went up for new bids. Channel 4 bought the rights; we'll have to see what Taskmaster is like on its new home.

Key moments

The blatant I'm-only-doing-this-because-the-recommission-of-my-show-depends-on-it apathy of Dave Gorman's performance.

Any episode where a participant is subjected to extra punishment, such as Josh Widdicombe being asked to count the numbers of beans, spaghetti hoops and grains of rice in their respective containers or Rob Beckett being asked to spend a task talking in an accent other than his own or Mike Wozniak bursting a haemorrhoid trying to fart.

Nish Kumar getting fed up with one of the live tasks and throwing a coconut at the Taskmaster's head and promptly being disqualified. Mind you, the highlight of that series was Bob Mortimer, Aisling Bea and Sally Phillips' less than affectionate tribute to an unwitting victim called Rosalind…

Rhod Gilbert using his prize tasks to embarrass Davies, especially when he gets Greg's mother involved.

The barely concealed look of glee on Horne's face after successfully predicting that someone, namely Ed Gamble, would answer the task 'Say a letter of the alphabet' with 'a letter of the alphabet'.

Catchphrases

"All the information's on the task."

Champions

2015	Josh Widdicombe
Summer 2016	Katherine Ryan
Autumn 2016	Rob Beckett
Spring 2017	Noel Fielding
Autumn 2017	Bob Mortimer
Spring 2018	Liza Tarbuck
Autumn 2018	Kerry Godliman
Spring 2019	Lou Sanders
Autumn 2019	Ed Gamble
2020	Richard Herring
Spring 2021	Sarah Kendall

Champion of Champions

2017	Josh Widdicombe

Participants

2015

2016 (Summer series)

2016 (Autumn series)

2017 (Spring series)

2017 (Autumn series)

Aisling Bea
Bob Mortimer
Mark Watson
Nish Kumar
Sally Phillips

Champion of Champions

Josh Widdicombe
Katherine Ryan
Rob Beckett
Noel Fielding
Bob Mortimer

2018 (Spring series)

Alice Levine
Asim Chaudhry
Liza Tarbuck
Russell Howard
Tim Vine

2018 (Autumn series)

James Acaster
Jessica Knappett
Kerry Godliman
Phil Wang
Rhod Gilbert

2019 (Spring series)

Iain Stirling
Joe Thomas
Lou Sanders
Paul Sinha
Sian Gibson

2019 (Autumn series)

David Baddiel
Ed Gamble
Jo Brand
Katy Wix (but see Trivia)
Rose Matafeo

2020

Daisy May Cooper
Johnny Vegas
Katherine Parkinson
Mawaan Rizwan
Richard Herring

New Year Treat

John Hannah
Krishnan Guru-Murthy
Nicola Coughlan
Rylan Clark-Neal
Shirley Ballas

Champion of Champions

Ed Gamble
Kerry Godliman
Liza Tarbuck
Lou Sanders
Richard Herring

2021 (Spring series)

Charlotte Ritchie
Jamali Maddix
Lee Mack
Mike Wozniak
Sarah Kendall

2021 (Autumn series)

Alan Davies
Desiree Burch
Guz Khan
Morgana Robinson
Victoria Coren Mitchell

Inventor

Alex Horne, who also wrote and produced the show.

Title music

The Horne Section.

Incidental music by Dru Masters.

Trivia

Based on a stage show at the Edinburgh Festival in 2010 and 2011.

In early series, judgement was pronounced at the Clapham Grand theatre. Later series used a proper studio set.

Series 1 participant Tim Key was retained for future series as a Task Consultant.

Pre-watershed editions were made of each episode, which wasn't too much trouble for the most part. However one of Alice Levine's task attempts had to be so badly censored they had to add a line to explain just how much had been taken out. Way to spoil the illusion. When aired on E4, these editions were aired as Taskmaster Bleeped.

Just as they had done with Penn & Teller: Fool Us, The CW bought the eighth series in 2020 with a view to producing a remake. It lasted one episode before being hauled on to CW Seed and replaced by Supernatural reruns.

After Greg and Alex, the contestant with the most appearances is Kerry Godliman, with eleven appearances; ten in series seven, and one in series nine, episode five after covering for Katy Wix when she was ill. Katherine Ryan covered for Wix in episode six of that series.

Web links

Dave webpage

Wikipedia entry

British Comedy Guide entry

Feedback

@@ Line 37: / Line 37: @@
 The blatant I'm-only-doing-this-because-the-recommission-of-my-show-depends-on-it apathy of [[Dave Gorman]]'s performance.
-Any episode where a participant is subjected to extra punishment, such as [[Josh Widdicombe]] being asked to count the numbers of beans, spaghetti hoops and grains of rice in their respective containers or [[Rob Beckett]] being asked to spend a task talking in an accent other than his own.
+Any episode where a participant is subjected to extra punishment, such as [[Josh Widdicombe]] being asked to count the numbers of beans, spaghetti hoops and grains of rice in their respective containers or [[Rob Beckett]] being asked to spend a task talking in an accent other than his own or Mike Wozniak bursting a haemorrhoid trying to fart.
 Nish Kumar getting fed up with one of the live tasks and throwing a coconut at the Taskmaster's head and promptly being disqualified. Mind you, the highlight of that series was [[Bob Mortimer]], [[Aisling Bea]] and Sally Phillips' less than affectionate tribute to an unwitting victim called Rosalind&hellip;
 [[Rhod Gilbert]] using his prize tasks to embarrass Davies, especially when he gets Greg's mother involved.
+The barely concealed look of glee on Horne's face after successfully predicting that someone, namely Ed Gamble, would answer the task 'Say a letter of the alphabet' with 'a letter of the alphabet'.
 == Catchphrases ==
@@ Line 77: / Line 79: @@
 |Autumn 2019
 |Ed Gamble
+|-
+|2020
+|Richard Herring
+|-
+|Spring 2021
+|Sarah Kendall
 |}
@@ Line 180: / Line 188: @@
 *Richard Herring
-;2021
+;2021 (Spring series)
 *Charlotte Ritchie
 *Jamali Maddix
@@ Line 186: / Line 194: @@
 *Mike Wozniak
 *Sarah Kendall
+;2021 (Autumn series)
+*Alan Davies
+*Desiree Burch
+*Guz Khan
+*Morgana Robinson
+*Victoria Coren Mitchell
 == Inventor ==
@@ Line 206: / Line 221: @@
 Pre-watershed editions were made of each episode, which wasn't too much trouble for the most part. However one of [[Alice Levine]]'s task attempts had to be so badly censored they had to add a line to explain just how much had been taken out. Way to spoil the illusion. When aired on E4, these editions were aired as ''Taskmaster Bleeped''.
-The barely concealed look of glee on Horne's face after successfully predicting that someone, namely Ed Gamble, would answer the task 'Say a letter of the alphabet' with 'a letter of the alphabet'.
 Just as they had done with [[Penn & Teller: Fool Us]], The CW bought the eighth series in 2020 with a view to producing a remake. It lasted one episode before being hauled on to CW Seed and replaced by ''Supernatural'' reruns.