Comedian

People are very confused about how to do things on a computer, but generally, if you hover your cursor over things, it will tell you what it is.

There is no 'magic water' that you can rub on a script to make the jokes funnier.

Conflict is entertaining and it's the stuff of drama - or comedy - but too much conflict, or conflict that's at too high a pitch can get annoying.

There are some actors who come alive in front of a crowd, and if you've cast it right, there's an energy between cast and audience that can be exhilarating for both parties, then enjoyed by the audience at home.

I get contacted daily by people in America saying is there any legal way to download 'The IT Crowd', but the whole mechanism is too rigid to allow for things like that.

If people can spot talent rather than the talent having to come to us, then I think you might find that the quality of stuff goes up.

Facebook was just John the Baptist. Twitter is the real deal.

I have to use all these programs that cut off the internet, force me to be bored, because being bored is an essential part of writing, and the internet has made it very hard to be bored.

People tend to group together their favourite sitcoms and feel that they all took place in one spot named 'the past', but in fact all these sitcoms are spread over a long period of time, and all the terrible sitcoms that were on have been justifiably forgotten.

I like working with people who respect the intelligence of their audience.

Father Ted' would be impossible to remake it in America. The whole situation of being Irish and being a priest in Ireland is so different than anything else in America.

We're no good at holidays, the wife and I. We just don't have the knack. We had one good one, early on, but that was a fluke. Everything since then has been a nightmare.

I think there is something to be said for churning things out. Motown churned out hits and there is nothing wrong with that.

I'm not very good in the mornings and often stay up late writing, so I get up at about 10am if I'm not on set for the day. I take our dog, Milo, for a walk before having a light breakfast and settling down to write.

So I don't think that the default mode of aggressive interviewing is useful, because politicians just build a defence against it. In fact, they thrive on 'Today' because they know what's going to happen.

The net is a very precious thing. I hate it when people discuss measures to limit it.

I've always been an enormous fan of comic books and anything that captures the real in a surreal environment.

Part of the job involves thinking about things and eliminating them. You spend a lot of time coming up with ideas that are terrible and hating them and hating yourself.

The writing of 'The Ladykillers' was fun. But once it goes out of your hands it's not fun, 'especially for someone who is used to being hands-on like me.

Audience laughter, when it's deserved, acts as a sort of fairy dust that makes funny moments not just funny, but joyous.