Have I Got News For You

Have I Got News For You (often abbreviated to HIGNFY) is a long-running UK television topical panel game. Produced by Hat Trick Productions for the BBC, it is a comedy programme rather than a serious game show: the banter between the guests and their sardonic remarks are more important than the scores, which are only ever briefly referred to. The format is loosely based on that of a popular radio show, The News Quiz, but cultivates a reputation for sailing close to the wind on matters of libel.

Choice Moments (Featuring some from The Very Best of "Have I Got News For You" DVD)

• One of the biggest laughs of the show's first year came when the missing headline words round posed the question 'I MADE THATCHER _____ BOASTS NIGEL'. To which Paul quickly suggested, 'Swallow?,' leaving the rest of the panel incapable of providing further comment. After a while, Angus jumped in with, 'No, it's not a question about food...'
• When forced to apologise to Ernest Saunders for suggesting his bout of Alzheimer's, which got him released from prison (after 10 months of a 5-year sentence) and from which he had subsequently recovered, seemed a bit too convenient, the show (via Angus) added that Saunders was a swindler and con-artist. As Saunders had originally been jailed for fraud, he could hardly complain again.
• In a rare example of Merton being the butt of a joke, Hislop and Deayton started a rumour in 1993, that Deayton, who had recently been voted "TV's Mr Sex" had been "shagging Merton's wife," who was, at the time, Caroline Quentin. The joke was accentuated by light-hearted flirting between Quentin and Deayton when she made guest appearances on the show. In one edition of HIGNFY, the panel discussed Merton being mistaken by several members of the public for disgraced footballer Paul Merson. Merton explained that this had resulted in phone calls which had awoken his wife. Hislop was quick to chime in, apologising for any inconvenience caused to Quentin, but Deayton forgave him, claiming they had not been disturbed.
• When Roy Hattersley failed to appear for the June 4 1993 episode (it was the third time he'd cancelled at the last minute), he was replaced with a tub of lard (credited as "The Rt. Hon. Tub Of Lard MP"), as "they possessed the same qualities and were liable to give similar performances". The tub of lard was on the same team as Merton, and they won – much to the chagrin of Hislop. This was despite the fact that Merton's team's questions were made deliberately hard, especially those directly posed to the tub of lard. The Missing Words round also featured foreign headlines, in languages such as French, German, Russian and even Japanese. The final one was in English, but the entire headline had been blanked out.
• For Series 7, Episode 8, in 1994, it was announced that the tub of lard would be making a return appearance, though this turned out to be a ruse to disguise the appearance on the show of Salman Rushdie, who almost didn't get to be on the show. When his police guards were asked if it was possible for Rushdie to do a quiz show in 1994, they at first refused, but when they heard it was HIGNFY they changed their minds because they liked the show. Rushdie later said his son was more impressed that he had been on HIGNFY than of anything else he had done.
• In a 1995 episode, featuring Mike Yarwood, a noted British impressionist, the panelists were instructed to do impressions of various famous people. By a method of "random selection", the first one that the panellists had to do was Harold Wilson, which had been intended for Yarwood, but Paul Merton, wanted to do it himself, as he claimed, "We need the points!". Also in that round, Ian Hislop was memorably made to do a startling realistic impression of bald pop star Jimmy Sommerville, whom, it had long been joked, he resembled. Hislop noted afterwards, "I can't see myself doing Question Time again."
• When Piers Morgan was a guest in 1996, he came across as very thin-skinned and demanded the others (and in particular, Hislop) cease their "vindictive attacks" on him. Clive Anderson scathingly joked that the Daily Mirror was now, thanks to Morgan, almost as good as The Sun, and when asked by Morgan "What do you know about editing newspapers?" swiftly replied, "About as much as you do". In what was not Morgan's finest moment, he used a joke that Eddie Izzard had used the week before, with a significantly diminished response from the audience. Hislop pointed out that Izzard got a laugh because "People like him". Morgan responded to this by attacking Hislop saying, "Don't play the popularity line with me, Hislop," before appealing to the audience: "Does anyone like him?". When the delighted audience responded loudly in favour of Hislop, Morgan appeared to be well and truly vanquished and somewhat humiliated.
• Shortly after a high profile fall from grace amidst accusations of sleaze, ex-Conservative MP Neil Hamilton and his wife Christine were panelists in a 1997 edition where they managed to come through pretty well despite numerous jokes about the scandal that had engulfed them. This appearance was widely felt to have launched the couple as minor celebrities.
• Conservative Member of Parliament and journalist Boris Johnson has had several memorable appearances on the show, which arguably raised his public profile and later led to him being asked to be a guest presenter. The first, in 1998, Johnson seemed to take the ribbing in good humour and eventually admitted defeat and announced that he wanted it 'on the record' that he'd 'walked straight into a massive elephant trap'. In a later appearance in 2001 he was suddenly subjected to a spoof round of Mastermind where he was asked his name and questions on the then leader of the Conservative Party, Iain Duncan Smith, ending up, rather amusingly, with a score of 0.
• On one occasion, after he was asked a question, Paul looked upwards (with a gormless expression on his face). The scene then switched to a "daydream" of Paul and Ian skipping through a sunny field, holding hands and smiling. This rather nonsensical aside drew laughter from the audience, as well as the two guests.
• When ex-MI5 agent David Shayler was a guest on the show in 2000, a large television set was placed on the desk, showing him in a studio elsewhere – supposedly in Paris, where he was in hiding from Official Secrets Act charges. Merton, upset by the idea (a guest on a two second delay worked against his theory that comedy is based on timing) actually switched the set off at one point. Later, in protest, he left his seat, and proceeded to shake hands with audience members in the front row, before collecting a newspaper and settling back down to read it. In addition, the feed was "interrupted" at one point by a five-second sequence involving a naked woman and a ferret. All were disappointed when Shayler reappeared.
• When Sir Elton John failed to appear as billed in 2001, he was replaced by a "look-alike" called Ray Johnson (apparently a taxi driver) who made very little verbal contribution. Each time the scores were recapped, captions appeared on the screen, advertising, praising or saying something about Ray, whilst at the same time, saying something derogatory about Elton, for example, how Ray would never let anyone down, "unlike Elton. Bastard." Ray was credited as Ray "Elton John" son.
• The first real 'guest' presenter was Anne Robinson, and at the beginning of the show, during her opening greeting, she pointed to the fact that since she used to work for Robert Maxwell (she used to work for him at the Daily Mirror for a not insubstantial fee, as Hislop did not hesitate to point out), Hislop was bound to make fun of her for it. So after declaring that there were no hard feelings, she proceeded to give Merton four points straight off the bat, and did it again later on, when Hislop duly delivered the goods. Not that that saved her. Merton then went on to tease her for both The Weakest Link ("I only watch the last five minutes because The Simpsons comes on afterwards. It's nice to see some animation on the television screen".) and her famous wink, saying that it made her look like she'd had a stroke.
• The final show of the second guest-presented series, in 2003, was hosted by Bruce Forsyth. Forsyth's game-show trademarks and cliches were parodied during the show, including a round entitled Play Your Iraqi Cards Right and, instead of the usual Odd One Out round, a round in which the contestants had to remember a number of items on a conveyor belt (including the ubiquitous cuddly toy), and then work out the connection between them (a parody of a similar game in The Generation Game). Forsyth has attributed his recent renewed success to his appearance in the programme.
• In 2004, Robert Kilroy-Silk was fired from his position as host of a popular daytime chat show (entitled 'Kilroy') by the BBC following an article he had written for the Daily Express about Arabs, which was widely condemned as racist. He appeared on HIGNFY a few weeks later and, after several verbal jabs from Ian Hislop during the show, Paul Merton launched into a memorable verbal tirade against Kilroy-Silk. (See also 'Running Gags' below)
• The 3 December 2004 episode was chaired somewhat unsuccessfully by Neil Kinnock. He struggled to keep on top of things at times, and was subject to pretty rough handling all round, particularly from Will Self, who notably accused him of hypocrisy for accepting a position in the House of Lords.
• The 22 April 2005 episode, after the election of the new pope, featured Merton repeatedly talking about him having "the eyes of a killer", under the pretense that if he said it often enough the editors would have to include it at some point (which they did, many times over). At one point he accused the pope of injuring a man with a frozen sausage. Various verbal jabs were also made towards Michael Winner, who was at the time the star of eSure's dubious Calm Down Dear insurance commercials, who was on Hislop's team. His use of the lame catchphrase led Merton to observe, "Thank God we've got that out of the way".
• The 29 April 2005 episode was chaired by veteran presenter Nicholas Parsons. Sections of the show were changed to emulate Just a Minute (the Radio 4 comedy quiz hosted by Parsons on which Merton is a panellist) and Sale of the Century.
• The 13 May 2005 episode contained a segment modelled on British TV quiz show Blankety Blank. The section, entitled "Blunkety Blunk" parodied disgraced ex-Cabinet minister David Blunkett and his rapid return to the cabinet following the 2005 general election.
• The final episode of the series on 3 June 2005 featured Merton expressing his amusement at KFC selling "buckets" of chicken, and suggested that they sell "a trough, a whole trough of chicken...and a ditch of chips and coleslaw in a skip!"