Never Mind the Full Stops

Never Mind the Full Stops is a British television panel game based on the English language, its idiosyncrasies, and its misuse. It is hosted by the British actor, author and Oscar-winning screenwriter, Julian Fellowes. Each episode lasts 30 minutes. The series was filmed in March 2006 at Channel 4's studios in Horseferry Road, Westminster. It was originally broadcast on BBC Four, and aired on BBC Two from 9 October 2006.

Never Mind the Full Stops
Presented by	Julian Fellowes
Country of origin	United Kingdom
Original language	English
No. of series	2
No. of episodes	22
Production
Executive producers	Martin Scott Katie Taylor
Camera setup	Multi-camera
Running time	30 minutes
Original release
Network	BBC Four
Release	11 May 2006 (2006-05-11) – 24 April 2007 (2007-04-24)

Two teams of two people are faced with various questions and challenges concerning English grammar, spelling and usage. The show is divided into rounds, with themes such as identifying the famous author of a badly spoken sentence (John Prescott was one of those picked on in the first episode) and correcting the punctuation in a written sentence. There is also a quick-fire round with questions such as "What is a malapropism?" Points are awarded throughout the show to determine the winning team.

Each show starts with the host giving a 'difficult-to-spell' word and an example mnemonic to help remember that spelling, and by the end of the show the panellists have to have devised their own. In episode one Julian Fellowes gave the example arithmetic: A Rat In The House Might Eat The Ice Cream; and Ned Sherrin's version (which earned his team the win as the final points were tied) was: As Richard Interred The Head Master Every Tiny Infant Cheered. By the end of series 1, even Julian Fellowes had realized that these so-called mnemonics were invariably harder to remember than the spellings – particularly as they were rarely related to the words in question.

Another round featured a film of someone speaking a very obscure UK dialect (often on the verge of extinction), and the teams would have to try to guess what had been said.

The programme's name is derived from that of the long-running pop music panel game Never Mind the Buzzcocks, which is itself taken from the title of the Sex Pistols album, Never Mind the Bollocks.

Episode list

Series 1

Episode number	Air date	Team to host's right	Team to host's left
1	11 May 2006	Carol Thatcher & Ned Sherrin	Janet Street-Porter & David Aaronovitch
2	18 May 2006	Nina Wadia & John Sergeant	Tim Brooke-Taylor & Rod Liddle
3	25 May 2006	Bonnie Greer & Dave Gorman	Eve Pollard & Rod Liddle
4	1 June 2006	Jessica Fellowes & Gyles Brandreth	Sue Carroll & Roger McGough
5	8 June 2006	Julia Hartley-Brewer & Hugh Dennis	Andy Zaltzman & Roger McGough
6	15 June 2006	Hardeep Singh Kohli & Graeme Garden	Janet Street-Porter & Lembit Opik
7	22 June 2006	Sue Perkins & Nicholas Parsons	Pam Ayres & Rob Deering
8	29 June 2006	Jilly Cooper & Paddy O'Connell	Marina Hyde & Simon Fanshawe
9	6 July 2006	Henry Blofeld & Sue Perkins	Daisy Goodwin & Simon Hoggart
10	13 July 2006	Bonnie Greer & Arthur Smith	Victoria Mailer & Rob Deering

Series 2

Episode number	Air date	Team to host's right	Team to host's left
1	13 Feb 2007	Arthur Smith & Shappi Khorsandi	Kirsty Wark & Rob Deering
2	20 Feb 2007	Sue Perkins & David Aaronovitch	Gillian Reynolds & Robin Ince
3	27 Feb 2007	Stewart Lee & Patricia Hodge	David Nobbs & Paul Sinha
4	6 Mar 2007	Sid Waddell & Frederick Forsyth	Eve Pollard & Simon Hoggart
5	13 Mar 2007	Will Smith & Edwina Currie	Susie Dent & Lemn Sissay
6	20 Mar 2007	Phil Hammond & Shappi Khorsandi	Kirsty Wark & Mark Steel
7	27 Mar 2007	Rod Liddle & Bonnie Greer	Virginia Ironside & Ian McMillan
8	3 Apr 2007	Richard Herring & Sharon Foster	Paddy O'Connell & Vanessa Feltz
9	10 Apr 2007	Simon Hoggart & Lucy Porter	Angela Rippon & Stuart Hall
10	17 Apr 2007	Ian McMillan & Jenny Murray	Edward Stourton & Michael Rosen
11	24 Apr 2007	Paddy O'Connell & Aggie MacKenzie	Barry Norman & Jessica Fellowes

Reception

Reviewing the first episode of series 1, Sam Wollaston of The Guardian wrote that the show was "so bad it's impossible to understand the process by which it came to be put on air. You're left stunned, pummelling your head with your fists, shouting, 'Why?' [...] The whole thing is staggeringly amateur, like a slightly drunken and badly thought-out after-dinner-party game in Islington (I'm guessing here, promise), and in no way merits a television airing."^[1] The Times's Gabrielle Starkey described the series as a "slightly smug quiz".^[2]

References

1. Wollaston, Sam (12 May 2006). "Last night's TV". The Guardian. Retrieved 2 August 2023.
2. Starkey, Gabrielle (13 February 2007). "Multichannel choice". Retrieved 2 August 2023.

External links

• Never Mind the Full Stops at BBC Online
• Never Mind the Full Stops at IMDb