David Farnor | On 12, Feb 2020

Dave has ordered a third season of its original comedy series Hypothetical.

The panel show, presented by Josh Widdicombe and James Acaster, asks the questions that no one else has asked, and no one knows how to answer – questions such as “how would you stop the assassination of JFK if you were a cat?”, “how much would you have to be paid to wear boxing gloves for a year?”, and of course, “big hat or small hat?”. Josh poses the tricky hypotheticals to a panel of four comic guests, and James dishes out the points on a seemingly random basis.

Hypothetical reached 4.5million viewers across the eight episodes of its first season in 2019 and was one of UKTV Play’s most popular shows of the year.

Now, UKTV has confirmed it will bring back Widdicombe and Acaster for a third season of eight more episodes. The news comes just as the show returns for Season 2.

“What might sound like a dry exercise in improvisation is a relentlessly laugh-out-loud affair, as Josh proves the generous straight man to Acaster’s irresistibly hilarious presence,” we wrote in our review.

Josh Widdicombe says: “Thank you to everyone at Dave and UKTV for again allowing me to piss around with my friend James and put it on TV. I for one won’t rest until we have found out whether every celebrity in Britain would wear the big or little hat.”

James Acaster adds: “So excited to be back on your screens gunging contestants and giving away speedboats baby!”

Hypothetical is produced by Hat Trick Productions, commissioned for UKTV by Iain Coyle, head of comedy entertainment, and ordered by Richard Watsham, director of commissioning, Luke Hales, Dave channel director, and Steve North, genre general manager, comedy and entertainment. Hypothetical is executive produced by Coyle alongside Stu Mather at Hat Trick Productions, series produced by Danny Carr and produced by Sophie Le Good.

Coyle comments: “Commissioning a third series even before the second one has gone out, shows how confident we are about this show.”

Hales says: “We are so excited to be bringing back Hypothetical for a third series – we loved the first, and series two is even stronger. We have a unique, fresh and very funny format hosted by two of the best loved comics in the UK. The guest line-up has gone from strength to strength and the rounds have got even funnier – there is still no script, the guests remain fully on the spot and forced to think off the top of their heads – the result is comedy genius. For my money this is one of the best comedy entertainment formats in the market at the moment.”

The return of Hypothetical joins other recent Dave commissions, such as Mel Giedroyc: Unforgivable, World’s Most Dangerous Roads and returning Comedians Giving Lectures, Sliced and Expedition with Steve Backshall. Coming to the channel in the first half of 2020 are Big Zuu’s Big Eats, Meet The Richardsons and Comedy Against Living Miserably, as well as returning favourite Red Dwarf for a feature length special.

Hypothetical Season 3 will air on Dave later this year.

 

James Acaster and Josh Widdicombe to host new Dave comedy show

26th July 2018

James Acaster and Josh Widdicombe are teaming up to host a new comedy panel show on Dave.

Hypothetical will test two teams of comedians on their ability to deal with a series of ridiculous Hypothetical scenarios. You have to live in a motorway services for a year, how do you cope? You have to take a selfie with Nicolas Cage within 48 hours or you die – how do you do it? You’ve been booked for the Royal Variety Performance with an hour to spare – you can’t do comedy – what do you do?

Each hypothetical will be posed by Josh, while James’ job is to enforce ridiculous rules and score the guests’ attempts at dealing with them. None of the guests see the hypotheticals beforehand, promising a comedic workout for each unsuspecting participant.

“I have spent the last decade of my life annoying other comics with these questions in cars and dressing rooms so I am delighted Dave have allowed me to claim that I was in fact researching a show and not just wasting everyone’s time,” says Widdicombe. “More to the point I cannot wait to work alongside the man who makes me laugh more than anyone else in comedy. I just hope this goes better than our 2009 Edinburgh show (one star, Three Weeks magazine).”

“It’s the show Josh was born to host and the show I was adopted into in order to help out with,” adds Acaster.

The series has been ordered by Richard Watsham, UKTV’s director of commissioning and Steve North, genre general manager for entertainment and comedy, for comedy channel Dave, overseen by channel director Luke Hales. Hypothetical is commissioned by UKTV commissioning editor, Joe McVey who will also executive produce alongside Stu Mather at Hat Trick Productions. Sophie Le Good will produce.

Starting off as a Whatsapp conversation with Mather, the show joins a growing list of UKTV Original shows coming to Dave, including Judge Romesh later this month plus John Robins Beat the Internet and the return of award-winning Taskmaster in the Autumn.

“We loved the format when it landed on our desks – in a world of semi-scripted panel shows it really stood out from the pack and felt fresh and different,” says Hales. “The format forces improvisation and you get to see the comics thinking on their feet and making it up as they go along.”

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