Dawn French will bring a twist to The Traitors
By Annabel Rackham
Entertainment reporter
The annual Comic Relief fundraiser has featured sketches based on the show The Traitors and Eurovision.
Dame Mary Berry, Danny Dyer and Jamie Dornan made an appearance on the show.
More than £31m has been raised during the live broadcast, hosts Paddy McGuiness, David Tennant and Zoe Ball announced live during the show.
This year’s fundraising effort will support people struggling with the cost of living crisis, food poverty, mental health problems and homelessness.
Comic Relief was founded by Sir Lenny Henry and Richard Curtis in 1985 with the aim to put an end to child poverty in the UK and around the world.
For the first time since the programme was first launched, Sir Lenny was not there but he appeared in pre-recorded appeal to help starving communities in the African continent.
Following a montage of clips from his past visits to the continent with the charity, Sir Lenny said: “But I think what I said then, still rings true to me now. Forget geography. These are your neighbours”.
The 2023 programme also includes AJ Odudu, David Tennant, Joel Dommett, Paddy McGuinness as presenters.
Image source, Getty Images
Live performances from Zara Larsson and Tom Grennan came live from Salford.
Celebrities began fundraising ahead of Friday night’s live show, with Radio 1’s Arielle Free taking part in a cycling challenge and BBC Morning Live’s Gethin Jones dancing for 24 hours.
Image source, Getty Images
Singer Zara Larsson performing during the Red Nose Day night of TV for Comic Relief
The live TV event also included a video appeal from The Prince of Wales, in which he meets homeless people who have been helped by Comic Relief.
Prince William said his mother would be “disappointed” to see that the UK is still no further along the line in terms of tackling homelessness, and preventing it from happening.
There was also a parody sketch of The Traitors, featuring real contestants Maddy and Wilf, alongside Dame Mary Berry and Danny Dyer.
Comedians Jennifer Saunders, Stephen Merchant and Rosie Jones featured in the sketch, with a twist as Dawn French took on on Claudia Winkleman’s host role.
Elsewhere on the show there was appearance from Kylie Minogue, whilst Blackadder star Sir Tony Robinson read a bedtime story as the character Baldrick.
Lulu, Graham Norton and Sam Ryder feature in a Eurovision sketch
Graham Norton, Lulu and last year’s UK Eurovision entrant Sam Ryder paid homage to the European music contest, by playing a mock judging panel looking for the next UK star to enter the competition.
Auditions came from Jamie Dornan, Spandau Ballet’s Tony Hadley and comedian Miranda Hart.
Eurovision fans got another treat though as during the fundraiser, two tickets for the Liverpool final were given away on the show by Eurovision presenters Scott Mills and Rylan Clark.
The cast of Mrs Doubtfire The Musical also delivered their first UK performance of Make Me A Woman from the new stage show.
This year’s Red Nose was designed by Sir Jony Ive, who is best known for being a designer for Apple.
Skip twitter post by Comic Relief
The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites.
Sir Jony said: ‘We’ve grown up with Comic Relief and are proud to support their remarkable work.
‘This new and seemingly simple Red Nose has been a fabulously complex little object to design and make and has involved our entire team. We hope it brings a little moment of joy to everyone who wears one.’
It is made from plant-based materials and is available to buy from the Comic Relief website or Amazon.
Skip twitter post 2 by BBC Radio 1
The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites.
