A Poke in the Eye (With a Sharp Stick) Terry Gilliam of Monty Python (with "Python girl" Carol Cleveland); Jonathan Miller, Peter Cook and Alan Bennett of "Beyond The Fringe"; Bill Oddie, Graeme Garden and Tim Brooke-Taylor of "The Goodies". Solo performers included: John Fortune, John Bird, Eleanor Bron, Barry Humphries in character as Dame Edna Everage. Neil Innes and mime artist Des Jones. The show consisted primarily of "greatest hits" of the various performers. Peter Cook and Alan Bennett performed iconic solo routines from their early 1960s revue "Beyond The Fringe". The Monty Python team performed several of their most famous skits including the Dead Parrot sketch, the
The Sketch Show two episodes were never broadcast. The show started at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 1999, and starred Mack, Catherine Tate and Dan Antopolski. Mack later expressed regret at not including them in the TV show, stating: "I’m not a great believer in regret, but looking back over the last eighteen years of me doing this job, not keeping our sketch show Bits together and jumping at the first offer to put a version of it on telly is probably the biggest mistake I’ve made". The original line-up of the cast was Lee Mack, Jim Tavare, Tim Vine, Karen Taylor and