Just a Minute of the show, all created by Messiter, include a 1952 version on South African radio, and a television version on the DuMont network in the United States. The pilot for the show was recorded in 1967, featuring Clement Freud, Derek Nimmo, Beryl Reid and Wilma Ewart as panellists. The chairman was originally planned to be Jimmy Edwards but he was unavailable on Sundays, the proposed recording dates, and was replaced by Nicholas Parsons who was originally supposed to be a panel member. Parsons did not want the job and only reluctantly took it, just for the pilot episode. After the
Richard Vranch their cartoons published in "Maxim", "Punch", and "The Spectator". He presented the children's shows "Let's Pretend" on ITV and "Jackanory" on BBC One, and was a contestant on a charity special of "The Weakest Link" in 2005. He guested on BBC Radio 4's long-running panel game "Just a Minute" in 1999. In 2002 he was commissioned by Tamasha Theatre (East is East) as a writer for their show "Ryman and the Sheik" and worked for a few years as an Artistic Associate of the company. Vranch had a previous career as a research physicist, and has appeared on the panel