Genre Comedy Country United Kingdom Home station BBC Radio 4 | Running time approx. 30 minutes Language(s) English Starring Brian Cox
Robin Ince | |
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The Infinite Monkey Cage is a BBC Radio 4 comedy and popular science series. Hosted by physicist Brian Cox and comedian Robin Ince, The Independent described it as a "witty and irreverent look at the world according to science". The show's eighth series was broadcast in June and July 2013 and the podcast, published immediately after the initial radio broadcast, features extended versions of most episodes starting with 1 July 2013 Glastonbury Special episode in Series 8. The programme won a Gold Award in the Best Speech Programme category at the 2011 Sony Radio Awards, and it won the best Radio Talk Show at the 2015 Rose d'Or awards. The name is a reference to the infinite monkey theorem.
Contents
Each show has a particular topic up for discussion, with previous topics including the apocalypse and space travel. There are normally three guests; two of these are scientists with an interest in the topic of discussion, offering an expert opinion on the subject. The other guest is usually a comedian, who takes a less serious view of the subject, and often makes the show more accessible by asking the 'stupid' questions that the other guests may have overlooked.
Ince and Cox headed an Uncaged Monkeys live tour in 2011, and toured the United States in 2015.
Humour
The programme features a number of running themes and gags. Robin Ince regularly pokes fun of Brian Cox's hair, good looks, and former career as a rock musician. Ince often imitates and quotes Carl Sagan. Cox often ridicules chemistry, astrology, Creationists and occasionally returns to the subject of how and when a strawberry can be considered dead.
Theme song
The programme's theme song was written by Eric Idle and recorded by Idle and Jeff Lynne. Idle and his band performed the song live on the show when it toured in Los Angeles in 2015 and it appears in the 2016 TV show "The Entire Universe".
List of episodes
The following is an episode list of the BBC radio series The Infinite Monkey Cage. As of February 2017, there have been 89 episodes spanning 15 series plus 5 specials; two responding to viewers questions and Christmas Specials in 2014, 2015 and 2016. All episodes are available to stream via the series website and as podcast downloads.
Since 2013, podcasts are longer than the broadcast episodes at around 45 minutes, frequently adding mild spats between Cox and Ince, and occasionally language unsuitable "for the 4:30pm school run slot".
In addition to the regular programmes, a special entitled "An Infinite Monkey's Guide to General Relativity" was broadcast in two half-hour episodes on December 8 and 15 2015.
Year-end specials
To commemorate the 100th anniversary of Albert Einstein's theory of General Relativity, two special episodes were added in December 2015: