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Wednesday 24 Sep 2014

Press Release

David Walliams completes another marathon challenge for Comic Relief, staying awake for 24 hours in UK's first-ever live online 24 hour panel show

David Walliams

David Walliams completes another marathon challenge for Comic Relief, staying awake for 24 hours in the UK's first-ever live online streamed 24 hour panel show.

Asked how he was feeling after his marathon 24 Hour Panel People challenge, he said: "Like I'm descending into madness! No it was fine, but it does take its toll on you physically with things like your eyes not being able to focus so well anymore on the autocue."

On whether it was as tough as he thought it would be: "Yes it was as tough as I thought it would be, particularly at the end just having to keep the show together, being so exhausted and not being able to think straight any more, especially being the host of Never Mind The Buzzcocks and having to make the rounds work. I just couldn't really read the autocue anymore because my eyes couldn't focus which is quite a scary thing especially as there was an audience here. It was tough, yes, but it was the right side of tough. I mean, if I was slumped on the desk not saying anything I think it really wouldn't have been very entertaining but you could see I was a little bit delirious towards the end."

On how it compares to his other marathon challenge of swimming the channel, he said: "I trained for a long time to swim the channel so I was kind of ready to do that. With this I had a lot less sense of how it was going to work out because I really didn't know how I would be after staying awake for so long and also being on TV and trying to be entertaining - it is so different."

And on the first thing he is going to do now he has finished: "I'm going to have a shower! I haven't had a shower for a very long time. I've changed my shirt a few times but I've only had breaks of five minutes or so which wasn't enough time to wash."

With a host of different formats across 24 hours and a whole heap of funny people, 24 Hour Panel People was a comedy event of epic proportions that saw David take part in some of TV's most iconic panel shows, all in aid of Comic Relief. Taking part for the full 24 hours, David switched between the roles of team captain, panellist and host across the day.

Across the 24 hours David was joined by a star studded line-up including: David Tennant, Jack Dee, Stephen Fry, Miranda Hart, Claudia Winkleman, David Mitchell, Dara O'Briain, Paul O'Grady, Sue Perkins, Jo Brand, Jimmy Carr, Lee Mack, Richard Bacon, Vernon Kay, Sir David Frost, Barbara Windsor, Russell Tovey, Charlie Brooker, Christopher Biggins, Ulrika Jonsson, Patricia Hodge and Jedward.

As well as an abundance of funny people, the epic event featured favourite shows including Have I Got News For You, Would I Lie To You, 8 Out Of 10 Cats, Celebrity Juice, Mock The Week, QI, Mastermind, Never Mind The Buzzcocks and Just A Minute. Alongside the current favourites were some much-loved, all-time classic shows including The Generation Game, Blankety Blank, Through The Keyhole, They Think It's All Over, Room 101, Call My Bluff, Give Us A Clue and Whose Line Is It Anyway.

Highlights of 24 Hour Panel People will be aired on ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ Three in 5x30 minute programmes from Sunday 13 March to Thursday 17 March in the run up to Red Nose Day on Friday 18 March.

RB

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