Jordan's always said that if he can't be in Cirque du Soleil, he'll beat them at their own game. here (warning: autoplays), he pitches Zach Galifianakis, Ed Helms, Bradley Cooper, Todd Phillips and Heather Graham on the idea.

Tonight Show writer-performer Brian Stack joins Jesse and Jordan to take calls and talk about Shoeverine, among many other things.

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HURRAY FOR ANDREW WK! GIVE CHILDREN BAZOOKAS!

I can't even begin to tell you how important these two were to five-year-old Jesse. I used to read the Koko book, and the National Geographic article about Koko over and over.

via an ambitious project collapsing

Spy Magazine made a TV pilot in the early 90s, hosted by Kevin Nealon. Current Public Radio Superstar and past TSOYA guest Kurt Andersen was still working with Spy back then, and pointed us to this hilarious segment from the Spy TV pilot.

When Kurt was on TSOYA, he talked about the history of Spy.

These are my ten favorite comedy shows, ever. Selected by favoriteness (not greatness, not influence, just favoriteness). No particular order. Cheated a little by counting Brass Eye and The Day Today as one show, and Letterman as one show.

My favorite right now is 30 Rock, my favorite ever is Larry Sanders.

30 Rock
The Simpsons
Newsradio
Mr. Show
Brass Eye / The Day Today
Curb Your Enthusiasm
The Larry Sanders Show
Seinfeld
Late Night / Late Show with David Letterman
King of the Hill

Episode one of the Larry Sanders Show. My favorite television show of all time, bar none. Even more than The Simpsons or Seinfeld or anything.

Click through for parts two and three, then buy the DVDs, download/steal the whole series, and for God's sake watch it.

I love Larry Sanders SO MUCH.

Jesse Armstrong is one of the co-creators and writers of the BAFTA-winning BBC sitcom Peep Show. (A BAFTA is like a British Emmy.) Now entering its sixth series, with a US version in development at Spike TV, Peep Show is a funny, but cringe-inducing, depiction of the lives of two twenty-something flat mates, played by past TSOYA guest David Mitchell and comedy partner Robert Webb (above). Its first season recently became available in the US on Hulu. No less an authority on UK comedy than Ricky Gervais called it "The only British thing that I was really blown away by in the last few years."

Armstrong has also written for other acclaimed television series, including the sketch series That Mitchell & Web Look and the political satire The Thick of It.

MaxFun Contributor Matthew Phelan spoke with Armstrong from the UK.

Matthew Phelan: You've said that you and co-creator, Sam Bain, and the show's stars [David] Mitchell and [Robert] Webb, met in something called a "writing team experiment" within the BBC …

Jesse Armstrong: Yeah. [laughs] It was fascinating because there is a definite mystique around American writing techniques in the UK--the long runs, the more successful audience figures. We have a problem getting mainstream comedies to work and people often think that it may be something to do with [not using] the team system. I think there are interesting things about having teams of people on a show, but I definitely don't think it's a magic bullet.

So, this was a really ill-thought-through plan to create a British, team-writing situation. The people behind it thought that, to do a team show, you got six people (in this case who didn't know each other) in the room with a producer and a one-line idea--which was, "What if there was house that was squatted and these people all lived together." We wrote the script between the six of us. Each taking, one sixth of the script and we came up with this horrible, kind-of "Frankenstein's monster" as anyone would imagine. Anyone with any knowledge of the US system knows that you still have a show creator who writes the pilot, sets the tone.

So, that was disastrous, but we went into it not knowing David [Mitchell] and Robert [Webb] and came out knowing them quite well, as we sniggered behind our hands and went, "Oh, god. This is terrible what we're doing, isn't it?"

Click "Read More" for more with Peep Show Co-Creator Jesse Armstrong, including audio of the full interview.

Clash of the Titans!

Would it be possible for me to marry both David Letterman and past TSOYA guest Amy Sedaris? I'd rather not divorce my wife, either, because she's way cool and super foxy. So I guess it's like a love square? California Supreme Court: please advise.