Horrible Histories with Stephen Fry

Horrible Histories with Stephen Fry was a re-version of Horrible Histories. Broadcast from 19 June 2011 to 31 July 2011, the program featured a compilation of sketches from the first two seasons of the parent show with Stephen Fry replacing Rattus Rattus as host, presenting “added insight and historical nuggets”. The spin-off consists of his “hand pick[ed] funniest moments” from the two then-aired series. Holy Moly describes the series as “a re-hash of all the best sketches and japes from the previous two series, presented by Stephen Fry, who pops up every few minutes to explain and elucidate historical facts.”

“Horrible Histories has been a hideously gruesome and gory success for CBBC and we are delighted to welcome it to BBC One”, said Cassian Harrison, Commissioning Executive, History and Business, Science and Natural History. This version of the show came out just before the British Comedy Awards, when the show was still classified as strictly a children’s show. After the awards show, when it had won the award and had become a lot more well known, it “made the transition”. Norris found that the Stephen Fry repackage saw the adult demographic as a whole start to watch, where before it had just been parents and children. Instead of leaving the older generations knowing about the cultural phenomenon and the way the show is stereotype but knowing little about he actual show itself, it also gave them the “opportunity to go and watch it”. Norris explained that the show was an experiment of “what would we do if [the Horrible Histories] was in primetime”. While she liked the result, she would change some things if she “were to do it again”. Essentially, all the writers had to do to make the repackage was choosing the sketches that seemed like they would work for adults, i.e., the non-kiddy ones, and then “writing links for Stephen Fry to connect them”. So far, only one six-part series was aired.