While we were at SxSW, Nick White, our editor, couldn't shut up about this guy who was on QVC but was kind of making fun of it. Little did I know that the guy in question was Mike Rowe, who now hosts the cable series "Dirty Jobs." Or that the clips entirely merited Nick's incessant prattling. This is a delight.

Andy Richter was guest-hosting Regis & Kelly this week, and talked about the situation with NBC. Richter is not only really funny, he's also a class act all the way.

Kimmel does solid work.

Luis Guzman is one of America's most successful character actors. He's appeared in dozens of films and television series, from Short Eyes in the 1970s to Miami Vice in the 1980s to Carlito's Way, Boogie Nights and The Limey in the 1990s. Now he's featured on the new HBO show How To Make It In America.

He talks with us about growing up in New York's Lower East Side, and about his work there as an activist and social worker. As a teen, he hung out at the legendary New Yorican Poets Cafe, watching poets and writers like Amiri Baraka, Allen Ginsburg and Miguel Piñero, who cast Guzman in Short Eyes in the late 1970s, and got him his first television audition, for Miami Vice in the 1980s. Since then, Guzman has become a favorite of directors like P.T. Anderson and Steven Soderbergh, among others.

Jordan Morris gives the folks from It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia and Our Town some lessons on how to bring their screen acting to the stage.

Drunk History on The Sound of Young America from Jesse Thorn on Vimeo.

Derek Waters and Jeremy Konner are the creator and director of Drunk History, a series of shorts in which comedians get very, very drunk, then re-tell their favorite stories from history. The stories are re-enacted, with drunken narration and dialogue, by notable actors. Past participants have included Michael Cera and Jack Black. At Sundance, Konner and Waters screened two shorts, one featuring the story of Tesla and Edison, with actors John C. Reilly (above) and Crispin Glover, and one telling the story of Lincoln and Douglass, who were portrayed by Will Ferrel and Don Cheadle.

"Drunk History: Douglass & Lincoln," narrated by past Jordan, Jesse, Go! guest Jen Kirkman, won the Jury Prize in Short Filmmaking at the Sundance Film Festival. The new shorts will air as part of a new series on HBO, Funny or Die Presents, which premiers tonight.

Six TV Comedies You Need to Watch

I don't think there's any reason to waste your time on OK television when you could be watching great television. Spend a little time searching out some of this amazing non-US English-language comedy, and you can reward yourself with laughs beyond your wildest dreams. All of these shows are hobby-horses of mine, so apologies if you've heard this one before. (By the way: a good place to find torrents of UK tv that isn't available in the States: the Box. Google it.)

The Day Today

These days, this show is remembered by comedy fans, if at all, as the show that launched the career of Steve Coogan, and birthed his most famous character, Alan Partridge. It's so much more than that. It's a brilliant deconstruction of the inanity of television news which takes the form of a television news show. Amazing character work, spectacular writing and almost no topical humor. An amazing show. If you live in the US, you'll have to download this one.

Brass Eye

This was a sequel of sorts to The Day Today. What The Day Today did for TV news, Brass Eye did for TV newsmagazines, only moreso. Maybe the most elegantly (and somehow most brutally) written television show I've ever watched. Sound and fury signifying nothing, taken to the 9th degree. Anchored, as in The Day Today, by the sneering, fearless Chris Morris, doing a spectacularly harsh and hilarious take down of the TV news anchor. Some amazing put-ons, as well. In one episode, they manage to convince a real Minister of Parliament to introduce a bill condemning the fictional drug they've created for purposes of satire. This one's available for about $10 from Amazon.co.uk, and the DVD is region-free, so you don't have to worry about whether it'll play in your DVD player.

The Thick of It

If you saw my favorite movie of last year, In the Loop, you have some idea of the hapless world of government bureaucracy created for The Thick of It. The show was conceived by Armando Iannucci, who directed the film based on his previous work. It takes place in a made-up government agency, but the tone is all about verisimilitude: shaky cameras and overlapping dialogue. The show's about how the shaky relationship between rhetoric, policy and the media. Peter Capaldi plays a super-feared uber-spinmeister for the New Labour government, who rips into some of the most insanely profane tirades I've ever seen on any screen. Another show that is, in my opinion, about as well-written as television gets. Insightful and hilarious.

The Newsroom

This small Canadian show was a brilliant precedent to The Office and Curb Your Enthusiasm. Ken Finkleman, whose second-best credit is writing and directing Airplane 2 (to say nothing of Grease 2 and Who's That Girl?), created and starred in this show, another news satire. This one's a lot quieter - a dry sitcom in the mold of Larry Sanders, set in a local CBC television news operation. All the characters are fantastic, but Finkleman's selfish, arrogant, foolish lead is one of the best TV characters I've ever seen. The show gets crazy in the later episodes (though still enjoyable), but the earlier shows are some of the funniest TV around. Seasons of the show are available on DVD in the US.

The Trailer Park Boys

I've already done two Sound of Young America interviews about this show - one with its creator and director, Mike Clattenburg, and one with the stars, Ricky, Julian and Bubbles. It's a very low-budget Canadian faux-documentary series about the titular boys. The comedy is simple: they get into trouble, they spout malapropisms, they drink heavily, they scheme. The characters are so finely drawn, sweet and compelling, though, that it transcends anything you might imagine from hearing that description. The show's available on DVD in the US of A, and airs on Direct TV, as well.

Peep Show

You may remember David Mitchell's appearance on The Sound of Young America a year or so ago. He's half of the comedy team Mitchell & Webb, who also created several very funny sketch series for UK TV. Their best work, though, is as actors on the sitcom Peep Show. The conceit of the show is that it's all shot in POV - which quickly gets old, but then fades into the background. Really, it's an odd-couple comedy with an extra dose of awkward situations. The characters are finely rendered and lovable, and the writing is fantastic. You can watch the series on Hulu, free.

Jane Espenson (above right) is a television writer and the executive producer of "Caprica," a new series set in the Battlestar Galactica universe. She's also been a writer on shows like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, The Gilmore Girls and even Ellen. She started her career as a linguist at UC Berkeley, research assistant to the eminent George Lakoff. She tells us about how submitting a spec script for Star Trek: The Next Generation was her big break, and how she navigates the waters of half-hour comedy and hour-long dramas. "Caprica" is a prequel to the rebooted (and critically acclaimed) Battlestar Galactica, and touches on classic sci-fi themes with a focus on family relationships. The show stars Eric Stoltz, Esai Morales (above left) and Allessandra Torresani.