I know this is often cited as an example of the House Party's decline, but I'm sure the New York episode was fairly decent, and it was actually a visit elsewhere in America (possibly LA or Vegas) that rang the death knell for the show? I may be wrong though.
Well, I didn't enjoy the New York one at much at all, but I reckon the series had already started its decline by then, as far as I was concerned it all started to go wrong when they changed the theme tune and got rid of the dancing trestle tables in the titles. That coincided with Guy Freeman's arrival as producer and it seemed a far weaker show at that point in terms of dull new items, things like live bands and people plugging films which never seemed right and just a general lack of enthusiasm about proceedings. I thought the New York one was pretty devoid of any atmosphere although it probably wasn't that much worse than the rest of the run. I abandoned it at the end of that series. It was the series after, 1997/98, which was the total disaster, with the Florida show, then Guy Freeman's abrupt departure, then Noel's walkout.
From what I've read, it's another Live At The Apollo clone in the same way The John Bishop Show pretty much was, only with a bit of music.
His Christmas show in his "house" was a far better setup that I think they should pursue for a full series. I'm a comedy fan but I'm sick to death of how often they try and recycle the same formula and claim it's something new.
One difference between this new show and the various Live At The Apalling things is that it's pre-watershed, which is interesting, because for all he's supposed to be the epitome of the mainstream comedian, he's never been on pre-watershed, so while it's a familiar concept in some ways, it isn't in that part of the schedule, so for some of the audience it'll be quite a new thing, and I think it'll be fascinating to see how it works.
We've had things like Lee Mack's All Star Cast and The Guess List before which have tried to being ostensibly "alternative" comedy to Saturday nights, and I thought they were both quite good series, but they were post-watershed so they didn't really seem to work because they seemed a bit lightweight for that slot, but seemingly they were a bit too scared to put it in a really prime slot. So, interesting to see how it works, I think.