The BBC has removed 11 sketches from That Mitchell and Webb Look on iPlayer over racism fears after putting all four series back online for the show’s 20th anniversary.
A spokesman said the cuts were made “in consultation with the programme makers” and that the corporation had kept “the ones that still work today and not the ones that don’t”.
The Bafta-winning sketch show, written by and starring David Mitchell and Robert Webb, ran on BBC Two from 2006 to 2010. It grew out of Radio 4’s That Mitchell and Webb Sound and won the Bafta for best comedy programme in 2007.
Viewers and Reddit users noticed the gaps after the iPlayer upload. Neither Mitchell nor Webb has commented. BBC News said it had asked them.
🚨NEWS: The BBC have removed a number of sketches by Mitchell & Webb as they are now deemed offensive
This sketch which features a Burqa and Blackface purposefully to make fun of how offended people get has now been ironically axed, because people may be offended. pic.twitter.com/jEy3QJ5Cvv
— Basil the Great (@BasilTheGreat) September 21, 2026
The missing material includes allegedly offensive images that can be seen as politically incorrect.
For example English Civil War re-enactors who tire of Roundheads and Cavaliers, put on blackface to stage a battle in the Democratic Republic of Congo, then stop after deciding the idea is “very, very racist”.
Another clip handles a makeover-show parody, with Olivia Colman, in which a contestant appears in a burka, after which a cutaway has Webb asking whether the sketch mocks sincerely held beliefs and Mitchell removes the garment to reveal blackface.
There is also a sketch about an indigenous “tribe” living in a garden centre; a joke about Jimmy Savile; Webb impersonating the late chef Gary Rhodes making homophobic remarks; a sketch billed as “Rude Gandhi”; material involving Bill Oddie; and three Gilbert and Sullivan sketches.
The series often broke into fake behind-the-scenes arguments in which Mitchell and Webb, playing versions of themselves, asked whether a sketch had gone too far. That frame is why some defenders say the cut scenes were satire of racism and of comedians who shrug off offence, not an endorsement of the tropes on screen.
Famous remaining sketches include Numberwang, Sir Digby Chicken Caesar, Hennimore, The Event, and the Nazi-cap routine that ends with the line “Are we the baddies?”
The BBC’s statement does not list the 11 sketches or say that Mitchell and Webb personally approved each cut.
Jimmy Mulville, co-founder of Hat Trick Productions, told reporters he understood the BBC’s difficulty. He said he “personally… wouldn’t censor anything” but that blackface “is a problem”.
Dom Joly, of Trigger Happy TV, called the decision “classic BBC overkill” and “hysterical censorship”.
“I totally get it if the BBC is putting out something really racist, which is laughing at and encouraging other people to feel that it’s okay to do that.
“But it’s so clear that Mitchell and Webb are not doing that. Their intent was not to be racist.”
“The BBC are in an impossible position,” he added, but producers should be careful “that this is not the thin end of a wedge where we cut things out”.
Censoring scenes from the past has become a regular feature on streaming platforms over fears of racism and offensiveness.
Series such as Little Britain, The Mighty Boosh and Come Fly With Me have seen cuts in their shows as well.
Unedited episodes of That Mitchell and Webb Look remain available on Sky and NOW, with a content warning before they play.
this was quite funny actually https://t.co/ezttHaQZDE pic.twitter.com/5cxRBGw5cT
— Dark Cobbett 🏴☠️ (@darkcobbett) September 21, 2026
