Who's better: Stephen Fry or Hugh Laurie?

Stephen Fry in Kingdom for ITV - which has become a Sunday night staple on ITV1 Photograph: ITV/Rex Features/ITV / Rex Features

Hugh Laurie as Gregory House - described in the Washington Post as 'the most electrifying character to hit television in years'. But is he on Twitter? Photograph: c.20thC.Fox/Everett/Rex Features/c.20thC.Fox/Everett / Rex Features

The pair in their relative youth. Here's how their parents match up: Hugh Laurie’s dad, William George Ranald Mundell Laurie, was a British physician and ­Olympic gold medallist (for coxless fours). Fry’s less terrifyingly-named dad Alan John Fry was a physicist and inventor Photograph: Steve Poole/Daily Mail Rex Features/Steve Poole / Daily Mail / Rex Features

In 1983 for the on-location sketchshow Alfresco with, from left, Ben Elton, Siobhan Redmond, Emma Thompson and Paul Shearer Photograph: ITV/Rex Features/ITV / Rex Features

Which of these Blackadder gags is funnier? a) George (Laurie): "In the school debating society I was voted Boy Least Likely to Complete a Coherent .... erm ... Blackadder: Sentence? George: Yes.” Or b) Melchett (Fry): "Something’s the matter. Something sinister and something grotesque. And what’s worse is that it’s going on right here under my very nose. Blackadder : Sir, your moustache is lovely.” Photograph: Rex Features/Rex Features

Fry and Laurie on Saturday Night Live - but which is hotter? There’s something about a slightly chubby Englishman in a tweed jacket, isn’t there? By contrast, as Dr House, the gaunt, misanthropic, cane-wielding Laurie resembles Rochester in Jane Eyre, the kind of brooding crumpet who drives straight women and gay men wild with desire Photograph: Rex Features/Rex Features

Jeeves and Wooster: Bertie Wooster (Laurie) being buried up to his head in the sand by Jeeves (Stephen Fry). Will Fry wish he'd finished the job if House wins out on Sunday night? Photograph: ITV/Rex Features/ITV / Rex Features

Laurie has enjoyed film success in Monsters vs Aliens, 101 Dalmations, Stuart Little and Stuart Little 2, in which he is pictured here ... Photograph: Allstar/Cinetext/COLUMBIA/Allstar/Cinetext/COLUMBIA

... whereas Stephen Fry played the lead role in the Oscar Wilde biopic ... Photograph: Rex Features/Rex Features

... and the unforgivable Peter's Friends 1992 - alongside Laurie, Kenneth Branagh, Tony Slattery and Emma Thompson Photograph: Allstar/Cinetext/BBC/Allstar/Cinetext/BBC