FEATURE: Remembering Caroline Aherne

This article was originally published in The Big Issue in June 2026.

Of all the great artists and entertainers who passed away in that accursed year 2016, Caroline Aherne was one of the hardest losses. She was only 52, a relatively young woman who should still by rights be with us now.

She wouldn't welcome the accolade, but she was also a national treasure, a comedian, writer and actor of exceptional talent who, quite simply, made an awful lot of people very happy. We didn't just admire her work, whether as Mrs Merton or as co-creator/star of The Royle Family, we liked her as a person.

At the risk of sounding weirdly parasocial, she belonged to that vanishingly rare breed of celebrities you could easily imagine having as a friend, or at the very least an acquaintance who makes you laugh at work or down the pub.

That's a quality some celebrities try very hard to cultivate, but Aherne always felt like the real, unselfconscious deal. Naturally funny, likeable and clever (she had an IQ of 176, so an actual genius), her huge success and generations-spanning appeal were essentially rooted in the fact that she was an 'ordinary' working-class person with an extraordinary gift for capturing our shared life experience through a prism of acutely observed comedy.

The characters she created, usually in conjunction with her close friend and writing partner Craig Cash, were people we recognised from our everyday lives. We've all met a Jim Royle, for example, that lazy, miserly, often boorish yet fundamentally decent Royle Family patriarch. He might even be a member of your own family. He might even be you. And that's okay, you weren't being held up to abject ridicule.

Much like the Royles themselves, Aherne always took the piss with warmth and affection.

Even when she cheekily mocked her celebrity guests in the deceptively innocent, purple-rinsed guise of OAP chat show host Mrs Merton, there was never anything cruel or sneering about her comedy, she never punched down.

“So Debbie, what first attracted you to the millionaire Paul Daniels?”

That loaded question, which Aherne as Merton faux-gently fired at the magician's wife and glamorous on-stage assistant Debbie McGee, is rightly regarded as a classic line. An immortal put-down. It's important to remember, however, that McGee didn't laugh through gritted teeth. She was genuinely tickled by Aherne's willingness to go there. She got the joke, and because she actually loved her talented millionaire husband, didn't feel offended at all.

One suspects that Aherne instinctively knew that: Debbie will be up for a daft laugh, just as I am.

Her instincts also proved correct during that famous Mrs Merton interview with the racist comedian Bernard Manning, an encounter in which Aherne basically breaks character to challenge him on his bigotry. Her elderly studio audience laugh along with him at first, but when she gradually exposes just how unrepentantly horrible he was, you can sense their discomfort and inner conflict. As Aherne later acknowledged, some of those pensioners were probably quite racist themselves, but you would hope that interview made them question some of their knee-jerk prejudices.

She did that a lot in her work, it was a defining characteristic. As her friend and occasional collaborator Steve Coogan observed in the touching 2003 BBC documentary Caroline Aherne: Queen of Comedy – which is still available on iPlayer – she was inarguable proof that “clever, intelligent comedy can appeal to everyone.”

Most of us first became aware of Aherne via her memorable contributions to The Fast Show. One of her recurring characters, Our Janine, was a pregnant, working-class teenage girl whose stream-of-consciousness monologues oscillated between naive absurdity and utter bleakness.

But you never got the impression that Aherne was laughing at this kid, it's more that she was – like so many great comedians – fully aware that comedy and tragedy, absurdity and pathos, are sometimes barely indistinguishable. They exist side by side, poking at each other like family-members squashed on an old settee.

Compare her treatment of Janine to the way Catherine Tate and Little Britain depicted working-class teenage girls in their depressingly popular sketches. Scornful stereotypes perpetrated by middle-class comedians going for cheap and easy laughs.

Matt Lucas has, at least, latterly expressed sincere regret about that. Caroline Aherne, however, never had to apologise for anything. Sure, some of those later Royle Family festive specials were atrocious, utterly gobsmacking disasters in which formerly nuanced and beloved characters were turned into cartoon caricatures of their former selves.

God only knows what happened there, but fortunately no one ever thinks of them when they remember the woman who helped to redefine what a British sitcom could be. Caroline Aherne adored Mike Leigh and Ken Loach, and saw no reason why you couldn't combine those influences to create a programme in which nothing and everything happens all at once. We laughed, we cried, we loved spending time with that family.

Aherne was adamant that it shouldn't have a laugh-track, that it should all be shot on film, in real time. She knew it would work, just let it breathe and be what it is. The people will come, they will understand. And they did.

Whenever Ricky Gervais boasts that The Office changed the sitcom landscape, remember this: The Royle Family did it first.

When funny people die – and there were few funnier than Caroline Aherne – our grief is tinged with a kind of selfish disbelief and resentment. This person will no longer be around to make us laugh, and that's not fair. But the work lives on, forever.

We didn't know Caroline Aherne, she owed us nothing. That she gave us so much was a blessing.

Caroline Aherne: Rebel in Disguise, a new biography by David Scott, is out now via Manchester University Press.

BOOK REVIEW: Young Once: A Life Less Heavy by Nigel Planer

This article was originally published in The Big Issue in March 2026.

Young Once: A Life Less Heavy by Nigel Planer, out now, John Murray Press, £22

The actor and comedian Nigel Planer is fully aware that, when he dies, his obituaries will lead with the fact that he played Neil in The Young Ones. He doesn’t mind. On the contrary, he’s proud of the role he played in the alternative comedy revolution and he’s grateful for the opportunities it afforded him.

As his highly entertaining and endearingly droll memoir Young Once: A Life Less Heavy reminds us, Planer has enjoyed a long, successful career doing something he absolutely loves. It’s been quite the colourful life so far; he’s packed a lot in. 

Smart, funny, self-aware and thoroughly likeable, Planer is an engaging raconteur with anecdotes to spare. Inevitably, the most riveting chapters are devoted to his memories of working with the groundbreaking Comic Strip gang, a period he writes about with a vivid combination of fondness and unsentimental honesty.  

Scholars of memoirs written by ageing alternative comedians will be pleased to note that, as always, Keith Allen comes across as a massive pain in the arse, while Rik Mayall emerges – just as you’d hope – as a charismatic force of nature. Planer’s account of the day his old friend died is so very sad and beautifully written.  

It’s also a touching love story. Planer first met Roberta when he was an unknown jobbing actor in the late ’70s. They hit it off immediately; actual soulmates. To cut a long story short – it involves a long period of estrangement and some other romantic relationships, which Planer covers discreetly – they’re now happily married.  

As he notes in his foreword, the whole thing resembles an utterly implausible Richard Curtis romcom. But so much better than that.

BOOK REVIEW: A Mind Of My Own by Kathy Burke

This article was originally published in The Big Issue in January 2026.

A Mind Of My Own by Kathy Burke is out now (Gallery UK, £22)

Kathy Burke’s mother, Bridget, died of cancer when Burke was only two years old. Her late father, Pat, was an alcoholic prone to violent rages. As Burke half-jokingly declares in the foreword to her frank, funny and wise autobiography, A Mind of My Own, Pat is the only ghostwriter you’ll find in these pages.

This is no misery memoir by any stretch of the imagination, Burke is far too self-aware for that sort of nonsense, but she does capture the stark reality and tedium of growing up with an alcoholic parent in the house. She and her two older brothers would long for the peace that would descend when he was asleep, away on days-long benders, or those occasional periods of sobriety.

Burke also writes about her own problems with heavy drinking in the 80s and discreetly alludes to a dark period in the early '90s – “the bad, sad days” – when she was involved in a difficult romantic relationship.

Otherwise, this is an upbeat and enoyable account of a talented working-class woman who only ever wanted to act, write, direct and entertain.

Burke comes across just as you’d expect, a thoroughly decent, kind and non-judgemental person who reserves her ire for those who deserve it, eg she didn’t enjoy working with a pre-Trainspotting Danny Boyle (“He reminded me of a supercilious priest from my childhood.”), and once called Helena Bonham-Carter a “stupid cunt” in a letter to Time Out after HBC complained in all sincerity that it’s harder for attractive posh actors to evade typecasting than it is for “non-pretty, working-class” actors. She has no time at all for patronising luvvies.

Seriously, be more like Kathy Burke.

BOOK REVIEW: A Fine Line Between Stupid and Clever: The Story of Spinal Tap, by Rob Reiner, Christopher Guest, Michael McKean & Harry Shearer

This article was originally published in The Big Issue in November 2025.

A Fine Line Between Stupid and Clever: The Story of Spinal Tap, Rob Reiner, Christopher Guest, Michael McKean, Harry Shearer, out now, Simon & Schuster, £17.49

One of the greatest comedy films of all time, This Is Spinal Tap didn't make much of an impact upon its release in 1984.

An improvised mockumentary about a fictional English rock band played by American comic actors who weren't particularly well-known was, apparently, a tough sell. However, it gradually became a cult hit on VHS and is now part of the cultural fabric.

In A Fine Line Between Stupid and Clever: The Story of Spinal Tap, the film's director Rob Reiner recounts its making alongside co-creators Christopher Guest, Michael McKean and Harry Shearer. A fascinatingly fact-packed gift for Tapheads, it's as much of a labour of love as the film itself.

What began as a sketch for a 1979 TV comedy special hosted by Reiner quickly took on a life of its own when Guest, McKean and Shearer realised they loved improvising - or 'schnadling' as Guest calls it - in character as these none-too-bright yet endearingly sincere and pretentious rockers.

Reiner, a successful sitcom actor who wanted to direct, was similarly smitten, and lo the film was born. Well, almost. Armed with a 20-minute demo reel and a four-page document detailing the band's eventful history, it took four demoralising years of fruitless meetings with baffled executives before they eventually met a producer, Karen Murphy, who understood what they were trying to do. A masterpiece ensued.

Amidst all the generously detailed trivia on the film's production - e.g. they wanted Michael Palin to play Tap's manager, but were too nervous to approach one of their comedy heroes - the book also foregrounds the talents, both musically and comedically, of its three main players.

Guest and McKean in particular are music obsessives who've been friends since the late '60s; their enduring closeness is mirrored by that of their Tap alter egos Nigel and David, albeit without the petty squabbling. Like all the best musical parodists they have a keen understanding of, and affection for, their target (certain jokes in the film are based on first-hand experience).

The authors also reflect upon the strange afterlife of Tap - much like the Monkees and the Rutles they became A Real Band who played shows and released albums - the decades-long legal battle to actually earn money from the film, and the making of its belated and not-bad-at-all sequel.

We're also treated to an enjoyable epilogue in which they 'schnadle' in character, possibly for one last time.

A delightful book.

BOOK REVIEW: Comedy Samurai: 40 Years of Blood, Guts and Laughter by Larry Charles

This article was originally published in The Big Issue in September 2025.

Comedy Samurai: 40 Years of Blood, Guts and Laughter, Larry Charles, out now, Grand Central Publishing, £22.15

Comedy guru Larry Charles is a celebrated writer/director whose credits include Seinfeld, Curb Your Enthusiasm and the Borat movie. He's an inherently subversive countercultural dude with a dark, absurdist sense of humour.

In Comedy Samurai: Forty Years of Blood, Guts and Laughter, he analyses his craft with good-natured intensity. Charles takes comedy seriously, as all great comic artisans do. It's a fascinating, colourful book.

He lavishes praise upon his "accidental mentors" Larry David, Sacha Baron Cohen and Bob Dylan (Charles co-wrote and directed the 2003 Dylan vehicle Masked and Anonymous, the making of which sounds just as bewildering as the film itself).

But he also writes, with palpable sadness and exasperation, about the disintegration of his relationships with David and Cohen.

He hasn't spoken to David, with whom he'd been friends for over 40 years, since 2022, when David put the last minute kibosh on a documentary Charles had made about him. According to Charles, his subject felt he came across as too serious and emotional in the film, an image he wasn't keen to share with fans of the fictional Larry David from Curb. Ironically, the real Larry David's petty, neurotic and cowardly handling of this situation was entirely on-brand.

As for Cohen, by the time he made his third and final film with Charles, The Dictator, he'd apparently become an egomaniacal control freak surrounded by yes-men who was impossible to deal with. Charles writes about the experience like someone with PTSD.

I see no reason to doubt his version of events in both these cases, as he comes across as a very honest, thoughtful, generous and decent man of integrity who tends to criticise himself more than anyone else.

Comedy, it's a joyous, painful business.

TV Review: DETECTORISTS + MOTHERLAND

This article was originally published in The Courier on 11th November 2017.

https://www.thecourier.co.uk/category/lifestyle/entertainment/tv-film/

DETECTORISTS: Wednesday, BBC Four

MOTHERLAND: Tuesday, BBC Two

When DETECTORISTS rambles off forever in a few weeks time, it’ll be like saying goodbye to dear old friends.

Fans of this beloved cult sitcom will understand my bittersweet conflict when it returned for a third and final series last week. Lovely to have it back, but I don’t want it to end.

Mackenzie Crook, who writes, directs and co-stars, should be applauded for creating a charming little fictional universe which, for all its underlying melancholy, offers sun-dappled respite from the escalating madness of our brutal world.

If you’ve somehow committed the baffling error of never having watched it, a swift precis. Laconic Andy (Crook) and fastidious Lance (Toby Jones) are best friends and metal detector enthusiasts based in picturesque rural Essex. The defining image of the series is the pair of them gently trawling a large field in search of life-changing treasure. They never give up.

The pace is leisurely and comforting. The character-driven humour is droll, humane and prickled with glimmers of absurdity (Andy and Lance’s buffoonish rivals resemble Simon and Garfunkel). Our endearing duo chat about their quietly complicated lives while detecting or over a pint in the local pub. A winning cast of mildly eccentric supporting characters mill around them amiably.

On the soundtrack, haunting English folk music awakens aeons of ghosts from this green and pleasant land (the latest episode even paid explicit homage to M.R. James’ classic ghost story Whistle And I’ll Come to You).

That, in essence, is all there is to it. And yet Crook, without strain or pretension, conjures a bewitching spell from this simple template. Detectorists is gentle but never bland, poignant but never saccharine. Lance, Andy and co are fully-rounded, funny characters. It’s been a pleasure spending time with them.

The final hurdle is a solar energy farm being built on their beloved terrain. Their shell-shocked expressions when they heard the news spoke volumes. It was as if they’d been bereaved. That field is an escape hatch, an oasis of calm and enrichment. What will they do without it?

Crook, I suspect, knows we feel the same way about his unique creation.

A new sitcom from Sharon Horgan, Holly Walsh, Graham Linehan and his wife Helen, MOTHERLAND is the cold metropolitan yin to Detectorists’ warm bucolic yang. It’s ruthlessly engineered to make parenthood look like an unbearable waking nightmare, especially if you’re comfortably middle-class and white.

I’m all for downbeat comedy when done well, but Motherland is so clinically intent on exploring this subject without a shred of sentiment, it ends up coming across as faintly depressing. Outnumbered, which covered similar territory, was never sentimental either, but it was full of wit and charm. Motherland is a migraine.

Linehan, Horgan and Walsh have all written good, sharp, funny sitcoms in the past – their collective credits include Father Ted, The IT Crowd, Pulling, Catastrophe and the underrated Dead Boss – but this joint effort is surprisingly dull and unlikeable.

It revolves around an aggravating central performance from Anna Maxwell-Martin – an actor whose work I’ve enjoyed elsewhere - as Julia, a permanently stressed and angry mother of two young children. You don’t always have to sympathise with sitcom characters to find them funny, but Julia’s clenched cynicism and intense exhaustion are exhausting to watch.

Episode one lumbered her with that hoary old sitcom standby, the disastrous children’s birthday party. A tiresome volume of awkwardness ensued. There’s something quite self-satisfied about the way in which Motherland digs viewers in the ribs with its pedestrian first-world observations. It’s like eavesdropping on a group of parents moaning about their fundamentally privileged lives. The smugness is unbearable.

That wouldn’t matter so much if the gag-rate was higher, but Motherland is unforgivably sparse on that front.

The only enjoyable aspect is the deadpan performance by Diane Morgan (aka Screen Wipe’s Philomena Cunk) as Julia’s best friend. She provides a few wry smiles. It's a chilly disappointment otherwise.

TV Review: PETER KAY'S CAR SHARE + BUCKET

This article was originally published in The Courier on 15 April 2017.

https://www.thecourier.co.uk/category/lifestyle/entertainment/tv-film/

PETER KAY’S CAR SHARE: Tuesday, BBC One

BUCKET: Thursday, BBC Four

Like a great phoenix night rising from the ashes of obsolescence, the artistic rebirth of Peter Kay has been something to behold.

Despite his continued draw as a stand-up, his reputation as a great observational character comedian had become tarnished – seemingly forever – by years of cynically repackaged DVDs, slapdash memoirs, self-serving chat show appearances and turkeys such as Max & Paddy’s Road to Nowhere and that mirthless X Factor parody.

Even previously loyal fans had begun to regard him as a lazy sell-out.

But then – as Adam Curtis would say – something happened that nobody expected. In 2015, Kay returned with two delightful hit comedies.

In Danny Baker’s Cradle to Grave, he focused solely on acting to marvellous effect. Even more impressively, the BAFTA-winning PETER KAY’S CAR SHARE proved that Kay could still co-create a warm, rich, laugh-out-loud sitcom.

Any concerns that he couldn’t sustain this comeback were cheerfully vanquished by Car Share’s return. It’s just as charming and funny as before.

Picking up where series one left off, it gently toyed with the burgeoning romance between bumptious supermarket manager John (Kay) and his sweetly daft, naïve employee Kayleigh (Sian Gibson, who co-writes with Kay and Paul Coleman).

Though set almost entirely within the confines of John’s car, the series occasionally finds new wrinkles in its premise. So, John and Keyleigh spent most of episode one chatting via phone on their respective journeys to work. These subtle difference are seismic in Car Share’s little world.

Kayleigh’s new digs might’ve scuppered their old routine, but they clearly can’t live without their daily conversations.

John was reticent to admit that his heart was lifted by Kayleigh’s gift of a Now 48 CD – only Kay could derive cockle-warming mileage from Pure and Simple by Hear’Say – but that didn’t dent their natural chemistry. It was like being reunited with two old friends.

And that’s the modest magic of Car Share, it’s a pure and simple comedy about two likeable characters shooting the breeze.

Even the broader sitcom twist of John’s altercation with a belligerent cyclist going viral on YouTube didn’t feel out of place, as it supported the show’s basic humanity: in its unfussy way, it showed how innocent people can become internet villains/laughing stocks by being subjected to duplicitous editing.

If Kay and Gibson make it look easy, new sitcom BUCKET proves just how hard it is to get laughs from two people talking almost uninterrupted.

Writer Frog Stone co-stars as Fran, the reserved, virginal daughter of Mim, a septuagenarian free-spirited hippie played by Miriam Margolyes, an actress upon whom the euphemistic terms “irrepressible” and “redoubtable” are permanently affixed like warning signs.

Their dysfunctional relationship is driven by one joke, hammered into the ground: Mim won’t stop talking frankly about sex, much to Fran’s understandable exasperation.

Old women saying “hilariously” inappropriate things is one of the laziest comedy clichés, but I suppose we should be grateful that she didn’t get high or do a rap. Not yet anyway.

Another insurmountable problem: their nasty bickering is depressing, and no amount of laboured, unconvincing, last-minute pathos can atone for that.

I’m all for black comedy, but Bucket reminded me of how much Steptoe and Son made us care about those characters, even when they were behaving despicably to each other.

We’re supposed to find Mim charmingly eccentric, but she just comes across as an unbearable nuisance. Bucket is inept, a clumsy stab at rude, broad comedy with delusions of depth.

TV Review: LONDON SPY and JOSH

This article was originally published in The Dundee Courier on 14th November 2015.

http://www.thecourier.co.uk/lifestyle

London Spy: Monday, BBC Two

Josh: Wednesday, BBC Three

Paul Whitelaw

A few years ago Ben Whishaw starred in Criminal Justice, a gripping BBC drama about a young man trapped in a waking nightmare after being wrongly accused of murder. Last week he starred in London Spy, a gripping BBC drama about a young man trapped in, well, you get the picture.

It's easy to see why Whishaw, a fine, interesting actor, gets cast in such roles. His ability to project boyish, vulnerable charm makes him an ideal candidate for torture of this kind. The scrawny sod, he's innately sympathetic.

In London Spy he plays Danny, a lonely gay romantic on a path of self-destruction. Early one morning by the Thames, after a solitary night of hedonism, he has a chance encounter with Alex, a fellow lost soul.

In typical romantic fiction style, they couldn't be more different. Danny is garrulous and indie-kid scruffy, while Alex is an inscrutable model of Savile Row elegance with the face of a sad-eyed camel. After a faltering start, they eventually embark upon an intense eight-month relationship.

Socially maladroit Alex claims to be a virgin, so Danny – who has a complex sexual past – takes care of that. They fall madly in love. It's all rather touching, and hardly what you'd expect from a drama titled London Spy. We're all expecting some sort of thriller twist, of course, but the slow-burning build created an unexpected, disarming mood.

Then one day Alex mysteriously disappears. Danny is heartbroken. Under curious circumstances, he eventually manages to enter Alex's apartment, where he's shocked – as you would be – to discover a secret attic full of bondage gear drugs, sex toys... and Alex's corpse squeezed inside a trunk.

Suddenly, and quite brilliantly, a sensitive love story has transformed into a bizarre, dark conspiracy thriller. Naturally, Danny is suspect number one, but how can he answer questions about a partner who'd apparently lied to him all along? It's a classic Hitchcockian 'Wrong Man' premise, made all the more effective for taking its time to establish character first.

Handsomely shot, thoughtfully written and superbly performed – Jim Broadbent, without a hint of “old queen” cliché, is wonderful as Danny's wealthy saviour/mentor – London Spy is one of the boldest dramas of the year so far. Despite playing along with standard spy conventions, it's emotionally richer and more offbeat than yer average thriller.

Writer Tom Rob Smith is the partner of Ben Stephenson, the Controller of BBC Drama Commissioning. Normally that would set off the nepotism klaxon to cacophonous levels, but in this case it's clearly been commissioned on its own merits. No, really. It's excellent.

By contrast, Josh, a new sitcom vehicle for comedian Josh Widdicombe, is entirely standard stuff. Based around three flatmates in their early thirties, plus their know-it-all landlord (Jack Dee, clocking in), its humour is almost exclusively based around tired, overdone pop culture puns and references: vaguely amusing pub banter at best.

It's also cursed by a particular kind of 21^st century comedy performance style that's like Kryptonite to myself and anyone else who's latched onto it. It's basically an irksome marriage of Alan Partridge emphasis, Martin Freeman awkwardness and Bill Nighy vagueness, which around 80% of British comic actors under 40 have appropriated in the last decade. 

Widdicombe is particularly guilty. He sounds like a helium-addled Partridge with lockjaw.

Still, nice use of Big Maybelle's version of 96 Tears over the end credits. I'll give them that.

TV Review: JEKYLL AND HYDE and DETECTORISTS

This article was originally published in The Dundee Courier on 31 October 2015.

http://www.thecourier.co.uk/lifestyle

Jekyll and Hyde: Sunday, STV

Detectorists: Thursday, BBC Four

Paul Whitelaw

Ever since Doctor Who reasserted its position as the reigning champ of weekend family viewing, ITV has made a few, almost grudging, attempts at establishing a suitable rival.

Time-hopping dinosaur romp Primeval was their most successful effort, but even its biggest fans would concede that it never troubled Doctor Who in terms of capturing the wider imagination. And the less said about Demons – which only shell-shocked TV critics and around 50% of those who made it choose to remember anyway – the better.

So it's perhaps surprising that it's taken them this long to enlist the talents of Fast Show alumnus Charlie Higson, a critically acclaimed, best-selling author whose success with the Young James Bond novels has secured his reputation as a gifted purveyor of intelligent children's fiction. On the basis of episode one, Jekyll and Hyde already feels like ITV's first serious challenger to Doctor Who's crown.

However, it's not without its flaws. An unofficial sequel to Robert Louis Stevenson's classic exploration of a vexing split personality disorder, it follows Jekyll's grandson, Robert, as he gradually unearths his poisoned family lineage.

Raised by a family in Ceylon – hence his impeccable upper-class English accent – he's introduced as a kindly colonial physician capable of superhuman feats of strength when emotionally piqued. He's basically a 1930s Hulk, and Higson doesn't stint on the comparisons. With its canted angles, stylised action sequences and somewhat campy feel, the show is framed as a live-action comic book.

That heightened-reality approach ensures that its flashes of violence and horror don't feel inappropriate for a family audience. Children can differentiate between this world and ours. Granted, the sight of a dog-hybrid 'Harbinger' – Higson's Jekyll universe if full of bizarre creatures - was unsettling for even a man as robust and fearless as myself, but God forbid I should represent the psyche of the average child.

More troubling, perhaps, was the fiery death of Robert's adoptive Indian family, murdered at the hands of an intriguingly sadistic villain in British military uniform. Then again, I doubt many children were conscious of its significance as an historical metaphor. They were probably just perturbed by the spectacle of some kindly people being incinerated by a greasy Englishman with an evil moustache. So that's okay.

Though peppered with clunky exposition – hopefully that will subside after this attention-grabbing scene-setter – this was a decent introduction.

The charismatic Tom Bateman handles his twin roles impressively: a Colin Firth-esque bumbler in Jekyll repose, a lascivious demon in two-fisted Hyde mode. From Frederic March to Jerry Lewis, Jekyll/Hyde tales rely upon acting versatility. Higson's reinvention shows promise, but Bateman is selling it so far.

There's something deeply heartening about the deserved success of writer/director/actor Mackenzie Crook's award-winning sleeper hit Detectorists. Maybe it's because no one ever expected Gareth from The Office to come up with a sitcom of such depth, wit and sensitivity.

It makes Derek, the saccharine dogs dinner served up by his former employer, Ricky Gervais, look even worse by comparison.

A low-key sitcom about two charmingly co-dependent metal detectorists - the other played by the great Toby Jones - when it returned last week I instantly eased back into its rural rhythms. Space precludes me from writing more, but I urge you to befriend this wonderful show. It's one of the best British comedies of the last ten years.