17 Aug 07
Outnumbered Television
Back in January 2004, comedy writer Andy Hamilton, (co-creator of Drop the Dead Donkey), wrote in the Independent that he would never write for BBC 1 again, "because the channel has become obsessed by short-term ratings and is governed by focus groups".
This was after his show Trevor's World of Sport, was apparently scuttled by BBC Scheduling, and never got a massive audience because they couldn't find it. As Hamilton wrote;
"You may have caught a few episodes. If so, you deserve a bloody medal, because it was not an easy show to catch. In fact, it wasn't really a series at all, it was, effectively, two half-series with a big gap in the middle."
After just three episodes the BBC suddenly reconsidered its placement - Friday at 9.30pm - and pulled it from broadcast, returning it to the screen, after a two week interlude, on Mondays at a later hour. This was a terrible news to me, as I really enjoyed Trevor's World of Sport, but eventually he revitalized the show on BBC Radio 4, and since then 3 series have been broadcast. Anyway, he seems to have forgiven the BBC because starting this Autumn he is back with his co-writer on Drop the Dead Donkey, Guy Jenkin with a brand new comedy series.
Outnumbered stars Hugh Dennis, Claire Skinner and Samantha Bond, in a sitcom about a family in London where the parents are 'outnumbered' by their three children - aged five, seven and eleven. Unlike "family sitcoms" such as My Family, the series is filmed without an audience, and includes elements of improvisation.
"It is scripted but there is this element of improvisation," Hamilton told MediaGuardian.co.uk.
"We don't put the children in positions they haven't experienced but this will hopefully make it more real, giving a sense of the stuff small kids do come up with."
One of Hamilton's other creations is Old Harry's Game, a sitcom set in hell, which has been running on BBC Radio 4 since 1995, with a new series expected this year. The show is for my money the funniest program broadcast in the UK for years, and on that basis alone - Outnumbered likely to be a lot of fun. The scripts contain an element of improvisation and, with the comedy going out post-watershed we think we're safe in saying this isn't going to be another bland, boring family sitcom.
Apparently I am not challenged in that opinion, over on tvscoop.tv John Beresford's feelings were not so good:
"It's not sounding very good so far is it? And then there's the fact that it's going to star Hugh Dennis. He's usually about as funny as putting your nuts in a grinder, so when this new series airs later this year (provisionally after the BBC One 10pm news) you won't find me anywhere near it."
Sorry John, but I think you are going to be proved wrong.