Alan Bennett (I)

ITV3, never previously a destination channel, looked as if it might have a hit on its hands with Ladies of Letters, a TV adaptation of Carole Hayman and Lou Wakefield's popular series of books of the same name consisting of letters between two fictional friends. It had previously been made into a popular Radio 4 series starring Prunella Scales and Patricia Routledge, and the television version had secured the equally redoubtable Anne Reid and Maureen Lipman. But, sadly, the transition proved an unhappy one.

During yesterday's opener, the sight of the two actresses speaking the letters to camera while engaged in a bit of cooking or a surreptitious sherry was far from enough to hold the attention. The letters bore only the minimum of narrative momentum and the subtleties of the occasional malapropism and shift in tone were overwhelmed by one's sheer desperation to see an actual event take place on screen. Perhaps the prosaic lesson of it all is that Ladies of Letters may be very jolly and wry on the radio but when it comes to TV, unless you've got a writer of the calibre of Alan Bennett on board, it's just too boring to watch talking heads for half an hour.

Serena Davies, The Telegraph, 3rd February 2009

Analysis by The Custard

With great guile, writer Karl Minns weaves together three monologues to tell the stories of the three members of girl group Cats Eyes, teasing out the true story. He shows the same touches as Alan Bennett did in Talking Heads, only gently revealing that the people talking about their lives are painting a rosy picture of misery.

The Custard TV, 9th November 2008

Unless you're a regular at the Edinburgh Fringe you've probably never heard of Count Arthur Strong. But you will soon, for he is a brilliant comedy creation. Strong is a self-deluded, exceptionally rude and linguistically challenged old luvvie who sounds a bit like Alan Bennett might if he was morphed with Alexei Sayle. In real life, Strong is the comedian Steve Delaney, but reality is thankfully overlooked in this warped day-in-the-life of 'a doyen of light entertainment'. I laughed until I hurt.

Radio Times, 23rd December 2005