Jack Cheshire

DLT Entertainment makes key hires for comedy push

Darren Smith and Jack Cheshire have joined the indie's growing development team on a part time basis, and will be responsible for driving DLT's push into comedy.

The comic strangeness was prevalent in The Wrong Door, a sketch show that relied heavily on technical and CGI trickery. One very funny sketch featured a group of sprites escaping from a bottle and making a poor drunken fool's life that much more horrible by texting a malicious message to his girlfriend and framing him for watching hotel porn.

One young woman was dating a dinosaur, as in Tyrannosaurus Rex, who visits her parents' home and destroys everything within, including eating the family dog. A robot stomps over London asking where it left its house keys, destroying swaths of the metropolis. The show is hit and miss - Superhero Tryouts, an X Factor for wannabe superheroes, was laboured and directionless - but the writers Ben Wheatley and Jack Cheshire (who also direct and produce) have at least originated a novel and bizarre show.

Their strangest creation, and the most brilliantly maddening, is a scientist's unfortunately successful attempt to create a new life form. Somehow a malformed DNA structure means that this creature is the most irritating thing on the planet. The scientists hate it. We hate it. This creature destroys everything it touches, but only after wheedling, pleading and manipulating. Are we there yet? it repeats. Eventually, the guy who took the creature in drove at a post to end it all.

It took two viewings to appreciate The Wrong Door. First time round, we didn't find many laughs from this CGI-enhanced sketch show. A repeat viewing helped it make sense and, while it's not hilarious, writers Ben Wheatley and Jack Cheshire have come up with a programme that does exhibit inventiveness and darkness.