Jo Brand

There are some real loud laughs to be had from Getting On, but they aren't comfortable, as this is a black, black comedy set in one of the more decrepit outposts of the NHS. Co-writers and stars Jo Brand, Joanna Scanlan and Vicki Pepperdine are the hopelessly incompetent staff of a pitiful geriatric ward. Brand and Scanlan are nurses rendered almost immobile by their own indolence and stupidity, while Pepperdine is a doctor who can't see her way past politically correct, coy euphemisms, as in "the deceased party" for "dead woman".

Getting On bears the fingerprints of The Thick of It, and not just because Peter Capaldi directs. It has the same ruthlessly naturalistic, documentary feel as its mighty predecessor and leaves the same lingering feeling that beneath the humour there's something very serious going on.

This is followed by Jo Brand's superb new comedy, Getting On. Set in the geriatric ward of an NHS hospital, it is centred around four brilliantly observed members of staff - a nurse newly returned to the NHS (Jo Brand), a subtly insane nursing sister (Joanna Scanlan), a male matron (Ricky Grover) and a brittle doctor (Vicki Pepperdine). Directed by Peter Capaldi, it is filmed in the verité style of The Office and The Thick of It using shaky cameras and dialogue that sounds overheard rather than scripted. It was the wonderful surprise of the week.

Here's something to savour from writer/stars Joanna Scanlan, Vicki Pepperdine, Jo Brand and director Peter Capaldi (The Thick Of It) - an extraordinarily funny, jet-black three-part sitcom set in a miserable NHS geriatric ward where the nurses are hopelessly bounded by bureaucracy and political correctness. Frighteningly familiar at times - which is surely partly down to the fact Brand used to be a nurse herself before she launched into stand-up.

Peter Capaldi has made virtually no mistakes since Local Hero. His is a CV that screams 'class' louder than someone at a pub quiz tiebreak asked to name Andrew McCarthy's debut film. So it's no surprise that when he turned his hand to directing a sitcom, it's extremely well made. Jo Brand and two less well known actresses play nurses on a medical ward that's overloaded with OAPs. They have to deal with NHS bureacracy which requires them to fill in forms and file faecal matter. It's a cynical, dry and washed through with realism. It is a lot like The Thick Of It, but understandably, and that's not a bad thing.

You really shouldn't laugh. That's what you'll keep telling yourself during the first episode of this dazzlingly low-key new comedy set in a geriatric ward.

But it's no good putting on your politically correct face and sitting there tutting, because this is a relentlessly funny, workplace comedy that is right up there with The Thick Of It or The Office.

Part of the BBC's coyly titled Grey Expectations strand about the joys of ageing, the morbid humour is as black as death itself. Produced on a budget that would barely cover hair and make-up on Ugly Betty, it's written by Jo Brand, Joanna Scanlan and Vicki Pepperdine who also star as the self-interested, bored and incompetent medical staff. To add to its credentials, it's directed by Peter Capaldi, most famous of course as The Thick Of It's explosive spin doctor Malcolm Tucker.

Brand, as everyone knows, used to be a nurse in a psychiatric hospital which must surely account for the way that every horrible detail is so ruthlessly observed. You feel you could be watching a documentary filmed by an undercover C4 researcher with a camera hidden in a bed pan.

As the patronising, brisk, and utterly ineffectual Dr Pippa Moore (obsessed tonight with a poo that has been left on a chair), Pepperdine is absolutely spot-on and instantly recognisable, while the team's joint dealings with a patient who speaks no English are toe-curlingly sublime.

But just remember, you really shouldn't laugh.

Jo Brand takes on the NHS in comedy Getting On

The former psychiatric nurse and comedian draws on her experiences working in mental health for TV series, Getting On.

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Jo Brand - I won't do Mock The Week again

"I don't do Mock The Week any more and neither do some male standups I know who have tried it once. We just didn't like the prospect of having to bite someone's foot off before they let us say something."

BBC faces fresh criticism over offensive remarks about Baroness Thatcher

The BBC is facing fresh criticism after two comedians made offensive remarks about Baroness Thatcher on a prime time quiz show.

In Friday night's episode of QI, Jo Brand, who was caught up in the Carol Thatcher "golliwog" controversy, and Phill Jupitus both made comments which have led to complaints being lodged and further anger from viewers.

BNP can't take a joke: Far-right party complain about Jo Brand

Members of the far-right BNP have complained to police about a joke Jo Brand cracked on Live At The Apollo. The comic was questioned by officers after the group's deputy leader, Simon Darby, claimed that the gag amounted to incitement to cause racial harassment. Bizarrely, he claimed: "The BNP is technically an ethnic group."