Kenny Doughty

Like another of Sky1's comedies, Starlings, Ruth Jones's series remains adept at observing the humour and hardships of life. As season two continues, Stella (Jones) has confessed to Sean (Kenny Doughty) about her night with her ex (Mark Lewis Jones) and not surprisingly he is planning to leave Pontyberry - but there is a twist in the tale. Her mood isn't improved when she hears that her eldest child, Luke (Craig Gallivan), has been deported from Canada, while undertaker Paula (Elizabeth Berrington) falls out with Dai (Owen Teale) because of his tendency to make-up the dead to "look like Joan Rivers".

Ruth Jones's beautifully observed comedy drama about a working mother in the Welsh valleys makes a welcome return. It picks up the story with Stella (Jones) and boyfriend Sean (Kenny Doughty) preparing for the arrival of their new baby, but Stella is having doubts as she's not sure whether Sean or Rob (Mark Lewis Jones), her ex who is now working in Canada, is the father.

In the real world, Stella would so be with solid, dependable lollipop man Alan. But this is Ruth Jones's cheery comedy drama so, despite the gritty Welsh setting, she bags hunky Sean (Kenny Doughty), the tousled young man that does... quite a lot. But is he a keeper or just a fly-by-night? And has prospective son-in-law Sunil been playing away?

Ruth Jones's enjoyably observant comedy about a Welsh single mother finds her character, Stella, in buoyant mood after a night with dishy painter and decorator Sean (Kenny Doughty). "Oh my God, I'm 42 and I'm snogging in the street," she says. Meanwhile, lovestruck, and pregnant, daughter Emma (Catrin Stewart) suspects her boyfriend Sunil (Rory Girvan) is cheating on her when her brother Luke sees him with another girl. And so the ever-protective Stella undertakes a reconnaissance mission to find out exactly what he's up to.

Ruth Jones's Welsh sitcom ambles on pleasantly but uneventfully in this third episode. The death of a local rugby legend promises to revive ailing fortunes when a lavish funeral is planned. Most of the humour revolves around the fact that his name was 'Dick', an innuendo that's repeated way too many times even before guest star Neil Kinnock gets saddled with it during his speech (his performance is fine, mind you - they have the sense to put him behind a lectern where he's at home). Eamonn Holmes also appears in a tailor-made Sky News broadcast, but other than that this is decidedly unremarkable and never hilarious. Still, props for having a hot younger guy, Sean (Kenny Doughty) mooning after Jones's mumsy character, rather than the other way around.