Madeline Smith

A welcome repeat of the enjoyable documentary, shown on BBC Four last year, exploring why sexual frustration still underpins British comedy. Leslie Phillips (star of the risqué Casanova '73) and Lesley Joseph (the insatiable Dorien Green from Birds of a Feather) are among the talking heads waxing lyrical on why Mildred didn't get it from George, why Terry didn't get it from June, and why the charmless Mr Rigsby spent his life wooing Miss Jones.

Narrated by former pin-up Madeline Smith (Phillips's fellow Casanova actress), the programme also examines the impact of the sexual revolution on British and, the more daring, American sitcoms. It suggests that the liberation of The Liver Birds was brought about by the abortion law reform and the introduction of the contraceptive pill, and that the shedding of inhibitions over the decades that followed resulted in the likes of the taboo-busting Gimme Gimme Gimme. But it seems that there's a lot of laughs to be had from being unlucky in love, and producers are sticking with the formula: the leads of The Young Ones, Men Behaving Badly, Ab Fab and the more recent The Inbetweeners got no more sex than their ancestors.

"I never touched your mother until after we were married," announces Alf Garnett. "Well after," adds his wife.

Sex and the Sitcom was all very enjoyable but over far too quickly. Provide your own punchline.

Narrated by Madeline Smith, the cause of erotic frenzy in many a seventies sitcom male - and my adolescent self - the documentary chronicled sexual mores and manners in the UK as reflected in its situation comedies.

Frustration featured quite prominently, as did inadequacy, embarrassment and anxiety, mostly located in male characters like Rigsby, Reginald Perrin and Hancock. Even the arrival of the permissive society failed to loosen the British sitcom's stays, although the programme did find a bizarre and disturbing clip featuring Terry Scott and June Whitfield planning an orgy.

For years the only man seen revelling in the physical delights of the opposite sex was Frankie Howerd in Up Pompeii, testament to what a fine actor he was.

When sex itself eventually made an appearance it was women characters who were invariably in the vanguard - the insatiable Dorian from Birds Of A Feather, Mildred trying to seduce George, Miss Jones' pursuit of Phillip in Rising Damp.

Leslie Phillips did play a sexually predatory man in Casanova '73, but public outrage caused it to lose its prime time spot after three episodes. The sitcom male has remained resolutely inadequate ever since.