Marcia Warren

Preview: Inside No. 9 series 4

Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton's Inside No. 9 returns to BBC Two for its fourth series on Tuesday 2nd January. Here's a spoiler-free review from Sophie who has seen episodes 1-4 of the new series...

Preview - Vicious: A Year

ITV doesn't produce many sitcoms, but when they do they tend to pull in the viewers. Most TV critics may not be fans of Vicious, Benidorm or the revived Birds of a Feather, but the public like them.

Absolutely Fabulous: The movie - bolly good show!

The jokes spring out at you from our crumpled old friends, sharp and fresh and pleasingly tasteless.

Radio Times review

Loathe it or love it (and I'm in the latter camp), Vicious is back for a second run. It's been a long time coming - it isn't easy coordinating the diaries of this stellar cast. Derek Jacobi and Ian McKellen are back chewing the scenery as bickering couple Stuart and Freddie, with Game of Thrones' Iwan Rheon as their doe-eyed neighbour Ash and Marcia Warren upstaging all as the forgetful Penelope.

Tonight, their voracious best pal Violet (Frances de la Tour) panics when her long-absent sister Lillian pays a visit. Violet pleads with Stuart to butch up - it's a struggle - and pretend to be her husband. Mirth ensues, not least because Lillian is played by goddess of camp, Celia Imrie.

ITV hit us with another new offering in the completely pointless Edge of Heaven. Set in the titular Margate B&B the show focused on the sprawling Taylor family headed up by matriarch Julie (Camille Coduri) the co-owner of the establishment alongside her chef husband Tandeep (Nitin Kundra). Julie's two adult children still live with her and while ex-army recruit Ann-Marie (Laura Checkley) is happy to stand about and make sarcastic comments, Alfie (Blake Harrison) is planning for the future. The future that Alfie envisions involves him settled down with would-be-wife Carly (Justine Cain) but, on the eve of her wedding, she begins to doubt her love for Alfie. It's incredibly clear that Alfie belongs with Carly's friend and colleague Michelle (Louisa Lytton), but at the same time it seems that we're going to have to wait six weeks for them to figure out they like each other. The Taylor clan also includes Julie's brother 'Bald' Gary (Adrian Scarborough) and his partner 'Camp' Gary (Robert Evans) who both love watching True Blood as well as Alfie's Nanny Mo (Marcia Warren) a foul-mouthed X-Box loving pensioner.

I do wonder why Edge of Heaven was created in the first place and who exactly its marketed towards. The extended brood aspect of the show makes me think that ITV wanted this to be their version of Modern Family, but what we get instead is a bunch of clichéd characters going through the motions. It's clear that writer Robert Evans has come from children's TV as all of the Taylor family feel like stereotypes and I just didn't believe in any of them. The B&B setting is equally unnecessary with only a couple of scenes devoted to the establishment's single guest. It's a shame that talented performers such as Coduri, Scarborough and Warren have wasted their time on appearing in this nonsense. Meanwhile Harrison continues to play the same character he did in both Big Bad World and Way to Go. Ultimately, Edge of Heaven will go down as another forgettable ITV drama that I'm sure will be demolished in the ratings once Jonathan Creek returns next week.

There's a faint whiff of Stella-on-Sea about this retro comedy-drama starring Inbetweener Blake Harrison as lovesick puppy Alfie, whose childhood sweetheart dumps him on their wedding day. It's set in the 1980s-themed Margate guest house run by Alfie's mum Judy (Camille Coduri) - but there's a high-camp spin-off series in the making over at Alfie's uncle's flat, where True Blood causes passions to run high in a curious ménage à trois between Marcia Warren, in fine fettle as Alfie's grandma, Adrian Scarborough as Bald Uncle Gary and Robert Evans - the show's writer - as Gary's partner, Camp Gary.

I am a great supporter of this out-and-proud, vulgar and loud sitcom, so it's a shame to report that this festive edition is below par.

Derek Jacobi and Ian McKellen's characters, Stuart and Freddie, do little but swish and snipe, and Iwan Rheon is completely wasted as gormless neighbour Ash who, inevitably, bungles their Christmas dinner. So it's left to the women in their lives to save the programme.

Frances de la Tour is in top gear as Violet the man-eater who's recently become a masseuse, while Marcia Warren butts in with the best lines as the forgetful Penelope, who suddenly remembers something very important.

Few new shows split opinion as neatly as Vicious did this year. Some thrilled to the waspish bitching and wilful campery of live-in lovers Ian McKellen and Derek Jacobi, best chums Frances de la Tour and Marcia Warren, and strapping neighbour Iwan Rheon; others derided it as dated, offensive and tacky.

This Christmas special won't change anyone's minds. The stars deliver gags as creaky as their limbs but with irresistible relish; there's some half-arsed slapstick; Rheon is underused; and the action never leaves the confines of the flat. In truth, it's a little underpowered this time round. De La Tour and Warren waltz off with the best lines and the wholly familiar narrative - a botched Christmas get-together - doesn't add much to the occasion. But the indulgent and sofabound may enjoy a few chuckles here and there.

Vicious (ITV) exited as it entered, a high-camp frolic with Ian McKellen and Derek Jacobi hamming it up like there was no tomorrow. The unapologetic portrayal of old-school gayness got up noses in some quarters, cited as evidence that TV has still not embraced sexual equality. Queerly, to me, it felt like the exact opposite.

The existence of Vicious seemed to suggest that TV was comfortable enough in its own skin to not give two figs about only showing a politically correct approved version of gay lifestyles.

Freddie and Stuart were riotous throwbacks, bitchy old queens from another era, but in between the barbs and the one-liners, these were recognisable characters. To deny their existence would surely be the politically incorrect thing.

Taken on its own level as a tribute to the old tradition of West End farce, McKellen and Jacobi's Vicious was worth a cheap laugh, an added treat being the presence of Marcia Warren and Frances de la Tour, who really should have a show of their own. And how refreshing to have a man in his seventies tell his mother-in-law: 'You're old, you're eating buttons.' Now that's anti-ageism.