Rebecca Front

Rebecca Front: My family values

The comedy actor talks about her family.

Simon Amstell has cunningly managed to deflect potential criticism of his acting skills in this sitcom in which he plays a version of himself.

"I'm doing vulnerability," he explained in last week's opener to season two. "I'm stiff in real life."

In which case, his performance here is absolutely bang on the money as he surfs the lumpy seas of his family's bitter squabbles with a rictus grin that is pitched midway between polite boredom and panic.

What this sitcom does so well is capture the ­claustrophobia of ­families who are close almost to the point of throttling one another.

"Isn't it nice we can all sit in a room together without any tension," his mother Tanya (Rebecca Front) lies tonight as her sister, Liz, arrives for another visit.

And Liz's husband Barry (Vincent Franklin) joins the cast this week.

He's a tedious, self-important git with post-nasal drip who is annoyingly reluctant to help Simon escape from his grandma's house by agreeing to rent him his flat in Soho.

The humour and the language in Grandma's House isn't ­nana-friendly.

But, as Simon and his cousin Adam discover grandpa's little secret up in the loft, there's a gag tonight about Jurassic Park that is a clear contender for one-liner of the year.

Following on from last week's droll, awkward tension, the second episode of Simon Amstell's gentle meta-sitcom continues in the same vein. This week, the 'Simon Amstell' character begins to seek (and beg) for alternative living arrangements and is desperate for the part of Ariel in a producer friend's new production of The Tempest ("Who's playing Prospero, June Sarpong?" snaps Auntie Liz). Once again, Rebecca Front steals the show as Simon's mum, Tanya, with a horde of smutty outbursts - "Clive is a generous, kind man. Let him have a wank in the loft" - and an outburst at Liz's husband Barry in the episode's finale. So far, the second series feels like more of the same. But the witty, understated dialogue make half an hour in Grandma's House strangely entertaining.

Rebecca Front has fun tonight as Simon Amstell's potty-mouthed mother Tanya in this sharply observed sitcom. A reconciliation with her sister Liz (Samantha Spiro) turns sour when Liz's mucus-ridden husband wavers on whether to let Simon borrow his flat in Soho. Much of the comedy revolves around a stash of pornography uncovered in the attic but it is the brilliant characterisation of toxic family relationships that brings in most of the laughs.

Simon Amstell returned with a second series of his very funny sitcom, Grandma's House, in which he plays a version of himself as a neurotic, gay, Jewish ex-TV presenter. Has his acting improved or do I just mind less this time around? The writing was as pointed as ever and the cast still first class, in particular Rebecca Front and James Smith (both alumni of The Thick of It), respectively playing the pushy mother Tanya and her blundering twit of an ex-beau, Clive.

This nicely rambling opener started with Simon waking up next to a 16-year-old boy and ended with Grandpa's armchair going up in flames. It takes a rare comic eye to join those dots with so little obvious effort. Those who saw his self-flagellating stand-up on TV recently will be wondering why he hates himself so much.

To anyone fond of complaining there are no funny women on TV these days, I say only this: watch Rebecca Front taking hold of Simon Amstell's comedy vehicle Grandma's House and making it her own every Thursday night for the next five weeks on BBC2. Cracking stuff. No wonder Amstell's character wants to move out.

Simon Amstell's brilliant, excruciating, quasi-autobiographical sitcom returns in fine fettle with our vulnerable hero being offered an acting job - and mum Tanya (Rebecca Front) responding with a shrill: 'You're not a failed nuffin' nobody any more - you're like a real-life Paula Abdul.' There's plenty of annoyances to offset the good news though: notably the permanently grumpy Auntie Liz (a fab Sam Spiro), Tanya's ex-lover, Clive, and Amstell's one-night stand, who forms the basis of some priceless scenes.

It's still really hard to tell where reality ends and TV begins in the second series of Simon Amstell's domestic sitcom.

And that's because this week Simon's trying to celebrate the fact that the BBC has commissioned a series in which he'll be playing himself.

"They're going to let you act on TV? Why?" gasps his mother, played by Rebecca Front of The Thick Of It fame.

Getting in the way of Simon's joyous mood is his sour-faced Auntie Liz and his very young one-night stand, who point blank refuses to go home.

It must be hard work making comedy look this laid-back.

'They're going to let you act on television? Why?' Yes, Simon Amstell's curious meta-sitcom returns tonight and it's just as flawed and intriguing as ever. This opener sees the aftermath of an MDMA-addled night out. Simon can't get rid of the 16-year-old he's picked up and, as usual, things are tense between Jackie, Liz and Clive with Simon alternating between tentative mediation and accidental provocation. There's still an air of semi-deliberate awkwardness about Grandma's House, with the excellent turns from comedy veterans such as Rebecca Front accentuating both the tension produced by the limitations of Amstell's lead performance and the self-consciousness of the show's premise. But we've got a feeling that's exactly the way he likes it.

The second series of Simon Amstell's meta comedy takes it up a notch by introducing a new fictional comedy show written by Simon, about his family. The farcical elements remain sharp, as Simon wakes up next to a man who insists on referring to him only as Simon Amstell, and the supporting cast is impeccable, particularly Samantha Spiro's angry aunt and Rebecca Front as Amstell's mother: "You're back on telly!" she beams. "I don't care if it's absolute shit."