Sally Phillips

Harry Venning and David Ramsden's Clare In the Community is a lesson in how to return, series after series, with freshly reworked comic material. Sally Phillips' social worker Clare has become the mother of little Thomas Paine (after the social reformer, following a flirtation with the name Mahatma). Her world view has become more excruciating than ever, ramping up the comedy to heady heights.

Sally Phillips plays Clare, self-absorbed social worker and new mother in the latest series of the sitcom by Harry Venning and David Ramsden. In their meticulously observed comedy of modern manners, Liza Tarbuck plays best friend Helen, Alex Lowe is Brian, the proud new father, whose best mate is Simon (Andrew Wincott), Helen's ex-husband. Nina Conti retains her role of put-upon Megan and doubles up as Nali, the au pair (not nearly as put-upon as she at first seems). Meanwhile, is this baby to be called Mandela, Mahatma or Thomas Paine?

Another year has passed and Clare In The Community returns for its fifth series. When we last met her, Clare - the antithesis to Carol Thatcher when it comes to political correctness - had an extra burden to add to the weight of her disappointment at being a white, middle-class and straight social worker. She was pregnant with her long-term partner Brian's child.

Now the baby has arrived she's determined not to be stereotyped into doing predictable things such as feeding it, bathing it or holding it. Enter an East European live-in au pair who adds a great flavour to the abusive sarcasm in Brian and Clare's home. Sally Phillips has made the starring role her own and passes off self-obsession so cleverly that Clare sounds irresistible rather than cruel.

A brand new game for Friday nights: spot Joanna Lumley. She's absolutely unrecognisable as a bonkers bicycling pensioner in Jennifer Saunders' gentle rural comedy set in Clatterford in Devon - one of those imaginary villages where you can't step out of your cottage without tripping over a dozen or so gurning eccentrics.

But what this lacks in laughs it makes up for in star names. As well as Saunders playing a rich, horsey, friend of Madonna-type, there's Pauline McLynn from Father Ted, Sally Phillips from Smack The Pony, Maggie Steed as the leader of the Women's Guild, a bubble-permed Dawn French as the village idiot, and David Mitchell of That Mitchell And Webb Look.

The piece was actually written for Sue Johnston who plays Sal Vine, the practice nurse whose doctor husband rather thoughtlessly keels over and dies.

Perhaps because of the huge cast, and the way slapstick comedy runs alongside sadness, this first episode feels like a patchwork quilt knocked up from leftover wool.

But some scenes, such as when Sal is visited by a hopeless grief counsellor (the brilliant Rosie Cavaliero) suggest it might be worth giving it a chance to find its feet.

The omens are good for this new Friday-night comedy: it's packed with talent - including Joanna Lumley, Sue Johnston, David Mitchell, Pauline McLynn, Dawn French and Sally Phillips. It's also written by Jennifer Saunders, whose flappywomen comedy formula may not be universally popular, but it has a devoted following among viewers.

But, my goodness, it's hard to find laugh-out-loud moments in this first episode - or even smile-politely ones even though the setting of the action should inspire them: a small Devon village characterised by League of Gentlemenly oddness.

In a week in which Dawn French began her so far failed attempt to show that her comedic skills can embrace radio as well as TV, Sally Phillips' turn as the social worker who is just not a people person edged ever closer to classic comedy monster status.

Radio 4 on Friday: "Current thinking in social work is that one shouldn't tell the child they're bad, one should say the act was bad." No, not a worthy documentary but the wonderful Clare in the Community. Two episodes in, it's clear that, with this adaptation of Harry Venning's Guardian cartoon about a social worker, Radio 4's found a really funny sitcom. Sally Phillips delivers Clare's PC pronouncements perfectly deadpan, making them all the more entertaining. Who'd have thought Clare would sound so cut-glass? She does, and it's now impossible to imagine her any other way. Hurrah - there are four episodes still to come.