Stephen Mangan

Episodes has so much going for it. It's co-written by David Crane, the clever writer mainly responsible for Friends! It has Joey from Friends in the shape of Matt LeBlanc playing himself, Matt, as an older, greyer and slappably unwiser version of Joey from Friends! It has Tamsin Greig! And Kathleen Rose Perkins! And it's really underwhelming!

Part of the problem must be that, while we Brits relished every last drop of the earlier battles surrounding the fictional couple Tamsin and Stephen Mangan's sharp fictional script being dumbed down for America, the real US scriptwriters might now feel a touch of possibly justifiable unease at all the shrewd Briton/whalethick Statesider gags. And thus have to concentrate on affairs, and Matt/Joey's vaulting new stupidities. But it's a fresh series, and I'll let it settle in, and admittedly Mr Mangan's facial reactions to Matt's financial woes last week - turned out he'd been scammed for half his lifetime earnings, and thus had "just" $31m left - were as pricelessly and stoically old-country as old maids cycling through the morning mists on cheap and broken bikes.

Episodes, the comedy in which Matt LeBlanc plays Matt LeBlanc in a TV show about making a TV show, began its fourth series this week. Television has been making shows about making shows for many years, with mixed success. The problem, as with actors talking about acting, is that people at home tend not to consider television to be quite as important as the people who make it. Most of us worry more about running out of rinse aid.

Episodes adds another layer of meta by having Stephen Mangan and Tamsin Greig playing two British screenwriters trying to make sense of the American way of making a TV show. The joke has evolved over four years to the point where by now they all know that the sitcom they are making is godawful, and yet for reasons to do with executive-level willy-waving the show goes on. Episodes is by no means godawful - Mangan and Greig are two of our very best comic performers - but it does sail a little close to the wind in telling a story about a sitcom that's outstayed its welcome.

The problem is that Episodes has got a little too cosy. When it began "Matt LeBlanc" was about as likeable as Eugene Terre'Blanche, and the jokes at his expense had teeth. But four series in, that near-the-knuckle humour has lost its bite. LeBlanc has become essentially a nice guy with a few quirks. The show isn't roasting him, as they like to say in America. It's barely even searing him - in fact, his appearance starts to look like the kind of self-deprecation that's actually a little affected - it's the same borderline smugness you sometimes sense is the driving force behind W1A.

Radio Times review

Sean and Beverly's terrible Pucks!, which stars Matt LeBlanc's ghastly alter-ego, has risen from the dead - "like Jesus if Jesus was a s****y sitcom" says one character. Some people might think Episodes itself should have been put out of its misery a while back. But Friends stalwart and co-writer David Crane has managed to breathe more life into a comedy that is as much a wry look at transatlantic foibles as Crane's satire/revenge on the industry he (and co-scribe and real-life partner Jeffrey Klarik) know all too well.

Some of the lines feel a little ponderous in places but many are brilliant. And the chemistry between Stephen Mangan and Tamsin Greig's exasperated Brits and LeBlanc's desperately shallow but oddly likeable leading man keep this singing.

Episodes, series 4, episode 1, review: 'not funny'

The only relief came from Tamsin Greig and Stephen Mangan in the return of Episodes, says Tom Rowley.

Stephen Mangan reveals run in with Hollywood cops

Episodes star Stephen Mangan has revealed he feared he was about to be arrested in Los Angeles - but the police were just stopping him to say they loved the show.

Episodes will be back for a fifth series says LeBlanc

BBC Two comedy in which the Friends star plays a version of himself alongside Stephen Mangan and Tamsin Greig will be back for another run - but LeBlanc is in no hurry to get back to work.

TV review: Episodes, series 4, BBC Two

Reliable laughs and behind the scenes comedy from Matt LeBlanc, Stephen Mangan and Tamsin Greig.

Matt LeBlanc and Stephen Mangan interview

TV Choice met Matt LeBlanc and Stephen Mangan to chat about Series 4 of Episodes.

This is the episode in which Jeremy Clarkson was set to return fire on his erstwhile employers. It looks as if he's decided that discretion is the better part of valour, but with the election now only a fortnight away, whoever is invited along instead - it'll be Alexander Armstrong, won't it? [actually Stephen Mangan] - will have plenty to talk about. In JC's absence, Miles Jupp and Camilla Long will be picking up the slack alongside Merton and Hislop, who must have been hoping for some sort of Angus Deayton-style valedictory humiliation.

HIGNFY review: no mention of headline making Clarkson

Stephen Mangan proves an able stand-in for the host they wouldn't mention.