Steve Pemberton

Guardian Review

So hurrah then for Steve Pemberton and Reece Shearsmith. Tonight's Psychoville was very funny, very dark and equally mysterious. You might even say vague, but according to Shearsmith this was fully intended. So let's go with it...

Everyone familiar with The League of Gentlemen will know what to expect from Steve Pemberton and Reece Shearsmith's latest offering. It is a characteristic mix of grotesque characters and sick imaginings, amid a bracing absence of anything remotely resembling good taste. That's not a criticism, mind. Although billed as a comedy-thriller, the comedy is as bitter as chocolate made from 100 per cent cocoa solids. But in the absence of laughter, there is a twisted narrative like a coherent nightmare, weaving together the story of an embittered clown, a disturbed midwife, a serial killer, a lovestruck dwarf and a blind collector of soft toys. As with The League of Gentlemen, Pemberton and Shearsmith take on the roles of multiple gargoyles alongside a cast that includes Dawn French and Janet McTeer. Once again they have created a fully imagined world unlike anything else around.

Video: Psychoville on BBC Breakfast

BBC Breakfast interviews Reece Shearsmith & Steve Pemberton about Psychoville.

It's a bitterly cold November morning in a Mill Hill seminary, so cold that it's hard to distinguish the mist and dry ice from our breath. St Joseph's College was founded in 1866, and Steve Pemberton, looking of a similar vintage under heavy make-up, is rocking a ZZ Top in Middle Earth look, with wispy beard and satin gown. He's also lost a wart, but in between searches he sits down to chat about new project Psychoville. Fellow The League of Gentlemen alumnus and co-creator Reece Shearsmith has also stopped by, thankfully in civvies rather the outre garb of some of his characters.

The show, both concede, is unavoidably reminiscent of Royston Vasey in its grotesque characters, reference-heavy humour (episode four is a Hitchcock tribute, shot in just two takes in the manner of 'Rope') and even the name; Psychoville is the title used for The League of Gentlemen in Korea.

But there's no sense of recycling ideas. The characters may be oddballs, but they're driving a crafted narrative and are played by a broader cast. There's disturbed midwife Joy (Dawn French, right), misanthropic kids' entertainer Mr Jelly (Shearsmith), telekinetic dwarf Robert (Jason Tompkins), serial killer-obsessed David (Pemberton) and his mum, Maureen (Shearsmith), and Mr Lomax, a blind recluse with, yes, a straggly beard (Pemberton). Eileen Atkins and Christopher Biggins are also among the deliciously eclectic on-screen talent who've at least had the courage of their convictions. 'We've had famous people saying: "I'll do anything, I'll make sandwiches."' laughs Shearsmith. 'Then you offer them a part and they say: "Not for me."'

The co-creators' curious real-life experiences once again bleed into the characters. 'Joy the midwife came from sitting with glum dads in antenatal classes,' says Shearsmith, with appropriate gloom. And Mr Lomax? 'I used to work for a blind man while I was at college,' remembers Pemberton. 'I thought I'd be reading Dickens and we'd do crosswords together. I ended up writing his cheques and reading out financial reports. If there was a graph, I'd leave it out - how do you describe a graph to a blind person?'

Most grimly, David was 'the friend of a friend. He was jaundiced and his mother only had one leg. Someone went to their house and saw these bottles of wee from where she couldn't get to the toilet; she was scratching her son's back with her foot. As an opening image, that's terrific!'

Horizons are broader than they were in The League, with five locations forming the backdrop to the stories of the main characters. Each setting, from Wood Green to Ilkley, has its own tonal palette (London's is orange, to fit David and his mum's curtains - and skin).

And gradually, the plot brings these disparate, scattered characters together to reveal the secrets hinted at when each receives an anonymous letter claiming: 'I know what you did.' The mystery is all the more enveloping as neither writer knew how it would end. 'We were writing ourselves into corners,' says Shearsmith. 'But if we didn't know how we were going to untangle ourselves, then hopefully the audience can't second-guess us.'

Later on, we join director Matt Lipsey in the catering truck, where he's chuckling wearily about episode four. 'The scripts are so detailed, it makes my life hell, but it's the complexity that makes the show. That 'Rope' episode was painstaking, but it was exciting for the actors: as they got closer and closer to completing it they got more and more nervous about screwing it up. Which one of them did on take 15 ...'

Psychoville is evidence that there are commissioners at the BBC willing to take a risk in a conservative climate. 'Anything that smacks of a diktat from on high is dangerous,' Lipsey argues. 'Surely it's about diversity.' Pemberton and Shearsmith concur. 'When we wrote this in 2006,' says Pemberton, 'we heard that dark was out and big and funny was in. But we ended up being drawn to the things we were drawn to anyway.' And, rather than conduct the first read-through in a White City conference room, they did it in front of 250 people in a Notting Hill theatre. 'We wanted to hear the sound of laughter so they didn't just think it was something dark and weird that no one would find funny,' he beams.

But, creepily hilarious as Psychoville undoubtedly is, one question still hangs in the air: what about a League reunion? 'The will is there,' begins Shearsmith. 'There's no reason why not,' adds Pemberton, before wandering off into the chill in search of another wart. Trust us, saying 'Hello David' for the next few weeks is no bad thing.

Psychoville: the new home of horror comedy

Steve Pemberton and Reece Shearsmith, half of The League of Gentlemen, have moved to Psychoville, the new home of horror comedy.

'League Of Gentlemen' stars keen on revival

Reece Shearsmith has revealed that he and Steve Pemberton are keen to revive the League Of Gentlemen franchise.

Anyone who has been pining these seven long years for the shock-horror tactics that made The League of Gentlemen such a unique comedy collaboration, fear not... or rather, be afraid. Half of the team - Steve Pemberton & Reece Shearsmith - have created this exquisitely crafted 'sick-com' and, after just 30 minutes, its smacks already of borderline genius.

Tease upon grisly tease are piled high in the opening scene-setter episode as the gallery of grotesques all receive a card in the post bearing the ominous legend 'I know what you did'.

The League of Gentlemen are back! Well some of them, at least. Former League members Reece Shearsmith & Steve Pemberton are the brains behind new comedy Psychoville, technically forming more of a duo than a league.

There will inevitably be comparisons with the aforementioned series, and quite rightly so, as this is Royston Vasey in all but name. But despite the familiar formula - an intoxicating blend of grotesque characterisation, dark humour, and occasional burst of outright horror - Psychoville still feels uncommonly innovative. No other show has even come close to successfully filling the gap left behind when the final League of Gentlemen series came to an end in 2002, and its a joy to have something so utterly warped back on our screens.

Once again Shearsmith & Pemberton have taken on dual roles as both writers & performers. While the ex-Gentlemen are playing the lion's share of the characters themselves, there are also several guest stars, notably Dawn French who appears as a midwife who obsessively treats her battered demonstration doll as a real live newborn. Other characters include Robert, a dwarf with psychic powers, Mr Jelly, a bitter & twisted children's entertainer with a detachable hand & David Sowerbutts, a serial-killer obsessive who has a very unhealthy relationship with his mother. If anything, this is even more disturbing than the team's previous work, and those of a nervous disposition should avoid it at all costs.

There is a plot thread connecting all of the disparate oddball characters in the form of a mysterious letter that's been sent to each of them, and those of us with the stomach for such grizzly fun should be in for a treat at this most bizarre mystery unfolds. When it comes to black comedy, Shearsmith & Pemberton really are in a league of their own. A triumphant return.

A telekinetic dwarf, a blind eBay fanatic, a delusional nurse who treats her toy doll like a real baby and a children's entertainer with a hook for a hand. Such hideous creations could only come from one place - the minds of League Of Gentlemen creators Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton.

In the twisted world of Psychoville, their new deathly black, surreal comedy, these disparate protagonists are united by a quill-written letter they've each received from a shadowy blackmailer containing the phrase, 'I know what you did'.

"It's more like a whodunwhat than a whodunit, as you don't quite know what's happened," explains co-writer and star Reece Shearsmith. "The blackmail letters arrive, and that's all you know. Each week, it gets more byzantine, with odd things thrown in to make the viewer think, 'What?'. It was a delicate thing to chart, to know how much information to give away at one point. There are only seven episodes, so we had to think about how soon was too soon."

If the series seems cryptic, it's no surprise. While writing the scripts in their north London office, the duo weren't entirely sure themselves where Psychoville was heading. "It wasn't until episode three we knew what was going to happen at the end, so until then we had to put lines in like, 'It's them' without actually knowing who 'them' were ourselves," Reece explains. "We just said, 'We'll sort that out later'. At least no-one will be able to second-guess it."

Some of the characters from Psychoville could slot nicely into The League Of Gentlemen and vice-versa, although it's not something that bothers Hull-born Reece. "We did try to avoid any similarities, but because it's our sense of humour, that'll be there. We couldn't willfully not write it like that," he says.

"All our strange obsessions always come out - dolls, clowns and things, all of which could have been in The League. Monty Python had their weird stamp on everything they did afterwards, it's just a particular take on the world."

"We spent two years writing Psychoville, so we have huge back-stories for each character, details we could never use in a seven-parter, but they're the sort of things that really tickle us. We thought this was a great opportunity to put it all up somewhere, so the characters have all got their own websites, blogs, forums and all sorts," Reece says. "It's all so geeky, I don't know how many people will do it, but I know Steve and I would. That's what we're like."

Though made by only two members of The League of Gentlemen, Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton, Psychoville is clearly twinned with Royston Vasey. It has the same grotesque characters, the same creepy, dependent relationships. But unlike the League, they're living, more or less, in the real world - the joke, repeatedly, is the clash between the gothic nightmare and the ordinary.

There is a clown whose idea of a "princess party" for a girl is more like a torture party; there are feuding panto dwarves, one of whom has a crush on Snow White; there is an uncomfortable mother and son duo with a worrying knowledge of serial killers. But the scariest of all is played by Dawn French, as a nurse with an obsessive love for her 'baby'. She is what you imagine the truth to be behind those documentaries about people who keep monkeys as children or believe they are married to the Eiffel Tower.

On paper, Psychoville should seem like a retread, but the ongoing mystery - many of the characters are receiving anonymous letters - and some disturbing but genuine laughs keep it compelling.