Tamsin Greig

Tamsin Greig: the question everyone asks me

Tamsin Greig talks to Jasper Rees about The Archers, her latest stage role - and snogging Joey from Friends.

Doon Mackichan joins Tamsin Greig in 'Jumpy' play

Doon Mackichan will join Tamsin Greig in cast of April de Angelis' Jumpy which opens at the Royal Court on 19 October (previews from 13 October) and runs until 19 November 2011.

Tamsin Greig to take on Royal Court role

Tamsin Greig is to star in a new comedy at London's Royal Court Theatre about a former Greenham Common protester as part of its new season.

Robert Popper's vaguely autobiographical sitcom isn't black-hearted, cruel, vituperative or blushingly filthy, yet on C4 earlier this year it still secured a devoted following of viewers who liked its inherent good-heartedness and lack of guile. Certainly this E4 rerun is very welcome and might help to keep fans going until the arrival of series two. Popper has adapted his own early family life to bring us the Goodmans: Mum, Dad and two grown-up kids, who gather round the dinner table every Friday. Mum (splendid Tamsin Greig) is daffy and obsessed by MasterChef, while Dad (Paul Ritter) is a bit bonkers, and has a bizarre obsession with his yellowing collection of ancient New Scientist magazines. It's all a bit Mike Leigh, only funnier.

That's Mine, This Is Yours (Radio 4, Wednesday) was a wryly romantic comedy by Peter Souter whose success on radio (Goldfish Girl, for one) sent him rocketing off to ITV where writers with a gift for the wistful are not cherished as much as those whose scripts come dripping in murder. Here, with brilliant Tamsin Greig and Alex Jennings as the divorced couple meeting to divide up the leftovers of their marriage and clever Gordon House as director, he shone again.

Peter Souter's play is a romantic comedy. Alex Jennings and Tamsin Greig play a couple who are splitting up. They meet in their old, cold house to divide up their joint possessions. There's a locked sea chest, an old tandem, a little tin chicken that lays tin eggs, that sort of stuff. As they go through it all they're bound to think of how they got them (just like in that great song, Thanks For the Memory) and the icy atmosphere warms up. They know each other well. And this writer (remember his Goldfish Girl?) knows how funny that can be.

More toe-curling in suburbia as Robert Popper's delightfully daft sitcom comes to an end.

Tonight, Jackie has organised a surprise for son Adam: inviting her friend's daughter Tanya to the Goodman's Friday night meal and a spot of match-making.

The appearance of good china and odd ­background music should be a hint that something sinister is about to take place.

"Is that somebody playing the lute?" demands Adam, confused.

Adam and Tanya haven't seen each other since they used to take baths together as babies, so have a lot of catching up to do.

Needless to say, Adam would prefer to do this without his mother and deaf, parsley-eating father shouting ­encouragement.

This episode ends the series on a pinnacle of ­embarrassment.

But am I the only one who can't quite get their head around Tamsin Greig being cast as Simon Bird's mother?

If playing their real ages, she'd have been pregnant at 16. What would the neighbours say?

Adam arrives for dinner at mum and dad's, but things seem a little off-kilter. Dad Martin (Paul Ritter, who should be crowned a comedy king in a special ceremony) is dressed in a suit, the table is laid with flowers and "mum's posh bowls" - and there's an extra place set for dinner. Of course, it's a trap, one that Adam (Simon Bird) walks straight into when mum (super Tamsin Greig) announces that Tanya Green will be joining the Goodman family for their end-of-the-week get-together. Poor unsuspecting Adam has been set up on a date by his infuriatingly well-meaning mother and what follows is excruciating: an acutely painful succession of burps and nosebleeds from dad and inappropriateness from mum ("Give her a kiss hello, Adam"). But even these levels of raw embarrassment count for nothing when weird neighbour Jim (Mark Heap) arrives with Winston, his lugubrious dog. Winston has swallowed Jim's keys, which is the cue for a toe-curling sequence with man, beast, a newspaper and a twig. It's the last episode of Robert Popper's cheerfully silly comedy. Oh, how I will miss it. There'd better be a second series, Channel 4.

Last in the run of the sitcom about a Jewish suburban family. It's been low-key but likeable, each episode squirming with minor social embarrassments. Tonight, Mum (Tamsin Greig) invites a girl called Tanya over, in the hope she'll take a shine to Adam (Simon Bird), the elder of her sons. As always, the best lines come at the expense of Dad (Paul Ritter). Mum: "Jonny, don't leave your dad on his own with Tanya. He'll only start talking about Isaac Newton or somebody." Cut to Dad: "He also invented the first practical reflecting telescope..."

Tonight's Friday Night Dinner, chez the Goodmans, is cooked by hopeless dad (Paul Ritter) as mum (Tamsin Greig) is immobile after spraining an ankle. Of course, it's a disaster as the meat is rigid with overcooking and makes terrible noises when dad tries to carve. "Should meat squeak?" the family wonders aloud. Poor Adam - this is supposed to be his birthday treat, along with a coffee table book on "heroes of the SS", a thoughtful gift for a young Jewish boy from his dad. It's another gloriously silly episode of Robert Popper's utterly endearing sitcom, which strays into Curb Your Enthusiasm comedy of embarrassment territory when dad bumps into an old girlfriend, the brassy Sheila Bloom (Frances Barber). Or Bitchface, as she is ungallantly known. Sheila is obsessed with her Mercedes to the delight of her tormentors, who find new and inventive ways of sniggering at her - not behind her back, but right in front of her face. It's packed with minor pleasures, including mad neighbour Jim and his supernaturally calm dog, and a piece of farce involving grandma in unsuitable clothing.