Will Poulter

This E4 sketch show by youthful comic actors had its flaws but was undeniably endearing. Now C4 viewers can get in on the silliness of series two. It's mainly worth catching for a dose of standout star Will Poulter, who, with films such as Son Of Rambow and, most recently, The Chronicles Of Narnia: The Voyage Of The Dawn Treader to his credit, looks to be a young lad who is going places.

People laughed AT us says Will Poulter

Three years ago people laughed at Will Poulter when he tried to sell his first ever Edinburgh Fringe show. But schoolboy star Will, 17, has had the last laugh.

The gimmick of teenagers playing adult roles in this sketch show is kind of strange. It's not like there's a shortage of grown-up comedians or actors out there; we're over-run with the darn things.

But surprisingly, it works much, much better than you'd expect.

Clichéd set-ups - like arguing middle-aged couples, and white van men (or ven men as we must now call them thanks to Peep Show) shouting incomprehensibly at passing women - are completely rejuvenated when played by these youngsters who are way funnier than they have any right to be.

The jazz-age lesbians were hilarious but a lot of the attention will fall on the brilliant 16-year-old Will Poulter, who starred in Son Of Rambow.

If I were a 40-year-old comedy actor, I'd be very, very worried indeed.

I generally only find children funny if they're being catapulted off a see-saw into a dung heap on You've Been Framed, so I approached School Of Comedy with caution. The idea of a bunch of precocious baby actors pretending to be adults in a bunch of sketches smacked of overindulgence, an idea best restricted to an end-of-term high-school skit, not granted a whole TV series.

Yet, though it had its iffy moments, School Of Comedy is laugh-out-loud funny. That's principally down to the rubber-faced Will Poulter, of Son Of Rambow, who is surely a star in the making. Segueing effortlessly from dunderhead schoolteacher to South African security guard by way of a defence lawyer with a neat line in hypnotising juries, Poulter gave a masterclass in comic timing and nifty accents. The rest of the cast are fine but this is Poulter's gig: the boy deserves his own show.

Can a bunch of secondary school children possibly do a sketch show that isn't cringeworthy? Well, yes they can - this able troupe have performed live at two Edinburgh Festivals, thus doing their comedy homework. The charismatic Will Poulter (of Son Of Rambow fame) holds it all together, playing a variety of incompetents (teacher, lawyer, doctor, security guard, brain surgeon and, most entertainingly, a 1940s estate agent) in sketches that have just the right levels of surprises and puerility. Overall, a B+.

With the glut of sketch shows currently clogging up the schedules, it takes something special to stand out from the crowd. School of Comedy achieves this triumphantly by handing over adult material to adolescent performers.

Yes, I know, it sounds an appalling idea. But the confidence, talent and professionalism of the cast quickly dispels all suspicions of gimmickry or fears of on-screen stage school precocity run rampant. Instead, the use of young actors brings a genuine freshness to a tired old format and introduces several new faces to watch out for. It is, of course, totally unfair on an ensemble cast to single out personal favourites, so I shall resist. Suffice to say, Will Poulter and Lily Ainsworth, you know who you are.