There Is No Escape

I first became aware of comedian Andrew Lawrence last year, when he caused a minor kerfuffle by moaning about '"political" comedians cracking cheap and easy gags about UKIP', the 'ever-creeping militant political correctness of the BBC' and 'women posing as comedians'. I filed the name away under 'tedious try-hard blowhards to be avoided like the plague'.

So, when I saw that he'd been rewarded by the militantly PC BBC with his own Radio 4 sitcom, my instinct was to avoid. However, when told how awful the show was I weakened in disbelief. I wish I'd stuck with my original instinct.

In There Is No Escape (R4, Tuesdays, 6.30pm), Lawrence plays a loser called Andrew who lives with his girlfriend in mutual disdain. The script consists of people being sarcastic to each other in the most charmless way, in a manner that people only do in bad sitcoms. Wise-cracking without any glimmer of wisdom. Diane Morgan (perhaps best known as Weekly Wipe's Philomena Cunk), who plays the girlfriend, deserves far better. Happily there is an escape. It's called the 'off' switch.