Heading Out

Review: Heading Out, BBC Two

Strong start for Sue Perkins's coming-out sitcom.

Sue Perkins debuted her brand new comedy Heading Out, looking at the travails of lesbian vet Sara, dealing with the onset of her 40th birthday, a new girl on the sofa, a dead cat... and the small matter of not being out to her parents.

The humour was swift-moving enough, with Sara inventing an absent salesman boyfriend for the benefit of the furrowed-brow parents. Not just any old absent salesman, but a French one, who sold prosthetic legs... of course.

As the writer on this too, Perkins packed it all in... ruminations with her cleanliness-obsessed best friend, her dealings with the feline crematorium manager, a disastrous netball match, a sweet meet-cute in the park with an errant dog owner, an equally disastrous surprise party - attended by not one but two potential girlfriends, as well as the aforementioned dead cat.

I had fears that the ever-likeable Perkins, like Simon Amstell in his Grandma's House, would be too familiar a face for us to lose ourselves sufficiently in this suburban caper. But her warm persona transferred robustly to the drama, which was set up perfectly for next week's therapy session with netball soldier turned life coach Toria (The Thick of It's Joanna Scanlan). In a word: Very promising (okay, two then).

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Heading Out review

I chuckled at a few things (the netball Haka, the scene with a sick cat being put down), but things sparked best when Sara met love interest Eve (Shelley Conn) and engaged in silly chit-chat about elves.

Heading Out - Episode 1.1 review

So, with a good plot and characters with potential, Heading Out will no doubt become a staple of my Tuesday nights.

Sue Perkins writes and stars in her first sitcom, playing a vet whose parents don't know she's gay. It's her 40th birthday and her friends have got her a surprise. It's a nice break from the whimsy-strewn stuff that passes for sitcom these days; it's full of actual gags and Perkins's extensive comedy vocabulary always throws up a surprising word when a less inventive one would do. "Your cat is essentially a windsock," she tells one distraught pet-owner who won't accept it's gone. Hugely likable.

Sue Perkins: I play a lesbian but it's not a gay sitcom

Sue insists that the series, which starts tonight on BBC2 at 10pm, is not a "gay sitcom".

Sue Perkins has been conspicuously absent from recent British cake bakes.

Now we know why - she's been busy writing and starring in this vet-based sitcom about the anxieties of 39-year-old gay vet Sara trying and failing to come out to her parents.

After a dodgy start - cat lovers beware - things perk up when Perkins's priceless comedy pals, including Dominic Coleman, Joanna Scanlan and Mark Heap, provide light relief from Sara's perplexing love life.

It's part of Sue Perkins's comic persona that behind the narrowed eyes and serrated wit lies, you can't help feeling, a thoroughly decent sort. Comedy and niceness aren't always bedfellows, but Perkins's stock as a presenter and quiz-show panellist could hardly be higher.

What we have here is more of a gamble: her first sitcom, her first series as a writer and her first venture into out-and-out acting. She plays Sara, a slightly hopeless vet who's turning 40 and still hasn't told her parents she's gay. A key early scene involves a phone call from her mother (Harriet Walter) where Sara finds herself improvising wildly about a fictional boyfriend, a French prosthetics salesman ("Legs mainly, artificial legs...").

This is someone who feels endlessly awkward, or worse: "I feel shame all the time. It's like ivy creeping round me," she tells her best friend. But is that curable? Finding out initially involves a 40th birthday party, a game of netball and a dead cat.

The recent death of Richard Briers drew attention to how wretched much of the BBC's mainstream sitcom output has become. Heading Out isn't going to reverse this downward slide, but if this opener to Sue Perkins's series is a little light on laughs, it's still sharply observed and amiably performed. Perkins, in particular, is unrecognisable from her hyper-irritating turns on Supersizers.

She plays Sara, a vet grappling with the prospect of coming out to her parents as she turns 40: animals, sexuality, family, age... Classic sitcom themes all, but the vaguely autobiographical nature of Heading Out gives it a little extra frisson. The physical comedy of the set-piece netball match is awkwardly staged and among a generally strong supporting cast, Joanna Scanlan's Miriam Margolyes impression seems to come from a different show entirely. Otherwise, a promising start.