Mister Eleven

The most obvious point about a Richard Curtis comedy is that everybody is quite likeable. This seems pretty basic to me. If you think Bridget Jones has a face like a slapped backside, and a personality to boot, you don't care whether she ends up with Mr Darcy or is left to endure an unhappy marriage with, say, a second-hand car dealer from South Norwood. This was the big problem with Mister Eleven. The heroine, the Bridget Jones of this particular romcom, was absolutely ghastly in every way. She was spoilt, silly, self-absorbed and seemed to be a bit thick, despite being a maths whiz. About 10 minutes into the action, she whipped out her mobile phone and called a convenient shoulder to cry on. "Just this once," said her chosen shoulder, "get over yourself." In our house, there was cheering and high-fiving.

Here is the plot. Saz Paley is a maths teacher who has been obsessed by numbers from a very early age. We know she's a maths teacher because she says "quadratic equations" every so often, and is keen on prob­ability. She tells us, for example, that most women marry the 11th man they sleep with. So Saz, for reasons best known to herself, but essential to getting the show on the road, marries a doctor called Dan for that reason. But, wouldn't you know it, she discovers at the reception that he's not Mister Eleven after all. Mr Nine shows up unexpectedly (as somebody's boyfriend) and reveals that she was too drunk to do anything worthwhile on their one-night stand. Cue collapse of marriage.

What Sazza should probably do next is consult her GP and get something done about her obsessive personality. What she does instead is try to rekindle her relationship with nice Mr Four, who turns out to be married with twins. "Twins?" Saz says. "You must have fantastic sperm." Frankly, it's astonishing that Saz has managed to sleep with four men, let alone 10.

Am I being harsh? Perhaps so, but I suspect that the director also worried about the thin thread on which the plot was attempting to balance. The script works very, very hard to keep us interested. Everything moves quickly, and the action switches every so often to a classroom, which is possibly also Saz's imagination.

Anyway, eventually the inevitable happens. Mr Nine (alias Alex the Australian) meets Saz in a hospital, to which location the plot has inevitably propelled her. You remember, of course, that Saz's husband, Dan, is a doctor. So you'll know what happens next. Alex and Saz embrace passionately. Enter Dan. With non-hilarious consequences.

In the interests of balance, I should warn you that my view of Mister Eleven might possibly be the result of bitterness and middle age. It seems only yesterday that I went to see the film Local Hero and emerged from the cinema as the women in our party swore undying devotion to Denis Lawson, that film's official love interest. In Mister Eleven, he plays an old bloke who is clearly going to have a heart attack or somesuch in episode two. What you have been reading so far could well be a midlife crisis.

Maths isn't an obvious subject for a laugh-a-minute romantic comedy, as amply demonstrated by Mister Eleven (ITV1), which starred Michelle Ryan as bonkers maths teacher Saz, a woman so obsessed by numbers that she talked herself into marrying precisely the 11th sexual partner in her life because, statistically speaking, that's what all women do. That way you were bound to marry Mr Right, right? Well, maybe, though it sounded to me more a formula for marrying Mr Average. But then it turned out new husband Dan wasn't number 11 anyway, because number nine - gorgeous Alex, appearing at the wedding reception - hadn't actually done it with her at all on the night in question, on account of Saz having being "so drunk that she thought he had". Which meant - Ohmigod! - she had just married Mr Ten, who of course equalled Mr Wrong! Dan foolishly wondered what was wrong about being Mr Ten (men, eh?) - and the newlyweds were soon having their first marital bust-up, or at least one of those hissing comedy arguments in front of bewildered strangers in the lift.

But now what? Dan buried himself in his work while Saz went back to her mum's to daydream and listen to soppy music and unwanted advice. Real life doesn't just "add up", said one friend. You do the math "joked" someone else. But what was the solution? Perhaps she should look back at numbers one to eight... perhaps she had been too hasty, rejecting the others for being the wrong numbers. But by now, number nine - gorgeous Alex - was sending yearnful texts and before long was snogging her in the carpark. The obvious thing now would be to shag him in episode two, thereby restoring Dan to his rightful spot at number 11. QED, though of course it's not the best start a marriage can have.

Mister Eleven Review

This two-part rom-com has been gathering dust in ITV's vault for so long now that Dev Patel (playing an embarrassed hotel waiter) has since gone on to star in an Oscar-winning movie, Slumdog Millionaire. Mister Eleven is another fatuous example of comfort-TV for undemanding girls stuck at home on a Friday evening, only made palatable thanks to Michelle Ryan's heartfelt performance...

Michelle Ryan stars in this super-frothy comedy about a maths teacher so obsessed with statistics she's based her life around the fact the average woman will marry her 11th sexual partner. It wouldn't have mattered if Brad Pitt had been her second boyfriend and George Clooney her third.

Statistics told Sarah "Saz" Paley that her 11th bedfellow would be her Mr Right, so that's what she's hung on for. Mister 11 is the dishy doctor Dan (Sean Maguire) and on their wedding day she has everything she's waited for, plus some bizarre Scrubs-style fantasies in which she's teaching her class the statistics of her love life.

But then a former one-night stand (Mister Nine) turns up at her wedding and reveals they never actually slept together - she passed out drunk. So Mister Nine was Mister Nearly, Mister 11 is actually Mister 10 and Saz's dream is in tatters. Well, it's not initially but the next day she makes a mountain out of a molehill, proves herself a ditzy, self-obsessed cow and screws up her own life. Not that you'll care.

The character isn't that likeable and it's hard to sympathise with her self-inflicted plight.

Her sister Beth, on the other hand, is comedy gold. Olivia Coleman, who plays her, steals not just every scene she's in but the entire episode.

Okay, there are things that don't ring true in the following set-up: Michelle Ryan is a stats-obsessed maths teacher called Saz, short for Sarah. She's heard that, on average, people marry their 11th sexual partner. And she's delighted to be marrying her Mister Eleven... Sean Maguire. Until an old fling turns up and says they never did it 'cause she was too drunk, making Sean Maguire, Mister Ten. And so she decides she needs to etc, etc.

Yes. There are holes in it. (Seriously? Saz? SAZ?) BUT, it still retains an easy charm. Michelle Ryan is better-suited to this stuff than Bionicisity, Sean Maguire has always been good and it is extremely well shot. Obviously, it's not for men, unless you're the type of guy who secretly likes rom coms (you know who you are). But really, not too bad at all.

Despite the usual likable performance from Michelle Ryan, this damp squib of a romantic comedy drama isn't really worth the time of day. It's based on a shaky premise, with Ryan's numbers obsessed brainiac holding out to marry her eleventh sexual partner as that's what the statistics say will be her optimum partner. Er, what? Amazing she got to her eleventh partner with a hang up like that, as most men would probably run away screaming. That being said, put this against Big Top and it looks like a Poliakoff epic.

Statistics reveal that modern women tend to marry their 11th sexual partner when they are about 28 years old. Sarah "Saz" Paley (Michelle Ryan) is an improbably glamorous maths teacher who from childhood has sought to impose numerical order on the world about her, and so here she is, aged 28, marching down the aisle with her "Mister 11" (Sean Maguire). But Mister Nine (Adam Garcia) turns up at the reception to reveal that after they met at a nightclub years before, Saz and he had both been too drunk to sleep with one another, and so now Mr Nine is Mister Not Quite, Mr 11 is demoted to Mr 10 and Saz's world promptly falls apart. This is obviously a ludicrously slight premise, but thanks to a sharp script and fine acting, this two-part romantic comedy turns out to be a delight.

Remember that scene in Four Weddings And A Funeral when Andie MacDowell lists her sexual partners to a beleaguered Hugh Grant? Well, this is sort of that, stretched out over two parts. This time, our leading lady is Michelle Ryan playing a statistics-obsessed maths teacher who reckons the 11th sexual partner is the one you should marry - the appearance of an ex on her wedding day prompts a romp through her hot-under-the-collar past. It's not entirely successful because Ryan's not much of an actress and the script is a bit lacklustre. But the eye-candy credentials of Sean Maguire and Adam Garcia, and an appearance by sweet Slumdog Millionaire star Dev Patel are enough to keep you paying attention.

Michelle Ryan and Sean Maguire on Mister Eleven

The former EastEnders stars who found unlikely success in Hollywood: Michelle Ryan and Sean Maguire discuss their new, British, two-part comedy drama.