Robert Bathurst pilots advertising agency sitcom
- Robert Bathurst is piloting an advertising agency sitcom
- A teaser short for the comedy, Agency, has been shot, co-starring Rachel Stubbings and Alistair Green
- Produced by the team behind Adam Buxton's BUG, the teaser is currently being shopped around channels
Robert Bathurst is piloting a sitcom about rival advertising agencies, British Comedy Guide can exclusively reveal.
The Cold Feet and Toast Of London star shot a proof of concept teaser for Agency last year, co-starring Rachel Stubbings and Alistair Green, with the taster currently being shopped around channels.
Envisioned as "The Thick Of It but in advertising", the pilot is produced by Phil Tidy (Adam Buxton's BUG) for his new company Squire Productions, which has hitherto specialised in making music videos.
Craig Ainsley, who writes and directs with Ben Harris, told BCG that Bathurst's character, Paul, "represents the older side of advertising that was a bit more ruthless and into burn-out culture. He's tended to play more sympathetic characters but he can be a dark guy as well."
Stubbings' character Rachel, who quits Paul's agency Home at the close of the teaser, "is the youth coming through, more of an idealist who wants to do work that is meaningful, whereas he just wants to make shitloads of money. He's a bit like [The Thick Of It's] Malcolm Tucker in that he's quite harsh but really smart. In the treatment we say it's a show about people who make their money by persuading you to part with yours".
In the prospective series, Rachel sets up a small rival agency, Chaffinch, "and they're pitching against each other for the biggest bit of business, which is a supermarket, and Paul's agency win the pitch by claiming that they can get Steven Spielberg to shoot the launch TV spot" explains Ainsley, a creative director at the Mother advertising agency. His comedy writing credits include Have I Got News For You, The News Quiz and BBC Three animated short The 12 Days of Christmas, voiced by Phoebe Waller-Bridge.
"Of course, they haven't got him locked down, so there's this ridiculous scramble where they're trying to convince Spielberg to shoot a supermarket advert. And that's going on throughout the series. Each episode has its own story too, each of them a ridiculous problem that has to be taken seriously.
"So for example, Home have the advertising account for Calippo but a new terrorist cell emerges in the Middle East with the name 'Calipo' with one 'p'. So disassociating themselves from that becomes a creative brief for the agency."
Green's character Dougie Fresh meanwhile, "is a despicable 'yes man'. Whoever you are, he will agree with you".
"His agenda is just to get the work out the door and keep everyone happy" Ainsley elaborates. "So he's always caught between someone like Rachel, who has a very clear creative point of view on what something should be and the client who's asking for 'a red that's not red'. He has to take that seriously but he can't do anything without Rachel's permission. His job is being a snake oil salesman to the people he works with and the clients he's working for."
Ainsley anticipates using real brand names in the series if it's picked up. And he isn't discouraged by the relative lack of success for previous advertising sitcoms, such as BBC Two's 2010 series The Persuasionists, which starred Adam Buxton, Daisy Haggard, Simon Farnaby, Iain Lee and Jarred Christmas, or 2000's The Creatives from the same channel, created by Absolutely alumni Jack Docherty and Moray Hunter.
"I've had feedback from channels before that shows like this are too media-centric. But then you see something like Call My Agent! and audiences don't know what it's like to be an actor's agent, so I never understand that feedback. If you can make it relatable in some way then that's fine."
You can watch the Agency teaser here: