Not Going Out

Lee Mack returns for a new series as the wise-cracking lodger who seems to have nothing better to do than make fun of the cleaner and hang out with his landlady's brother.

Apart from the inconvenient fact that Lee Mack isn't gay, Not Going Out almost reminds you of a British Will And Grace. The rat-a-tat gags and setup of unlikely flatmates might be as artificially manufactured and as full of dodgy additives as a market stall hamburger, but you can't get enough of it.

As series three opens tonight, Lee is pondering the urban myth about whether it's possible for a woman to get pregnant from bath water. Why? Well, his landlady Lucy (Sally Bretton) is mysteriously up the duff and there can only be one, disgusting, explanation. As Lee and best mate Tim (Tim Vine) consider the grim implications, the jokes come from all directions. Plus, we discover another reason why Lee is so keen to stay in the flat. Never mind that he fancies Lucy - the bathroom is amazing.

Written by and starring comedian Lee Mack, the flatshare sitcom returns for a new series. Tonight, the gags continue to come thick and fast as Lucy (Sally Bretton) announces to Lee that she thinks she's pregnant or, as Lee sarcastically puts it, "got a muffin in the breadbin". When he goes for a drink with Lucy's brother Tim (Tim Vine), Lee wonders if the father might accidentally be him and we discover how the unusual conception may have happened.

This sparkling, rapid-fire comedy - which boasts more smart and silly one-liners per minute than any other sitcom - is back with a third series. Starring Lee Mack and the brilliant punslinger Tim Vine, the charming larks generally revolve around Mack's continued efforts to impress Vine's sister. Better still, though, the writers have brought back Tim's dippy girlfriend, Daisy, as a regular character.

Some sitcoms just won't go away, and so it is with Not Going Out, starring Lee Mack as Lee, who just never found the time to grow up on take on any adult responsibilities. Thing is, you can't help but like Not Going Out, for all its down at heel, old fashioned, studio-bound feel. It's certainly a cut above the now-defunct After You've Gone and woeful Life of Riley, and Mack, who serves as scriptwriter, is well versed in constructing intricate gags with a good payoff. Go on, give it a look. You might like it.

Lee Mack Interview

Sitcom writer and stand-up Lee Mack tells The Independent the secrets of being funny on TV.

Although everyone gets his or her own punch lines, Lee responds to almost everything with a joke - we're meant to see it as a half-charming character defect - and so there's one every few lines when he's around. That relentlessness is eventually funny in itself - it's the Henny Youngman Effect, it wears you down. The pace is rapid and the tone is dry, and the rhythms and melodies of the jokes are particularly English and at times seem to jump back 50 years to the days of Tony Hancock and Kenneth Horne.

Despite the slightly serialised element hovering over the relationships, the show mostly relies on Mack's rapid delivery of jokes, which would be more palatable if the other characters didn't persistently question his subconscious motivations in using humour to hide his feelings. There's nothing like constantly being reminded you're watching a sitcom to undermine caring at all about the modest plots.

Although slacker comedy represents a well-worn staple, that conceit takes on a rather strange quality when said slacker passes the age of 25. At a certain point, Lee seems less like an unpredictable free spirit than that annoying guy sleeping on Kate's couch and unsettling the neighbors.

The show has a setup as simple and streamlined as a US sitcom. That's one of its charms, that it takes a US format, Anglicises it with quirky little grace notes and sells it back to us. In fact, Not Going Out has the feel of a British show destined to be Americanised, like the successful The Office or the flop Coupling.

NOT GOING OUT - A New BBC Sitcom

This is exactly what sitcoms should be all about. Funny, edgy, uncompromising and ultimately the right kind of distraction. These Brits truly know how to make anything sound and look funny so we know that this show can do very well here in the US. A must-watch!