Penelope Princess Of Pets

Written by and starring Kristen Schaal from Flight of the Conchords, this pilot did not try to be too clever, just surreal. Penelope has 3,769 hours to save the world by killing Thomas Stone MP (Julian 'Mighty Boosh' Barrett), and stopping his fiendish plot to start a war between humans and animals. With crackerjack repartee ("Is she dead?" "Not technically." "Figuratively?" "No, but Sam says she is to him") and a delightfully silly sensibility, this is a show with legs.

Kristen Schaal stars as Penelope, Princess Of Pets, who can talk to the animals, grunt and squeak and squawk to the animals. This Comedy Lab pilot started as internet sketches and is proudly low-budget - the heroine's pals are deliberately ropey puppets and the jokes are cheap, too.

It should be terrible, but thanks to Schaal's wide-eyed charm and some delightful silliness, I laughed much more than it deserved.

Fake pigeons dangling from wires, an alcoholic bird and a woman who can talk to animals. These are the surreal ingredients of the return of C4's Comedy Lab pilots tonight. Coincidentally, there's also a talking dog you could describe as a comedy lab - as in Labrador.

If you're a fan of BBC4's Flight Of The Conchords you'll recognise US comedian Kristen Schaal, who stars as Penelope and wrote this with her pal and co-star Kurt Braunohler.

The Mighty Boosh's Julian Barratt plays an MP who Penelope has just 3,762 days to assassinate. It's funny, charming and daffy but will it make a series?

These one-off Comedy Labs, running throughout this week, have inevitably had their high and low points. But there's a healthy pedigree behind the first of tonight's offerings, Penelope Princess of Pets, about a woman who can talk to animals. It stars Kristen Schaal from Flight Of The Conchords, and is produced by Avalon, makers of Harry Hill's TV Burp.

Kristen Schaal will be familiar as superfan Mel from Flight of The Conchords, but she also writes and performs in this comedy pilot, Penelope Princess of Pets. The premise is bizarre: Penelope can talk to the animals and, on a sightseeing trip to London, learns that an MP called Stone (Julian Barratt) plans a war between the humans and the animals.

Kristen Schaal, the amusingly creepy/kooky obsessive fan woman from Flight Of The Conchords, plays Penelope, a sort of Prozac Nation Saint Francis Of Assisi, and Julian Barratt is her nemesis, an evil Tory MP. Quirky rather than hilarious, but worth a squizz on an off-night for telly generally.

Interview with Kristen and Kurt

Hilarious, energetic and refreshingly surreal. Meet award-winning double-act Kristen Schaal and Kurt Braunohler.