Psychoville

Psychoville: Reece Shearsmith studies the fragments

Roll up Psychoville fans - nearly time to come out and play again. Yes you know who you are; in the words of the late (?) Mr Jelly - "Don't be ashamed".

The boys are back in clown

Actor Reece Shearsmith doesn't see the funny side dressed as a creepy clown. The star - Mr Jelly in BBC2's Psychoville - was filming new scenes in Hackney, East London.

Psychoville: sitcom review

Psychoville is yet another wonderful, dark comedy from deep inside the minds of Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton.

Appointment Notification

Your next appointment at Ravenhill Hospital will be Winter 2010.

Psychoville will return

That's right. It's coming back. So, what's become of the characters caught in the Ravenhill explosion?

Jon Plowman offered an intriguing glimpse of the BBC duty log at last week's Broadcast TV Comedy Forum. BBC2 black comedy Psychoville, which Plowman exec'd attracted complaints that it was "full of innuendo" and that a caption reading "Bristol, Avon", was inaccurate. ("When will you people realise?" the green inker wailed.) And a scene with the words "Fuck pig", emblazoned in blood at a murder scene laden wuth excrement and semen? Zero. "I despair what gets the British public annoyed," Plowman lamented.

This gothic BBC comedy-thriller written by Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton is as brutal, gory and funny as The League of Gentlemen. But also present is a sense of whimsy, even at times an unexpected tenderness. The story begins with five people receiving a letter that reads, 'I know what you did', and leads to an explosive and tense finale. It's shot through with savage comedy, from one man's preoccupation with the bowels of conjoined twins to the slapstick of a blind man trying to make phonecalls on a Club biscuit. The story is brilliantly told and expertly performed, never more so than in the central, fourth episode which is the most rewarding half-hour of the series, shot to suggest one long take. The on-screen chemistry between the League regulars is a joy to watch and moments like Maureen fluttering her cardy to make like Superman are hard to forget.

In the interviews included in the extras on the DVD, producer Jon Plowman reveals Psychoville was written in six parts but when it became apparent the ending was too expensive, Plowman asked the Beeb to make it as a seven-part show, then asked the writers to request an extra, cheap episode. This is the extraordinary fourth ep and is proof that too little money can be an advantage. On the disc, there's even a fascinating split-screen option showing how it was shot.

Psychoville episode seven: Ravenhill

It seems almost all of us who've watched Psychoville have really enjoyed the series. There's much to be said for anything that can frame its decisive moment of murder and high tension with a song from Joseph and the Technicolour Dreamcoat. The costumes, dialogue, locations and, to an extent, the plotting were pitch perfect. No other British comedy has been as enjoyable this year.

Psychoville has a Marmite effect on viewers: the story of a group of grotesques bought together by menacing notes, it reached an ingenious conclusion last night. Mr Jolly the clown was revealed as the puppeteer, Eileen Atkins was the sadistic matron of the asylum where all the characters were once resident (and where the wannabe serial killer David first struck - Atkins's nurse his victim, after a vicious series of electric shocks). Each character, every line, was cannily, cleverly drawn, toilet humour dovetailing with jolting pathos - and there's nothing like an explosion for a cliffhanger.