The Café

Is it wrong to judge a show by its theme tune? The folky version of Somewhere Beyond The Sea which opens The Cafe is sung by Kathryn Williams in a voice so wistfully fairy-like she makes Janet Devlin off The X Factor sound like Joe Cocker.

The second impression you'll get of The Cafe is that it's a bit Early Doors On Sea because it's directed by Craig Cash and is set, as you could probably guess, in and around a pretty beach-front cafe in Weston-super-Mare called Cyril's.

It's written by and stars Ralf Little and Michelle Terry (who is actually from Weston) and it makes a nice change to see Somerset getting a bit of a look-in, instead of the North West.

Having said that, many of the eccentrics who frequent the cafe run by Carol (Ellie Haddington) could have just stepped off the bus from Doc Martin territory. One of them, Kieran, who works as a living statue, is actually a different colour every day (a bit like Gold Guy in the short-lived sitcom Angelo's). Michelle Terry plays Carol's daughter Sarah, who's reluctantly living back home after a stint in London and is trying to become a writer.

Little plays her ex-boyfriend Richard who works in a care-home.

But a potential new relationship arrives tonight in the shape of an old school friend who has just zoomed down from the capital in a Porsche.

John is played by Daniel Ings from Pete Versus Life, who now seems in danger of being type-cast as the handsomest man for miles around. Poor thing. Must be tough for him.

This is the kind of show for which the word "bittersweet" could have been invented. A social hub, wry chitchat among the regulars and the occasional ripple of pathos - it's all here in this new seaside-set sitcom written by and starring Ralf Little and Michelle Terry, and directed by Craig Cash.

Yet while The Café does, at times, capture the loneliness that people can experience when everything around them is all-too-familiar, it's not as subtle as the best of the genre, such as Cash's understated Early Doors. In fact, the programme it most resembles is the short-lived Angelo's, a 2007 comedy set in a greasy spoon that, oddly enough, also featured a living-statue among its patrons. As for whether The Café will disappear as quickly, there's a danger that viewers will find it all a little bit too inconsequential.

The Cafe - advance review

The Cafe has a Royle Family streak running through it. Overall The Cafe is a steady and, for me personally, a slightly-annoying-at-times show but it is also a charming, warm and well written program that makes me want to watch the next episode.

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TV review: The Cafe

As a portrait of the tedium of life in a quiet seaside town, The Cafe was all too accurate. The main problem is that the pace is painfully slow. Glacial, even

If you've yet to visit the Victorian seaside town of Weston-Super-Mare, now's your chance: it's home to the debut sitcom from Ralf Little and stage actress Michelle Terry, and yes, its precinct is a café in which Terry's struggling writer Sarah and her loveable mum, Carol, banter with dotty grandmas, schoolboy sweethearts and sexy visitors from the capital. Gentle but endearing.

Ralf Little on following Royle Family with own creation

"When this was commissioned, my mother was text-book brilliant and supportive. She said, 'Oh, well done, I'm so proud of you'... Eight seconds later, the phone rang again and she added, 'Make sure it's good, won't you?'"

Royle Family actors Ralf Little and Craig Cash collaborate for a gentle sitcom set in a seaside café in Weston-super-Mare. Cash directs a script by Little and actress Michelle Terry in a story revolving around three generations who run a struggling café: Gran (June Watson), divorcee Carol (Ellie Haddington) and daughter Sarah (Terry). The characters are nicely observed - in particular some of the café regulars such as Richard (Little), a care-home assistant and Sarah's ex, and Keiran (Kevin Trainor), who works as a "living statue" - but The Cafe's sedate pace does make it a bit dull.

A new sitcom from director and executive producer Craig Cash (The Royle Family) that is co-written by Ralf Little (The Royle Family and Two Pints...) and Michelle Terry (Reunited). It's a classic British sitcom set-up - take an institution (in this case a seaside cafe) and use it as a hub for characters to interact and to tease out class, inter-generational and social observations. The comedy and characters are gentle, if at times familiar, but there's a nice pace to it, as though pitched somewhere between Gavin And Stacey and Alan Bennett.

Michelle Terry introduction

When we started writing The Café, Ralf Little and I were mostly influenced by what we didn't want to write...