Women On The Verge

The best new TV comedies of October-December (Part 1)

Here's part 1 of the best new TV comedies that have aired in the UK over the last three months...

While lacking the vulgar blunt force of her other show, Catastrophe, this Sharon Horgan-created series is more agreeably scabrous than most primetime comedy. In tonight's penultimate episode: mild criticism at a team-building event sends Laura into a shame spiral, and Alison reacts badly to news of her partner's low sperm count.

How my £10,000 therapy inspired a new TV comedy

An ex-Observer journalist on her battle with depression, and the creation of a celebration of women with complicated lives.

Far more delightful [than The Bisexual] was Women on the Verge, a wonderful adaptation, by the Observer's friend and ex-colleague Lorna Martin, of her grand book Woman on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown. Now set in Dublin, it's spritzy and filthy and honestly, deeply funny, and has the imprimatur of Sharon Horgan, who will end up playing against type. It's a three-lass vicious, honest comedy, and I still marvel at the fact there are still a number of 31-year-olds who haven't written about being chucked/angsted/drunk/in love with the wrong man. Horgan and Martin have taken the bones of a confused depression of old and sprinkled some laughter and zhuzz. Thus something has been lost, something won. The three laugh-out-loud actresses are wonderful and so good to see Nina Sosanya back again.

Women on the Verge review

Sharon Horgan's scabrous comedy is so Sex and the City, it's almost cliched

New wave of comedies likely to make you cry and laugh

The new of wave of comedies are as likely to make you cry as laugh - and that's great

This new Sharon Horgan-powered comedy follows three Dublin friends trying to navigate their lives, or rather struggle to get them under control. For Laura (Kerry Condon), that means being sacked as godmother when she sleeps through a christening, while Alison (Eileen Walsh) is so sick of dating she gets back with her ex and agrees to try for a baby. Gloriously deadpan Katie (Nina Sosanya) is on the verge of artificial insemination, but her daughter's father has some big news. So far, so funny.

How therapy becomes comedy in Women on the Verge

Journalist Lorna Martin wrote a memoir about her years in therapy - now she and Horgan have turned it into the anti-Sex and the City.

Women on the Verge review

A scabrous creation from Sharon Horgan that doesn't quite hit the peaks.