See the dangers facing seals and other animals in rural Scotland – Highlands – Scotland’s Wild Heart, BBC One Scotland

The best use of the word ‘shod’ you’ll hear this week (probably)

See how Nina’s fitting in – Love, Nina, BBC One

Alex Jones’ sheer range of emotions as Michael McIntyre types her ‘send to all’ message

Find out who replied – Michael McIntyre’s Big Show, BBC One

Ross Noble imagines Prince Harry’s life – as told by horses

See what else was discussed under host Gary Lineker’s watch – Have I Got News For You, BBC One

Trying to explain technology to your boyfriend’s mum

Get to know the new addition to the family, Kelly – Mum, BBC Two

Matt Lucas playing a donkey is everything you’d hope it would be

See his take on Shakespeare – A Midsummer Night’s Dream, BBC One

And finally, more confetti than an English country wedding at Radio 1’s Big Weekend

Watch performance highlights from the massive music event – BBC Radio 1’s Big Weekend

And if you want to see what Springwatch’s Chris Packham picks out on BBC iPlayer this week you can watch Frank Skinner On Demand With...

See more kangaroo stories – Natural World, BBC Two

These hopeful owners try to prise apart two young dogs at play, only to hear the harsh truth that: “They’re at a rave and you’re offering them the library”

See the playful pups – Choose the right puppy for you, BBC Two

Nick Hewer reveals his take on the “extraordinary, terrible story” of BHS

Watch the panel’s take on the latest news – Have I Got News For You, BBC One

Is it just us, or is this David Tennant’s young doppelganger? 

Watch a unique comedy interpretation of Shakespeare’s Romeo – Upstart Crow, BBC Two

And finally – there’s nothing like a child needing a wee to interrupt a live debate

See how presenter Victoria handled the news – The Victoria Derbyshire Show, BBC Two

Discover more comedy on BBC iPlayer.

And if you want to see what In The Club actress Katherine Parkinson picks out on BBC iPlayer this week you can watch Frank Skinner On Demand With...

Travelling with different internet celebrities was just mental, man. Everyone reacts to it in different ways. Vine star Arron Crascall got quite teary missing his family. Other people were more bothered by the bugs and the wilderness.

Some people were just bang up for it, like Conor Maynard - he made me look stupid. And Jenny Jones, the snowboarder, was building a raft in 40 degree heat with her bare hands while I stood in a bush with borderline sunstroke.

YouTubers Rose and Rosie were the most useless of my companions. No question. They were just like me, scared of everything, falling over. And Rosie is vegan. I took a vegan to the Arctic Circle… where there's basically just blubber, fat, blood and meat. She was sobbing every time there was a scene with a dead animal.

I'd like to take other comics with me next time. Someone like Rob Beckett. Or even, if I could talk him into it, Romesh Ranganathan. Maybe we could do one in Sri Lanka when he's filming the next Asian Provocateur. Or Jimmy Carr... it'd be quite funny to see him out of his comfort zone, in exploring shorts!

The third character on the trip is the phone. It is my robot companion. It's as close as we've got to an R2D2 or C3PO.

When you're making a programme called Stupid Man, Smart Phone, it's pointless just trying to be a rubbish Bear Grylls. The phone was the centre of the experiment, of the comedy, of the narrative. The phone's solving every quandary, that's what makes this programme completely unique.

But it taught me there's no substitute for the human element. Maybe my co-hosts would say differently, but you can't beat that feeling of an expert walking in and it's a real person, shaking your hand, talking you through it and helping you. It's just not the same.

I’m really close to my mum and she was just worried for me. I'm always falling over, always injuring myself, so I'm not the best person to be climbing up a mountain or trekking across the desert leading a beast. We were Skyping them all the time while I was away.

But I learnt I could prepare an animal. And I can light a fire without wood - we burnt camel poo one night. I used a tampon and hand sanitizer to start a fire. I've inadvertently learnt quite a lot of survival knowledge.

Thankfully for the team, I'm still a worrier. If we cure that, we don't have a show! A lot of the comedy comes out of seeing me screaming at a spider or a snake or a car door that didn't close.

Interview by Kieran Coyle.

Russell Kane is a comedian and stars in Stupid Man, Smart Phone.

The series continues on Sunday, 8 May from midday on BBC iPlayer. Each episode will be available to watch in BBC iPlayer for six months.

Comments made by writers on the BBC TV blog are their own opinions and not necessarily those of the BBC.

An understanding of the restorative powers of a good cup of tea

Who else would you get to host a documentary about our national obsession?

Knowing that just a chat between friends is often the best source of comedy

Capturing laughter and love in an ordinary workplace helped to make dinnerladies a huge hit for BBC One.

A mischievous desire to poke fun at our national treasures

Wood joined Harry Enfield, Jennifer Saunders and many more fellow comedy stars for this pitch-perfect Red Nose Day 2011 sketch from the archives.

Knowing that holding hands by the sea is delightfully romantic

It's hard to think of a more perfect person to play the mother of another northern comic hero, Eric Morecambe.

And, of course, recognising the inherent sexiness of a hostess trolley

Perhaps the ultimate comic portrayal of British suburban life, The Ballad of Barry and Freda will undoubtedly go down as one of Victoria Wood's greatest moments.

Musically talented, lyrically dextrous, a pioneer for women in comedy, humane and humble. Ladies and gents, raise your teacups to the wonderful Victoria Wood.

Victoria Wood: As Seen on TV is available to watch and download on BBC iPlayer until Saturday, 21 May 2016

Read Victoria Wood's post for Love TV from December 2014: That Day We Sang: It began in my bedsit

Jim Moir (aka Vic Reeves) discusses filming that scene by the sea: Eric & Ernie: A minute with Jim Moir

We discovered that Zoe and Kerry have had their own flat-sharing experiences…

Zoe: Well I lived with a drummer at university for a bit which was horrendous. It was a whole big mess. I think we thought it would be really cool to live with a drummer but it’s not cool, it’s not fun, it’s not big or clever.

Kerry: Probably my worst experience was when I was living in my dad’s apartment, and my brother Daniel was living there too. There were only two bedrooms, so my dad had his bedroom obviously and Daniel had the other one because he had a job. So I had to sleep in the lounge.

Dad would wake up really early in the morning, so my mum’s answer was to get me a pop up tent. So I slept in a tent inside the lounge… for about a year. I mean luckily [laughing] I didn’t have a boyfriend!

Zoe: “Oh come back to my pop up!”

Kerry: Yeah it’s amazing what you suddenly remember, I’d blocked that out! But the thing is, it’s not soundproof, I could still hear dad at 5.30 in the morning.

Zoe: It wouldn’t even block out the light either?

Kerry: No! It was awful.

…that their characters, Rhona and Leanne could learn a lot from each other…

Kerry: Leanne can learn to have a bit of breathing space to think things through before doing them.

Zoe: Yes, and Rhona could learn to cut loose a little bit more. She’s really inhibited. And also she really needs Leanne because Leanne is the BTEC qualified actress [they both laugh] but she’s willing to improvise and to take things as they come.

This is a situation that you can’t plan for – Rhona’s planning isn’t working so she’s dependent on Leanne. And that’s a nice dynamic, because they get a bit closer as the show goes on.

Kerry: On their own they wouldn’t manage, I don’t think. But together they are the ‘perfect human’, dealing with everything.

Zoe: …I wouldn’t say perfect! That’s so Leanne!

Kerry: [Does Leanne accent]: THEY SHOULD BE TOGETHER AND THEY SHOULD NEVER BE BROKEN. EVER.

Zoe: But the situation gets worse and worse, so they are more entangled in this thing. And they have to resort to more extreme measures as they go along.

We discovered that John Inverdale makes a memorable cameo in the comedy…

Kerry: John appears in a video about how to cope with witness protection. I loved it. We have that in every episode to mix it up and it’s brilliant.

Zoe: But what’s also really funny is that whenever we had a read-through everyone had a version of John Inverdale that they would do. So we’ve met so many different John Inverdales.

…and that they admire a lot of British comedy actresses…

Kerry: For me it’s definitely Julie Walters. She’s just amazing. And Patricia Routledge as well. There were a lot of strong really talented women around in the 80s and 90s. Dawn French, Jen Saunders…

Zoe: Mine’s Joanna Lumley. I bloody love her!

Kerry: …Penelope Keith. Judi Dench had her own sitcom. They were all leading shows. They weren’t quite setting up gags for other people but we’re changing that now.  

We discovered Kerry wants to work with her brother, Russell Howard again…

Kerry: I mean if the opportunity arose we’d definitely work together again. Filming A Gert Lush Christmas together was really really fun actually. But at the moment it’s just getting us tied down to something really because we’re both just so busy. He’s about to do a travel show with my mum!

We’re not really a showbiz family though, I was brought up on jumble sales in church halls you know, very very normal. It’s a bit weird what’s happened.

…and that her Bristolian family like hearing their accent on screen

Kerry: Well they just think I’m playing them, so all my cousins are like: “It’s me isn’t it”.

Discover more comedy shows on BBC iPlayer.

Zoe Boyle plays Rhona and Kerry Howard plays Leanne in Witless.

Witless starts on Friday, 22 April at 6pm on BBC Three and BBC iPlayer. Episode one will also be shown on Friday, 29 April at 11.25pm on BBC One. Each episode will be available to watch in BBC iPlayer for six months after broadcast.

Comments made by writers on the BBC TV blog are their own opinions and not necessarily those of the BBC.

Stag weekends are always predictable, rarely truly enjoyable - but it’s who you’re with, and everyone’s mood, that makes or breaks it.

In the case of this show, it’s a pretty unconventional weekend of hunting in the beautiful wilderness of Scotland. That in itself could be fairly pleasant. But they all behave so appallingly, so despicably - even when they should be working together to save each other - and that’s the defining factor.

For Stag, we wanted to skewer masculinity, and really there’s no better (or worse) display of that than on a stag weekend. Particularly when you add the ritualism of the hunting, the bloodsport, the testing of man versus nature.

We made our characters privileged which enabled us to heighten it even further - to set them up as entitled, supercilious, opinionated, unlikeable characters but then pull the rug from beneath them. To break them down to see what they’re really made of when it’s a case of life or death.

Getting the viewers to sympathise with these obnoxious individuals was a challenge we set ourselves, and something our amazing cast did a great job of bringing to life. 

It might not be much, but if you can move the needle on the character just a few millimetres, if we can show that their bullishness is just a bluff, and there’s some deeper insecurities and vulnerabilities under there, then we might start to care about them. We’ve really tried to redeem almost all the characters in some way. We wanted to try to surprise the audience into empathising with characters we had initially encouraged them to despise.

I myself wouldn’t go near this particular stag weekend. But Ian (Jim Howick) doesn’t have a choice – he’s the bride’s brother. He’s too polite to say no, for one thing. But more importantly he’s got to defend his sister’s honour, and keep his promise to look out for her fiancé.

I’ve been in Ian’s position on my brother-in-law’s stag do. Well, it felt more like an organised riot than a stag party. It was fairly uncontroversial though. We spent the day paintballing in some forest somewhere. Just a bunch of very unfit men in their thirties, running for their lives and squealing like children. Then we ended up in a pub I think.

But Stag is a thriller. We took this so seriously we didn’t even let the cast know who was behind the killings. It was an absolute nightmare to keep it secret because our cast were all so flipping nosy. And in particular when they figured out that some people knew more than others.

So we had to engage in all sorts of misdirection and subterfuge. Changing names in the scripts, putting fake names on the call sheets, squirrelling people around in blacked-out cars and making sure they didn’t cross each other in the hallways. The conspiracy behind the scenes was almost more complicated than the on-screen plot.

Jim Field Smith is a writer, producer and director of Stag. 

Stag starts on Saturday, 27 February at 9pm on BBC Two. Each episode will be available to watch in BBC iPlayer for 30 days after broadcast on TV.

Comments made by writers on the BBC TV blog are their own opinions and not necessarily those of the BBC.

The people portrayed in the film seemed pleased with the results – even though one of them was depicted with a deeply unflattering haircut.

Other snooker fans also enjoyed the pot-em-up (thank you, Charlie Brooker).

It seems as if there hasn’t been a more compelling mix of laughter and drama around the green baize since Big Break was in its pomp.

One of the most popular aspects of The Rack Pack has been its fantastic soundtrack. We’re not sure there’s enough prog for Steve Davis’ liking, but the classic rock from The Who, Cream and Thin Lizzy (and yes, Chas and Dave) has proven a hit.

We already have! You can check out the playlist at the BBC Music site.

Perhaps surprisingly, given it’s set in the era of cream suits and bri-nylon, the wardrobe has also attracted some attention...

But films based on real people and real events can often prove to be divisive - and the same has been the case with The Rack Pack...

The Rack Pack is available on BBC iPlayer until Monday, 16 January 2017. And if you can’t get enough of the eighties action, you can also look behind the scenes to see how the white hot atmosphere of the World Championships at the Crucible was recreated in a snooker hall in Llanelli.

Josh: I hate to admit this in print, but when I was an impressionable teenager with dreams of being independent, drunk and anywhere other than Devon, living the impossibly 90s lifestyle of Gary and Tony seemed like a utopia.

Looking back at that now I shudder at my naivety: while Men Behaving Badly remains a brilliant sitcom, how did I ever aspire to Gary and Tony’s eternal adolescence? Consistent trips to an awful local pub, badly functioning relationships, weak lager, and long hours in boring jobs. Having now lived all of these experiences at one time or another I can report back to my 13-year-old self that the reality doesn’t match up to the dream.

Tom's pick: Friends 

Tom: I’d enjoy living with this bunch, and not just because I’d get to live in a New York penthouse for diddly-squat. Joey, Monica and I have a love of food in common, while Ross could tell me about dinosaurs, and hopefully loudly enough to drown out Phoebe.

But best of all, I’d get to spend time with Rachel, my number one teenage crush. As a spotty adolescent with nothing to show for myself apart from a crisp packet pencil case, I remember feeling genuinely happy when Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston had marital issues… as if that gave me an in.

Josh's pick: Bottom

Josh: A lot of problems here for me. Number one: I am quite scared by physical violence and consequently have never been in a fight. As a result I wouldn’t ideally choose to live with two men who would hit you in the face with a frying pan as soon as look at you.

Add this to cleanliness problems and issues with one of your flatmates having the surname Hitler, and you can count me out of this room ad. This is despite the obvious benefit that - for the first time - I'd be considered the household’s resident ladies’ man.

Tom's pick: Father Ted

Tom: The issue here would be Dougal. I’ve had a dopey housemate before, and it was stressful. This was a man who once rushed to the loo after a big shop, and on finding no toilet roll, used a slice of bread.

Although I’m not this bad, I am a dopey person myself, so I need my flat-mates to offset this. In fact, on a recent romantic trip with my girlfriend, I managed to book a hotel room Ted and Dougal would’ve been proud of. Two singles and a dividing wall anyone?

Josh's pick: Josh

Josh: For the sake of this article I should say I am presuming I am coming into this flat as a replacement for the character of Josh, rather than dealing with the glitch-in-the-Matrix scenario of sharing a house with someone with my name, face and voice.

I actually believe I would cope better with this set up than any other on offer in this article (for a start, I would find living with or near Jennifer Aniston impossibly intimidating). In fact, often after a day of filming, Elis James (who plays Owen) and I would discuss how even pretending to be these people made us miss the time when you lived with your friends and had no responsibilities. I am a nostalgic person by nature and I worry now that doing this sitcom has just been my way of returning to a house-share for one final time.

Tom Craine and Josh Widdicombe co-wrote Josh.

Josh continues on Wednesday, 18 November at 10.30pm on BBC Three. Each episode will be available in BBC iPlayer for 30 days after broadcast on TV.

Comments made by writers on the BBC TV blog are their own opinions and not necessarily those of the BBC.

What’s the weirdest news story you’ve encountered during the show?
A man got a porcelain cast of his wife's vagina put on his gravestone, AT HER INSISTENCE! 

Which mystery guest will you never forget – for the wrong or right reasons?
Brian Blessed. It’s like having a conversation with a tornado. 

What’s one surprising fact you’ve learned in the course of making Good News?
A pig’s orgasm lasts half an hour. 

Which catchphrase are people most likely to shout at you in the street?
“Ain't nobody got time for that!”

How much time do you and your crew spend watching and reading news to prepare?
Hours and hours and hours…

Russell Howard is a comedian and presents Russell Howard's Good News.

Series 10 of Russell Howard's Good News starts on Thursday, 22 October at 10pm on BBC Two. Each episode will be available in BBC iPlayer for 30 days after broadcast on TV.

Comments made by writers on the BBC TV blog are their own opinions and not necessarily those of the BBC.

When is the last time you went on holiday together? 

Romesh: Last time I went on holiday with my mum was when we went to Canada to see some family.

Shanthi: When we arrived at the airport, my relations came to pick us up, and the first thing they said was: ‘Romesh looks exactly like his father’, which brought me to tears. But just spending time with Romesh in Canada was such a wonderful experience. And the way he looked after me when I was there was fantastic.

Romesh: I’m a really good son.

Shanthi: He’s a really good boy. He has got so much love in him, but he doesn’t know how to express it. But when I went to Canada and when we went to Sri Lanka, I was thinking what a lovely boy he is. 

Romesh: You can’t put any of this in by the way. I’m going to look like a right idiot.

Shanthi: No I’m telling the truth! It’s how I felt as a mother.

Romesh: Yeah but it makes me look like a…

Shanthi: No it doesn’t make you look like a mummy’s boy. It’s an inspiration for everybody because your mother is important to you.

Romesh: Yeah I’m a great guy.

Shanthi: Maybe. I’m very comfortable talking to Romesh about anything. Since my husband passed away we’ll have long chats, and he’s such a wonderful, kind person and I can ask him anything. I don’t feel sad, because when I think about Romesh he’s there for me. All the time. It’s such a nice feeling.

What’s your funniest memory of each other?

Romesh: When we were coming back from Canada, mum’s got a Sri Lankan passport, and the guy at customs looked at it and said: ‘You don’t have permission to return to the UK’. So I told him: ‘Well she does, she lives there’. And he said: ‘Not according to this passport. She’s not allowed to go back to the UK.’ And mum just started freaking out!

It was not funny at the time, but it was hilarious afterwards because then he just turned the page and went: ‘Oh wait, yes you do’.

Shanthi: Yeah it was shocking!

Romesh: It’s like, read the whole document! And mum was just freaking out. She’s like (adopts his mum’s Sri Lankan accent): ‘I’m going to kick him in his face! Read the whole bloody passport!’

Shanthi: Yes that worried me so much, I’m frightened to go to Canada again because of that experience. But the thing is in that moment we couldn’t say anything, because he could say: ‘No, you have to be investigated’ or something. So I kept my mouth shut.

Romesh: Yeah but then afterwards… (in mum’s accent): ‘I hope that man loses his job!’

Shanthi: I didn’t say that!

How did it feel to be part of a show together?

Shanthi: To work together with Romesh I found it very comfortable. He’d tell me: ‘This is what we are going to do mum.’ So I just carried on. I didn’t feel nervous or anything at all.

Romesh: The thing is that the whole point of the show is that we’re just like…

Shanthi: Shouting at each other.

Romesh: No not shouting at each other, I mean that just happened to happen, but basically it’s not a lot like doing a TV show because you’re just having these experiences, and we were chatting about them, and we were just filming it. So it was easy in that regard. 

But mum was very good, she just got into it and she wasn’t nervous around the cameras and stuff, she was just herself which is exactly what we wanted.

Shanthi: What a compliment Romesh, thank you! I was surprised with myself that I wasn’t nervous at all.

Romesh: Let’s be absolutely honest mum, you do see yourself having a TV career. The crew told her that she was very good, she started quietly going to me: ‘I do believe they think I’m very good Rommy’. 

I think for her, in an ideal world, series two would not involve me. It would be a spin-off show where mum’s like: ‘So we got rid of Romesh and now we can really get into the show.’ 

Shanthi: No, no, no (laughing) that’s what Romesh thinks! But I really enjoyed working with him. It was a fantastic, lovely experience. Sometimes I became emotional, thinking, ‘My god, I’m with my son, and they are filming me’, and then I have to control myself and get back to reality.

And the other thing is that he went and did all the spiritual things like going to the temple. He’s a religious boy. I never forced him to believe in anything. We are Hindu and Romesh always prays before he leaves the home. So I bless him with all my heart. It makes me cry sometimes, he’s such a wonderful son to have.

Romesh: I mean, mum, this is way over the top now. I’m supposed to be a comedian!

Shanthi: I’m telling you the truth Romesh, I don’t want to hide it. You know sometimes when you are facing each other it’s very difficult to express your feelings. You feel embarrassed. But I can’t see you now so I can say how I feel about you and the things I wanted to say. It’s a good opportunity for me.

Romesh: I think this interview was a mistake, I’m beginning to realise.

Shanthi: Is it? OK. Do you want me to keep my mouth shut?

Romesh: No! I’m joking, I’m joking.

Romesh, your mum describes you as a coconut in the first episode (white on the inside). What fruit would you say you are?

Romesh: I think I’m a mango. Just very sweet and lovely.

Shanthi: How can you call yourself a mango?! Darling you’re a coconut I tell you.

Romesh: And I would describe my mum as a pomegranate. No, a passion fruit, like, quite sour.

Shanthi: Oh! Thank you so much.

Romesh: She’s a lemon, my mum’s a lemon! Put that down.

Shanthi: Well when you do something wrong, I’m the only person who can correct you. Sometimes you take it in the wrong way and you don’t like it. But who else is going to tell you?

Romesh: Yeah, alright, thanks mum. You’re a lovely lemon.

Romesh Ranganathan is a comedian. He and his mum Shanthi appear in Asian Provocateur. 

Asian Provocateur continues on Wednesday, 7 October at 10pm on BBC Three. Each episode will be available in BBC iPlayer for 30 days after broadcast on TV.

Comments made by writers on the BBC TV blog are their own opinions and not necessarily those of the BBC.

Boy Meets Girl is one of the first mainstream TV comedies to feature a transgender actor in a transgender storyline. What does that mean to you?

Paris: I’m really pleased for Rebecca, because I’ve been looking at the States and have been quite envious of them for a while. They’ve got a really good scene in terms of transgender activism, with strong, sensible, articulate voices. And I just don’t think we’ve quite had that in the UK. So I’m really hoping this will provide a bigger platform for Rebecca, because we need as many people to fly the flag in this country – I think we need some more voices.

Rebecca: I think it’s wonderful that we are seeing one facet of one trans woman’s experience on mainstream British TV, and totally hats off to the BBC for picking up the flag and flying it, and reflecting a facet of our society. And I hope that Boy Meets Girl entertains people: it is a romantic comedy, it’s a sitcom, it’s supposed to make people feel good about themselves. But of course behind that there’s also a wonderful opportunity to show something, just something of the many complex stories that are out there in the trans community.

Paris: The frustrating thing for me a few years ago was that we were only seeing one type of trans story being told in the media, and it wasn’t coming from a very informed place. I always think it’s a rich sort of drama being trans. There are complications to it, there are emotions. But we weren’t really seeing it. It was always a case of pointing at the trans person and laughing and ridiculing them.

This programme didn’t happen by chance – it is actually the fruit of a really early meeting with the BBC, I think it was in 2011. So it’s really satisfying on so many different levels to see this project succeed, and for trans talent to be nurtured and celebrated.

How did your experiences relate to those of Judy in Boy Meets Girl?

Rebecca: Everyone’s got different stories. I mean there are as many lucky people like me who had a relatively safe transition as there are unlucky people who had a hideous transition. And everybody has – somewhere on that spectrum – their experiences. My transition, whilst I describe it as safe and supported, was not without its challenges and its aggressiveness in the streets and society. But I had it ‘easy’ because I’m an actor, I work in theatre in liberal arts. I’m not a welder or a soldier or a cop.

Paris: I’ve never had any problems in my dating life. I’ve been in two fairly serious relationships, one long-term, and nobody really cared actually. But I think Rebecca is right, I think we are privileged, and I think that’s partly to do with why we’re sitting here talking to you now.

But I think the real change we need to effect is with the people who are struggling to walk down the street every day, being abused every time they leave the house. That is still the reality for a lot of trans people. So while it’s wonderful that we’ve seen this explosion of media representation, that has to translate to better rights, better access to healthcare and housing, and mental health services. Because a lot of trans people sadly still face family rejection, so I think it’s important to keep that in mind.

I really hope that this show will help to be part of that change. Because this is mainstream, this is massive, this is literally groundbreaking. This is like when Lenny Henry or Julian Clary were first on TV: voices that we haven’t heard from in a minority are going to be in your living room.

Things have dramatically changed within even just the past three years, and this programme is part of that. I don’t think we can go back on that now.

Rebecca Root plays Judy in Boy Meets Girl. Paris Lees is a journalist and transgender rights activist.

Boy Meets Girl starts on Thursday, 3 September at 9.30pm on BBC Two. Each episode will be available in BBC iPlayer for 30 days after broadcast on TV.

Read Boy Meets Girl writer Elliott Kerrigan's BBC Writersroom blog.

Comments made by writers on the BBC TV blog are their own opinions and not necessarily those of the BBC.

Alice: Pete’s the loveliest man, he really made me smile. Whenever you walked onto set, he’d hug you to say hello – and he really hugged you. It was a real fatherly hug. And Lucy took care of us so much – anything you ever needed she was always there.

Frankie: And she’d give advice too, because obviously she’s been in the industry longer than we have. I mean the pair of them have, and they’re both awesome people.

Laurie: I think we all just had so much fun: a comedy brings everyone close. And with Peter playing our dad, there were so many scenes of laughter. We were crying with laughter! It’s just what families do, you know? If you’re sat around watching telly you do have a little joke and you have a little laugh. 

You play siblings in the show – does that brotherly/sisterly dynamic carry on off-screen?

Frankie: I think we still maintain that sort of relationship whenever we come together, we can always have a laugh and a joke. But at the end of the day, everyone’s off doing their own things and so it’s not like we all go sit round each other’s houses and sit on the sofa watching University Challenge [laughs]. But when we come together that spark returns, and we all just slot back in like a jigsaw.

Laurie: It’s very easy. Also it’s our real first break, so it was really nice to all go through that together.

Frankie: It was nice as well because although there were a lot of older cast members, because it’s based on Danny’s younger life, there were a lot of young actors too. Sometimes when you go on a job you’re surrounded by older heads who’ve got more experience, and they’re telling you what it’s like or what you need to watch out for. But the industry’s always evolving and changing and we’re evolving and changing with it. We’re experiencing everything together the same as that older generation did. So it’s lovely to just be on a set with people your age.

You all stayed in Manchester around the shoot. How much fun did you have when you weren’t filming?

Alice: It was fun, but it was a little bit manic! When I’ve worked on previous things in London, you come home in the evening. Like that’s it, you’re home, work’s finished. But it never ever felt like because we’d left the set, but we were still living with the cast and crew.

Frankie: But it was never like work: it was getting up every day to go on set with your bestest mates. Having a right good laugh, really enjoying yourself, the party never stopped you know? 

What did you learn working with Danny Baker?

Frankie: The way these episodes play out, I mean obviously it’s Danny’s life but it’s also exactly how his head works. You’ll go out for dinner with him, and he’ll start telling a story and then BOSH he’s telling another story, then he goes: ‘Anyway as I was saying…’ and you’re back where you started. You are constantly jumping! So this show is like diving inside Danny Baker’s head.

Laurie: His whole career is based on this just joyous storytelling. And I can’t reiterate enough just how welcoming he was to us. He was unbelievable. The first night, the day of the read-through was my 21st birthday, we all went out for this meal, and it was just…

Alice: IT WAS THE MOST EPIC MEAL EVER.

Laurie: …just incredible! It was like we’d known each other forever and he was chatting like it was the most normal thing in the world. And we’re like, ‘That’s him and we’re playing him and his brother and sister now, and we’ve gotta pretend like we’re cool’.

Frankie: I know, there was a time at that meal, Laurie and I were in the toilets going: "It’s bloody mad this! Can you believe it?"

Was it fun working with the Baker family?

Laurie: Yeah! The whole family is just so welcoming. Danny’s children, Mancie, Bonnie and Sonny are great people. Obviously with Danny as your dad, you’d just be the coolest cat in town

Frankie: And as much as Danny said Cradle to Grave is a reality, not the reality, the family still had massive involvement, it was such an asset to us to have. It was great for character development, but also to get the feel for that family environment.

Alice: So we now feel part of the Baker family.

Laurie and Frankie: Yeah!

Alice: And we only met each other in February…

Frankie: Exactly!

Laurie: That is madness.

Alice: Literally weird. It’s weird.

Frankie Wilson, Alice Sykes and Laurie Kynaston play Michael, Sharon and Danny Baker in Cradle to Grave.

Cradle to Grave starts on Thursday, 3 September at 9pm on BBC Two. Each episode will be available in BBC iPlayer for 30 days after broadcast on TV.

Comments made by writers on the BBC TV blog are their own opinions and not necessarily those of the BBC.

A: It’s like he was born to be the chief, you couldn’t find a better person. He just is the chief. In every episode we have a song, and most of them are sang by Donovan too. He’s got this amazing soulful, deep voice.

C: Then playing John Mahogany you’ve got Steen Raskopoulos who was nominated best newcomer at Edinburgh Fringe last year. And Mitch Rust is played by John Kearns, who won best newcomer at Edinburgh two years ago and last year he won the Fosters Edinburgh award.

John can play a very unusual character, and it was just I think quite fortuitous that we’d also written this really weird character where we were going: ‘Uh who do we get to play THIS?!’ John’s just got something different. 

C: For Mahogany, we probably went through maybe 50 to 60 auditions. It was tough because it’s probably the hardest character to play in the show. Mahogany has got to be the voice of the audience in a really surreal world. He’s our Father Ted.

A: He’s the closest to the audience, he’s the only one who can go ‘Um, what?’ you know, question what’s going on. But at the same time he’s ridiculous.

C: Yeah exactly, and that’s a hard part to play, there’s a lot of things to balance there. Steen did a chemistry audition with John and he was absolutely phenomenal. They had chemistry instantly but they met for the first time then in the room. 

A: And I think Gabby Best has done exactly the same with Helga. A lot of our friends think Helga is their favourite character, they just love her, even though she hardly says anything.

C: In an odd way, we’d written her character quite cold, obviously it’s a reference to Sarah Lund in The Killing and a lot of those sort of Scandinavian crime dramas in more recent years. But Gabby has such a natural warmth to her, that she’s made the character warm without losing any of her steeliness.

A: We’re also very lucky to have a fantastic cast and some really really good cameos in Top Coppers.

C: It was lovely to have Kayvan Novak back. And we got people from The Mighty Boosh, Simon Farnaby and Rich Fulcher. We seem to attract those Boosh kind of guys becausewhat the Boosh had of that kind of other-worldliness we have too. 

C: When we asked Alan Dale to play Mahogany’s father, he really took to it. He was filming a movie in South Africa at the time, so we just had to have him in the sound studio and recorded it all down the line.

The first time he called me I was on a beach with my girlfriend and we were climbing across some rocks when I got this call. So I answered it and started talking to him, and as we were talking she slipped and her foot went into this massive, deep puddle in the middle. So I was kind of like: ‘I’ll help you in a minute, I’m just on a call with Alan Dale…’ [laughs]. But she was somewhat starstruck that Jim Robinson from Neighbours was on the phone, so it was OK!

Cein McGillicuddy and Andy Kinnear co-created Top Coppers.

Top Coppers continues on Wednesday, 26 August at 10pm on BBC Three. Each episode will be available in BBC iPlayer for 30 days after broadcast on TV.

Comments made by writers on the BBC TV blog are their own opinions and not necessarily those of the BBC.

Her colleague, Joe, secretly likes her. He just needs to have a bit more faith in himself though, bless him! Amara is the type of person who’d only really get with someone who’s sure of themself. Who has confidence in their own looks. And he really doesn’t. That’s probably why she sees him as so sweet. He’s a mate to her, rather than what he wants, which is a relationship.

Is that set to change? Mayyyybe! 

Of all the characters I’ve played on TV, in real life I would like to be friends with Saz from Some Girls. She’s a little bit crazy and I’d never get bored of her. She’s one of those people where you just want to be like: ‘What the hell is going on inside your head?!’ She’d keep me entertained.

I always say I’m not similar to Saz at all, but the Some Girls cast say that I am. And I don’t quite know how to take that! I mean obviously Saz is a character I’ve kind of created myself in a weird way, because I’ve had the role since it was a read-through. So all of her stupid facial expressions and certain ways that she reacts to certain things, I brought those elements to the table. So yeah, maybe the silly side of me could well be Saz. But I’m definitely not socially inept like she is.

With any cast, especially doing a six-week shoot, you do end up becoming like family. And it’s difficult to just stop talking to each other because you are in each other’s life for so long. With Some Girls, all of us – as a whole cast that is – really do get along. We speak every day. And it’s actually formed really amazing friendships, I wouldn’t change it for the world. 

Likewise with Fried, it was such an amazing cast, and it was so much fun on set. Katy Wix, the Mary character, and the Derek character, Matthew Cottle, were definitely the mum and dad of Seriously Fried Chicken. And what a crazy mum and dad they are!

Matthew’s not at all like his character off-screen. One: he doesn’t have the accent. Two: he’s just so down to earth and lovely - he’s not shy but more kind of reserved. When he performs I am honestly so amazed. Whenever I watch him I’m like: ‘Where the hell do you bring that from ‘cause you’re a genius, a comedy genius!’

While filming, it’s the one production I’ve been in comedy-wise where I’ve felt so unprofessional, because I just found it so funny! So when it comes to corpsing on set, all of us were terrible! But do you know what? That just proves it’s such a funny show. 

With My Jihad, too, I’ve made amazing friends with Anjli Mohindra, and Ameet Chana as well, who I get to work with again soon in the stage version of Anita and Me. Weirdly he played my husband in My Jihad, and he’s about to play my dad! I know right? How weird! When we both read it we were like: ‘Ah… OK that’s interesting!’

Mandeep Dhillon plays Amara in Fried, Saz in Some Girls and Yasmin in My Jihad.

Fried starts on Tuesday, 25 August at 10.30pm on BBC Three. Each episode will be available in BBC iPlayer for 30 days after broadcast on TV. 

Comments made by writers on the BBC TV blog are their own opinions and not necessarily those of the BBC.

So, Cein and Andy, tell us about how long you’ve been working on Top Coppers?

C: We started out with a 15-second film, which features a lot of young, fresh out of university students - us! It was 2007 and Raindance was holding this competition.

A: We came up with doing a whole cop show, but in 15 seconds.

C: We knew a guy who had really big ginger hair, and at the time Andy had much bigger hair…

A: I was much more ginger!

C: We wanted to do two ginger cops that were partners – we thought it would be fun. And then thought of the character names Mahogany and Rust and the title Top Coppers came to us and we thought: ‘Ah yeah!’

A: We wanted to hold off doing anything more until we were good enough to do it. Then in 2010 we self-funded six five-minute episodes. I was editing Facejacker for Channel 4 at the time, so I knew Kayvan Novak quite well, and we managed to convince him to come and play our villain. So he gave us a day’s filming for free and he was brilliant really. I think having him on board really helped.

C: It helped a lot afterwards, with him being attached people trust it that bit more. It really intrigued Shane Allen, and when he came to the BBC as Controller of Comedy Commissioning he got back in touch. 

What is it about the cop genre that you love so much?

C: I think it gives you what is a very typically masculine environment, and I think we’re happy to admit we’re not the most masculine of guys.

A: Well….

C: Well I mean you are butch, you are butch.

A: Exactly.

C: [Laughs] But yeah there is something nice in modern day men like Mahogany – he’s a lot more cerebral and sensitive. But the cop show era was the era when men were supposed to be men. So that contrast already is funny.

As a director, I loved that style that they shot things in back then. It’s like they’d just discovered zooms and went nuts. And they over-emphasised everything. So they’d have an object and think: ‘We need a close-up of that,’ and would have someone lift it in, really obviously, and then back out. And it was just that kind of camera language that I really loved, because it’s just visually funny.

A: It’s so rich as well, they are such big stories, they’re like mini-films and there’s just so much going on. Big characters and big villains, there’s just so much to get your teeth into. We wanted it to be what you remember cop shows were like, and everyone’s memories of those great shows, all bundled into ours.

Let’s talk about the shows and films that influenced Top Coppers…

C: People have been comparing it to Police Squad, The Naked Gun, and even Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace which are all absolute favourites of ours. But we didn’t want to do that same thing, so it’s not a parody of old cop shows, it’s like the embodiment of the imagination of two kids who have played too much cops and robbers.

The first cop show I saw was probably Starsky and Hutch. Their names, Mahogany and Rust are supposed to have a sort of phonetic similarity, just a rhythm to them that sounds the same. So I think Starsky and Hutch was the main influence.

Another big one is actually Mission Impossible, the series rather than the movies. The camera style is more true to that than to Starsky and Hutch – Mission Impossible really went for it with their camera work!

A: I think Starsky and Hutch was a lot more tongue-in-cheek than I think people remember. It was quite a knowing show really.

C: Yeah you can’t take the mickey out of it like it took itself seriously because it didn’t. They knew it was funny. But a lot of what we remember from when we were young is the more 80s and 90s-type movies.

A: Yeah we’ve got The Terminator references; there is a very subtle Jurassic Park reference… a not very subtle Face/Off reference…

C: …There’s a not very subtle Robocop reference too. Then The Shawshank Redemption, Speed…

Another major influence is Father Ted, which might surprise people, because how can Top Coppers be anything like three priests living in a parochial house on a small island off Ireland?! But it’s because of the warmth and the character comedy of Father Ted, combined with some outright just really silly jokes. And that’s sort of the model of what we’re trying to do. 

Cein McGillicuddy and Andy Kinnear co-created Top Coppers.

Top Coppers starts on Wednesday, 19 August at 10pm on BBC Three. Each episode will be available in BBC iPlayer for 30 days after broadcast on TV.

Comments made by writers on the BBC TV blog are their own opinions and not necessarily those of the BBC.