Sharon Horgan's new sitcom Dead Boss begins with the central
character, Helen Stephens (played by Horgan) being found guilty of
the murder of her boss and receiving twelve years in prison. Her
incompetent lawyer has clearly been no help and as she's taken away
her hilariously selfish sister only cares about getting the keys to
Helen's flat: things are looking grim. Fans of dark, female-centred
comedy (like Horgan's earlier sitcom, the brilliant Pulling, for
example) should perk up though, because not only does this show
feature Susan Calman and Jennifer Saunders in the cast, it's also
frequently funny.
The first two episodes of this six-parter aired on Thursday
night, and I was hooked within five minutes. The set-up and
characters are solid and the script has many genuinely amusing,
clever moments. Optimistic Helen, who maintains she did not kill
her boss and is determined to clear her name, shares a tiny cell
with a beautifully needy arsonist, Christine, played by Bryony
Hannah, who thinks her new cell-mate is "stunning, like an old
Christine Bleakley". The pair are menaced by a very entertaining
gang of pumice-wielding thugs, led by the horribly scarred Top Dog,
who, it turns out, was Helen's long-suffering teacher at school,
and overseen by Jennifer Saunders' wonderfully insincere prison
governor, who seems more interested in using her office as a
painting studio than she is in taking care of prison business.
Outside the prison, creepy co-worker Henry seems to have a thing
for Helen (the collage of photos of her in his desk drawer is a bit
of a giveaway) and turns up to offer to help her, someone is
threatening Helen's hopeless lawyer (his motto: "No win, some fee")
and the plot gets ever more thick: if Helen didn't kill her boss,
who did? And why?
Great stuff.
Dead Boss is on BBC iPlayer and BBC Three on Thursday nights
at 10.30pm
Find out more
here
