Too many tossers on Top Gear? Not much of a surprise there. The first episode of the new series of W1A finds itself in a veritable art-imitating-life scenario when they have to do a damage limitation exercise on Jeremy "bleep" Clarkson’s latest fictional outburst, which involves trawling through old TG episode and counting up the times he has said “tosser”.
It’s a lovely touch, redolent of the moment in Twenty Twelve when the fictional Olympic clock went wrong around the same time as the real one. W1A/Twenty Twelve writer John Morton either has brilliant comedy antennae or a crystal ball.
Elsewhere in this extended opening episode there is a royal visit, which prompts the inevitable mix of panic and toadying and further problems when it emerges that HRH must not come into contact with sweetcorn under any circumstances.
My favourite plotline, however, involves Siobhan Sharpe’s attempts to “brand mash-up” the BBC’s Wimbledon coverage so that the tennis institution is not poached by a rival. In the best scene in the episode Sharpe and her witless Perfect Curve team – props to Sara Pascoe and her ridiculous Frida Kahlo eyebrows – literally bat around ideas on a ping pong table. There’s a priceless Graham Norton pisstake and the dim solution of adding familiar theme tunes and new commentators such as David Attenborough to the coverage to increase its “BBCness”
Jessica Hynes’ Sharpe might seem absurd to viewers but I’ve dealt with PRs and believe me, if anything she is playing the habit of hyperbole down. Though admittedly the ones that I deal with tend to use “awesome” a bit more and “cool” a bit less. But apart from that she is pretty wincemakingly bang on. Awesome even.
This is very much an ensemble piece though. Rufus Jones camps it up to the max as producer David Wilkes, trying to come up with the next big Factual Entertainment series after the flop of Britain’s Tastiest Village. Sterling work too from Hugh Bonneville, Jason Watkins, Nina Sosanya, Monica Dolan and Sarah Parish. It’s a testament to the quality of the casting that comic duo Max and Ivan feature but barely have a line between them this week.
And, of course, David Tennant’s intentionally clunky narration, which sounds like it has been written by thick-as-a-brick intern Will (Hugh Skinner) makes W1A well worth the licence fee. I’d watch out for Will though, it wouldn’t suprise me if he ends up as Director-General.
W1A, BBC2, Thursdays from April 23.
Read a preview of Inside No. 9: Nana's Party here.
