We Might Regret This puts those who were once the butt of the joke in the driving seat – and is funnier for it
The new BBC sitcom is the latest in an increasing number of stellar British comedies which spotlight genuinely authentic storytelling.
Over the past decade an emerging theme has continued to permeate boardrooms across the land - with commissioners and TV execs looking to produce more ‘authentic stories’ after continued global movements like #MeToo and Black Lives Matter have exposed the consistent failures marginalised people have experienced in TV and film. The quest is daunting yet urgent - and can easily lead producers into the trap of creating shows that are more inauthentic than anything else.
Now though, it feels as though we are in the midst of a mini-renaissance of genuine authentic storytelling where those in charge have finally realised that the main ingredient needed to make a funny, entertaining and diverse comedy drama is... well, funny, entertaining and diverse subjects both in front of and behind the camera.
It might seem obvious, but this small yet impactful shift is why audiences are being treated to some of the best and most inclusive comedy we’ve seen in years.
Take the BBC’s newest comedy drama We Might Regret This. The six-part series, written by and starring Kyla Harris, is a story full of messiness, grief and emotional vulnerability. Harris’s character Freya is in her thirties, is dating Abe (an older man played by The Outlaws’ Darren Boyd) and is in need of a 24/7 round-the-clock carer to help her navigate the world as a tetraplegic woman.
On the surface it reads as a niche story - perhaps to some commissioners a ‘risk’. But by ensuring Harris has control of the show's narrative as producer, writer and star, she has birthed a universally relatable show for people of all abilities and identities by putting our shared humanity at its core. Her disability isn’t the main plot point, but neither is it something that is shied away from.
We see this instantly in episodes 1 and 2 - with Freya being signed as a model by a trendy ‘of the moment’ agency who revel in letting her know that ‘this is really in right now’, as they gesture towards her wheelchair. Someone without her lived experience or awareness of her community history with tokenism wouldn’t be able to write such on-the-nose scenes full of myth-debunking and repeated quashing of microaggressions. From calling out air-brushing to the lack of accessible bathrooms and wheelchair space in almost every public space she’s in, she proudly shows us how she navigates the world - at times, with great difficulty that is no fault of her own.
To carefully take audiences from being shown how to put in a catheter to bowel stimulation is no mean feat - especially without these moments feeling shoehorned in, and that’s down to Harris’s ability to share her story in a way that she knows how to. She’s not sacrificing her authenticity for what arguably more experienced producers might think is ‘unrelatable’ - and quite rightly so.
Edward Bluemel - star of Prime Video’s My Lady Jane – is a stand-out too as Abe’s son Levi, portraying a man with a recent history of mental health wobbles and need for validation from Freya’s flaky friend and personal assistant Jo (Elena Saurel).
Alongside his mother Jane (played by Sally Phillips), it’s a family unit that is deeply relatable with its emotional stuntedness and sarcastic brush-offs many British audiences will be all too familiar with. Their characters explore grief and loss in its most literal sense after we understand Levi’s brother passed away when he was a child.
But Harris follows through with the theme of grief into her storyline, continually showing us the pockets of painful thoughts she experiences when fantasising about what her life might look like without the wheelchair. This intelligent narrative thread is only something she could pull off with such authenticity and excellence, because she’s felt every nuance and moment before.
The result? A comedy that delivers on authentic storytelling and comedic hits that crucially make it memorable.
She’s not alone in making shows about unique lived experiences. From BAFTA Award winner Jack Rooke, Big Boys was another beaming example of what happens when you allow the people with poignant stories to have the space to tell them with creativity and flair.
Channel 4’s recent offering of best-selling author Candice Carty-Williams’s Queenie and Nicola Coughlan and Lydia West in the lovably messy Big Mood also are further proof that putting women with stories to tell in the driving seat from start to finish will result in a hit. Lucia Keskin’s BBC comedy Things You Should’ve Done and BAFTA Award winner Mawaan Rizwan’s Juice too exemplify how to combine personal experiences with high comedy in a way that isn’t patronising or sickly sweet, but thoroughly thoughtful and funny throughout.
Who would’ve thought that letting talented writers with unique and diverse experiences produce and create their own shows is really the best way to create authentic television? Not through having an all-male team who hire a DEI consultant for one session, only to ignore their suggestions in favour of the more ‘affordable option’.
We Might Regret This and the stellar comedy output from British channels over the past 12 months is proof that allowing people to tell their own stories both behind and in front of the camera puts those that were once the butt of the joke in the driving seat - and they’re even funnier for it.
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We Might Regret This is available to watch now on BBC iPlayer.
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