How Do You Want Me?

"How do you want me?" was one of these programmes that grow on you from week to week, slowly and imperceptibly. It hardly even qualifies as comedy, since there are so few laughs. It's about people, and real life, and coping, and making the best of a total muddle: how we all flail about through life, not really knowing what it's all about, or why we're doing it. The tenderness at the heart of it was Charlotte Coleman. Every time she was on screen, you felt that life was worth living, because this is what it's about: finding those intimate moments, when all the bulls*** doesn't matter, because you know you're in the presence of someone who cares.

The Dylan Moran character is all bluff and bluster, and Charlotte is the port in the storm, for once playing a grounded and stable character. I, for one, will remember her most for this role, rather than her more off-the-wall efforts, because after the life she lived, it seems that she would really have been happy to lead that settled kind of life. The news of her tragic death at the age of 33 touched me in a way that felt like she was a friend. She always made you feel like hugging her.

I remembered this series fondly and had given up hope of it being repeated.

But I discovered that both series have just been put out on DVD. Only ten years after it was first made, but they got there in the end.

And I'm delighted to say that it is as funny and as sweet as I recall. Dylan Moran essentially plays his stand-up persona (himself?), and, as such, is wonderful. Rather than all the sitcoms that feature wise-cracking central characters who get rewarded with overdone canned laughter, Moran is put in a situation in which none of the other characters find him funny.

As has already been said, Charlotte Coleman is wonderful. It's also interesting to watch because many of the supporting cast, such as Mark Heap and Peter Serafinowicz, have subsequently become familiar from roles in "Shaun of the Dead", "Spaced" and "Green Wing".

Comedian Ian Lyons has married Lisa and now moved to the village where she grew up. He is very much a city person and finds it hard to fit in. He also has difficulties with his in-laws; Lisa's father can't stand him and offers him a substantial sum of money to leave, without her. Unable to work as a comedian in such a small place he takes over a photography business; a job he is not immediately qualified to do.

This series is a real delight. Dylan Moran and Charlotte Coleman have a great chemistry as Ian and Lisa; they feel like a real couple not a comedy-couple. There characters are the most 'real' in the series. The other characters are equally impressive and only slightly exaggerated... particular highlights among them are Frank Finlay's performance as Lisa's father and Peter Serafinowicz as her psychotic brother. The various situations Dylan finds himself in create both humour and feelings of discomfort without being overly forced. The realism is increased by the wise choice not to include a laugh track. Having watched all twelve episodes it is just a shame more wasn't made; I'd certainly recommend this to people who like the idea of a sitcom that isn't just forced gags.

Previously Simon Nye wrote the award winning Men Behaving Badly. Dylan Moran went on to write the award winning Black Books. Why nobody gave this an award escapes me.

This seemingly forgotten and unappreciated work of unalloyed genius deserves repeating and above all deserves a DVD release. The cast were brilliant, the script sublime. The only series that comes close to its brilliance is Black Books.

I agree with all the reviewers bar one who misses the point of the whole exercise.

Irish city boy Ian Lyons relocates to the home town of new wife Lisa in the West Sussex countryside. Yes, he is a fish out of water among her family and the conservative rustic types that populate the area. But the narrative and message is more than that - it's about love and how far that can sustain a relationship when one of the participants is clearly treading water in a culture he doesn't understand and which fails to embrace him.

It is funny and emotionally moving at the same time. Dylan Moran and the late Charlotte Coleman navigate their respective roles brilliantly. Dylan Moran went on to other things while Charlotte Coleman died tragically a couple of years later. The show only ran for twelve episodes over two series and ended without resolution. Sometimes life has no resolution and that may have been writer Simon Nye's intention. I'll always remember Charlotte Coleman fondly and this show maintains my memory of her tremendous talent.