The Dim Blue Line
The team behind Green Wing has changed colour for its new sitcom – but some are already seeing red…
ITV / Moniker Pictures
- Huw Fullerton
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In 2004, screenwriter Victoria Pile and her tight-knit writing team hit gold with Green Wing, Channel 4’s surreal hospital comedy that made stars out of actors including Stephen Mangan, Tamsin Greig and Mark Heap. Two decades on, Pile’s group of scribblers – and Heap – are back with Piglets, which began on ITV last week and is described by Pile as “an all-out comedy based in a police training academy”.
Heap and Sarah Parish star as beleag-uered senior officers instructing the hapless next generation, with up-and-coming stars like Callie Cooke, Ukweli Roach, Jamie Bisping and Sam Pote as the young wannabe cops (and their trainers). Cue awkward interrogation training, plenty of inter-office romance and the hunt for a mole that plays like a slapstick Line of Duty.
“Somebody had asked me if I would do another Green Wing, and I said no,” explains Pile. “And if I did do it, it would be with Channel 4. So Piglets started because I was looking for another vehicle.”
Inspiration struck when she found herself rushed by “some young hoodies” in a park. “I thought, ‘Ooh, here’s trouble!’ – but then I realised they were young cops in training,” she says. “It’s a cliché, that thing about cops being younger every day, but they literally looked about 12!
Abdul Sessay as Dev in Piglets. ITV
“And we just started talking about how they chose to become cops. It was a very difficult time for the police. How did they make that decision, as 16-year-olds, to become police officers?”
Soon, Pile had brought in her regular writing team – including Oriane Messina, Robert Harley, James Henry and Fay Rusling, all of whom also worked on Smack the Pony and university comedy Campus – who had a quick turnaround to bring the series to life.
By now something of a comedy legend, the 67-year-old Heap (who played fussy, unhinged registrar Dr Alan Statham in Green Wing and has also starred in Friday Night Dinner, Spaced and many other critically acclaimed sitcoms) was soon brought on board to play food-obsessed Superintendent Bob Weekes.
“Hopefully he’s not too similar to any of my other characters,” Heap says. “There’s a limit to what one person can do in terms of variety. The idea that you’ve got to totally be someone else every time – it’s quite a tough one.”
It’s not a satire on the police. It’s a sit in which to put the com
Mark Heap
The cast – many of whom had never been on TV before – had to hit the ground running, with the series conceived, written and shot at an unusually breakneck speed. When RT speaks to Pile, Heap and co-writer Oriane Messina, the trio have just finished editing the final episodes, with the series shot at pace over January and February this year.
“Back in the day with Green Wing, we were lucky enough to luxuriate in workshopping time, and let the actors really muck about and improvise,” says Pile. “But with the budgets these days, and schedules, you can’t do it. So we had one week’s rehearsal, I think, for the whole series. We’d sling updated scripts at Mark and the youngsters during filming. And it’s not enough time.”
“Which I hate – being shoved a script,” adds Heap. “I get a bit panicky, because I’m old now, and I can’t remember things so well."
Mark Heap as Superintendent Bob Weekes in Piglets. ITV
All agree that in the two decades since their first collaboration, making comedy has become harder. “You’d be hard-pushed, I think, to get an ensemble hour-long comedy like Green Wing commissioned today,” muses Messina. Notably, Piglets has half-hour episodes, a shorter run time that meant abandoning some of their signature style.
“It definitely felt like the storylines were much tighter than we normally do in that space of time,” adds Messina.
“There is a lot of footage that we shot that we couldn’t fit in,” adds Pile. “Some of the fun, sketchy bits – you’d call them surreal bits – that would have been in Green Wing. More generally, the experimentation has gone in comedy. People have to have instant hits. No one is prepared to develop ideas in the same way as they were then.”
Mark Heap as Dr Alan Statham (far right) and the stars of Green Wing. UKTV
All three note that sensitivity to certain topics and themes is also more extreme than it was, with the team keen to avoid offending anyone. To help, for the first time they added new, younger writers to their close team (including Omar Khan and Abiola Ogunbiyi) to make sure that the diverse group of trainees rang true.
“Of course it’s harder,” says Pile. “Sensitivities are different. But to not be able to voice a range of opinions and attitudes would be wrong. I don’t think any of our content is offensive. It’s mostly affectionate and poking at things.”
Though as it turns out, one group has already been offended by the series – the police themselves. Just over a week before the first episode aired, the Police Federation of England and Wales condemned the series’ title (a play on the derogatory term for police as “pigs”), stating that it was a “disgusting choice of language” and “highly offensive to police officers risking their lives”.
ITV responded saying, “The title is not intended to cause any offence, it’s a comedic and endearing play on words to emphasise the innocence and youth of our young trainees.” And for their part, some former officers have spoken in defence of the series on social media website X (formerly Twitter), suggesting there were better uses for the Federation’s time than complaining about comedy shows.
I’m about to email everyone about a Green Wing follow-up
Screenwriter Victoria Pile
It’s clear that some of these criticisms may have been anticipated by the writers and cast, who were all keen to emphasise that they weren’t hoping to make any kind of statement with Piglets. “It’s not a documentary,” Heap says. “It’s not a satire on the police – it’s just a nice structure. It’s the ‘sit’ in which to put the ‘com’.”
“It’s a workplace with all the usual challenges and romances,” agrees Pile. “Whether it’s a hospital, a police training college or a university, it’s still got the same human condition at its heart. Our little group wants to explore the real ways that people behave – and pull it out a little bit at the corners and go for the extreme.”
Time will tell how this outrage informs reaction to the series, which – to give it its due – has a fairly fluffy, comedic take on policing that’s more Thin Blue Line than Line of Duty. Certainly, the team seem hopeful it’ll be popular enough for a second series.
Halema Hussain as Afia, Callie Cooke as Steph in Piglets. ITV
“It would be fantastic,” says Pile. “It was conceived as something that could roll on, because a new training group can come in. You’ve built the foundations, and now you hopefully get the chance to go further.”
“I would be very sad not to have another stab, to be honest,” says Heap. “I’m working with my favourite people, these writers. It feels like being at home. I loved it. I just wish we could have a bit more time and do it again. Let’s hope people don’t hate it.”
And if, thanks to some angry police officers or just the usual difficulties of creating modern comedy, Piglets doesn’t get a second series, there’s always more Green Wing. Following a reunion of the cast earlier this year for a one-off podcast, apparently the writing team are considering an on-screen follow-up.
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“We are debating it,” says Pile. “I’m about to email everybody and see how they feel about it… So, yeah, we’re contemplating what we could do. There are potential things we could pick up. We did end with them on the edge of a cliff, after all.”
Authors
Huw FullertonCommissioning editor
Huw Fullerton is a commissioning editor for Radio Times magazine handling comedy, entertainment and specialist drama. In a previous regeneration, he covered all things sci-fi and fantasy for RadioTimes.com.
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