Green Wing. Image shows from L to R: Guy Secretan (Stephen Mangan), Caroline Todd (Tamsin Greig), Mac Macartney (Julian Rhind-Tutt). Copyright: Talkback Productions
Green Wing

Green Wing

  • TV sitcom
  • Channel 4
  • 2004 - 2007
  • 18 episodes (2 series)

Comedy about the childish and slightly mad staff working in a hospital. Stars Tamsin Greig, Julian Rhind-Tutt, Stephen Mangan, Mark Heap, Pippa Haywood and more.

  • JustWatch Streaming rank this week: 158

Episode menu

Series 2, Episode 1

Following the accident Mac is now in a coma. As such he is getting some very strange dreams and a lot of visitors. Elsewhere, Boyce's daddy has died, Statham tries to play a prank on Joanna, and Guy drowns his sorrows down the pub.

Further details

And so we return to the hospital with possibly the fewest patients in the country and it turns out the consequences of Guy's actions are gradually coming to light. The most worrying of which is the fact that Mac is in a coma and has been for quite a while. However, as the rest of the staff try to wake him up in increasingly imaginative ways; (for example telling him that they love him, playing the harmonica to him and threatening to shoot a kitten if he doesn't wake up), Mac lies in blissful slumber dreaming of being in an all-Mac version of Take That and in partaking in some semi-naked wrestling with Guy.

Elsewhere, Boyce is still managing to wind up Alan Statham by informing him his "daddy" has died (which turns out to be a daddy longlegs), Alan tries to play a trick on Joanna which backfires spectacularly and Guy pours out all his emotions and his version of what happened in the ambulance to a man in a bar.

Whilst all this is happening, there is some good news: Mac wakes up! Though the news may not be so good for Caroline, once she realises that a bout of amnesia may possibly have ruined everything between the two of them...

Broadcast details

Date
Friday 31st March 2006
Time
10pm
Channel
Channel 4
Length
60 minutes

Repeats

Show past repeats

Date Time Channel
Wednesday 3rd December 2014 10:00pm London Live
Friday 5th December 2014 12:00am London Live
Friday 5th December 2014 11:00pm London Live
Monday 29th December 2014 10:00pm London Live
Sunday 12th July 2015 9:00pm London Live
Monday 13th July 2015 2:00am London Live
Thursday 16th July 2015 2:00am London Live
Friday 17th July 2015 1:30am London Live
Thursday 26th November 2015 9:00pm London Live
Friday 27th November 2015 1:45am London Live
Sunday 11th February 2018 12:40am Gold
Saturday 2nd March 2019 11:20pm Gold
Monday 4th March 2019 1:40am Gold
Saturday 25th April 2020 11:00pm Gold
Tuesday 16th June 2020 1:30am Gold
Friday 3rd July 2020 1:35am Gold
Wednesday 22nd July 2020 2:20am Gold

Cast & crew

Cast
Tamsin Greig Caroline Todd
Julian Rhind-Tutt Mac Macartney
Stephen Mangan Guy Secretan
Mark Heap Alan Statham
Pippa Haywood Joanna Clore
Michelle Gomez Sue White
Karl Theobald Martin Dear
Olivia Colman (as Olivia Coleman) Harriet Schulenburg
Oliver Chris Boyce
Sarah Alexander Angela Hunter
Lucinda Raikes Karen Ball
Sally Bretton Kim Alabaster
Katie Lyons Naughty Rachel
Guest cast
Nick Frost Just a Man
Paul Bazely Anaesthetist
Jane Cameron Nurse
Rebecca Clow Nurse
Doreen Ingleton (as Doreen Ingieton) Nurse
Alison Partgeter Nurse
Chetna Pandya Nurse
Writing team
Victoria Pile Writer
Robert Harley Writer
James Henry Writer
Stuart Kenworthy Writer
Oriane Messina Writer
Fay Rusling Writer
Richard Preddy Writer
Gary Howe Writer
Production team
Dominic Brigstocke Director
Tristram Shapeero Director
Victoria Pile Producer
Peter Fincham Executive Producer
Nick King Editor
Billy Sneddon Editor
Jonathan Paul Green Production Designer
Jonathan Whitehead (as Trellis) Composer

Press

The first series of Green Wing (Friday, C4) was one of the most freshly funny and crisply innovative comedies for years. The humour was all based in the character, not the situation. The story lines were negligible; there were no catch phrases; it was surreal in a way we hadn't seen since Monty Python; and the cast were actors being funny from inside a characterisation, not stand-up comics bolting a cartoon persona onto the back of gags. There had been a worrying gap between the first and second series, but finally we got the preview ads, and a run of the previous series as a fanfare and a reminder. Then the new one began with a dream sequence. Oh my God, I could hardly believe my eyes. Was I asleep? No, it really was a dream sequence.

Now, every 11-year-old knows dream sequences are the lowest form of plotting solution, lower than unexplained superpowers such as the ability to stop time or become invisible; even lower than a magic get-better potion. Within two minutes, Green Wing had destroyed itself, lost its assured grip on the cliff of comedy and tumbled into the abyss of embarrassing overacting, formless gurning and pointless repetition. What had once looked Dada-ishly brilliant now looked like stoned improv from a show-off's drama school. The lack of plot and coherent narrative that previously had been a blessed freedom was revealed to be a formless free-for-all, brilliant performances as silly mannerisms. Nothing I've seen this year has disappointed me as sharply as the second series of Green Wing. As Tom Paine so poignantly pointed out, only a step separates the sublime from the ridiculous.

A. A. Gill, The Sunday Times, 2nd April 2006

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