Camping review

It's an indisputable fact that you need a very strong stomach to watch anything written by Julia Davis.

Review: Camping, Sky Atlantic, eps 3 & 4

I was probably a bit unfair to dub this series Nighty Night On Holiday when I first heard about Camping].

The new Julia Davis comedy, Camping, about a group holiday on a camping site, hit the sodden grass running with two episodes that simultaneously amused and (deliciously) horrified.

Steve Pemberton played decent, resigned Robin, who was celebrating his 50th birthday, if "celebrating" is the right word, considering his wife Fiona's (Vicki Pepperdine) attempts at psychological castration via the medium of nagging malevolence (Fiona is the first great television monster of 2016). They and their son, Archie (banned by his mother from eating any foods "that could be vaguely homosexual"), were joined by Jonathan Cake's Adam, a recovering alcoholic, his son (a teenage masturbator), and wrung-out dishcloth of a wife, Kerry (Elizabeth Berrington). We also met recently separated Tom (Rufus Jones), cutting a tragic figure in his Topman finery and attempting to recapture his virility with "dubstep DJ" Fay (Davis), a woman determined to turn pretentious vacuity into an art form.

Camping managed to be wickedly funny while also serving as a compelling argument for losing all faith in humankind. Anyone familiar with Davis's oeuvre (Nighty Night, Hunderby) will know what I mean when I describe the characters as either wildly stressed, intrinsically damaged, irredeemably horrible or all three at once. At one point, Tom was caught in flagrante with Fay in a cubicle in a bric-a-brac shop. "Big apols!" he drawled. Priceless.

An interview with Julia Davis

Certain words come up when you talk about the kinds of comedy Julia Davis stars in, or writes, or sometimes both: goth-diary words like dark, twisted, macabre.

Camping review: a gloriously bleak comedy masterpiece

I'm not yet sure that it's quite up there with Nighty Night or Hunderby, but there's no better comedy around at the moment. The only pity is it's on Sky.

TV review: Camping, Sky Atlantic

I have a bit of a confession to make. I was never a big fan of Hunderby. I liked it but was not devoted to it is many were. For some reason - Blackadder excepted - I like my comedy to be wearing modern clothes. So it is feels me with joy that Julia Davis is back in the modern world for Camping.

Camping review

All kinds of awkward. The definition of last night's premiere of Camping on Sky Atlantic. Brought to us by the creator of Nighty Night Julia Davis, her latest offering is squirm-in-your-seat funny.

The latest offering from Julia Davis (Nighty Night) focuses on a holiday under canvas. It's a trip to celebrate the 50th birthday of Robin (Steve Pemberton), who's married to Fiona (Vicki Pepperdine), a woman so assertive she puts the campsite kettle "out of bounds" to maintain tent-life authenticity. But can Fiona's itinerary-making authoritarianism survive the arrival of Tom (Rufus Jones) and his new partner (Davis)? A comedy that's best when it's close to the knuckle, which is most of the time.

This new comedy from Julia Davis is brilliantly slow and agonising. You might cringe as you watch the sour and snappy Fi (Vicki Pepperdine), as with comedies like The Office where you wince at David Brent's lack of social awareness.

Fi is a brittle, neurotic woman, dressed permanently in beige, who refers to her kind and timid husband, Robin (Steve Pemberton), as "stupid idiot." She has organised a camping weekend for Robin's birthday and has planned everything with terrifying precision, so when things start to unravel so does Fi's temper. "This isn't really going to work for me" she seethes on viewing the sleeping arrangements and on hearing new visitors arrive unannounced. Even the use of the campsite kettle infuriates her: "It's for an emergency situation only which we would have to define in the moment!"

So when Tom turns up with his frisky new girlfriend who's clad in leopard-skin, the tension is nearly unbearable. With such rough guests, how can Fi possibly police her son's mealtimes and make sure he doesn't eat anything "vaguely homosexual", like sun-dried tomatoes or baguettes?

Camping preview

Camping is a hilarious new comedy from Julia Davis, who also created the wonderful Nighty Night and Hunderby.