How we made Teachers

"The alcohol and the cigarettes were all fake. We couldn't drink that fast and manage all the different takes".

Teachers: funny, honest, unglamorous comedy drama

A fond look back at UK comedy drama Teachers, starring a pre-The Walking Dead and post-This Life Andrew Lincoln.

After several years away from detecting action, Alan Davies dusts off his dramatic acting talent to tackle three new cases as unofficial sleuth Jonathan Creek. Our hero's trademark low-key humour weaves itself through the mystery action, which kicks off with a spot of smartphone rage on a trip to the theatre with wife Polly (Sarah Alexander, right with Davies). The familiar faces popping up in the loosely strung plot include Raquel Cassidy as a highly strung friend whose son fancies himself as Sherlock Holmes, while Ali Bastian calls on her Strictly experience as an aspiring West End musical star, complete with stalker...

Three weeks in and partially closeted lesbian vet Sara (Sue Perkins) isn't making much progress towards the grand parental coming-out inked in for week six. But forget the daft story and relish instead the comedy cameos that light up Sara's world. Tonight Raquel Cassidy puts in a delicious performance as Sabine, Sara's French-speaking ex. Sabine accuses Sara of being emotionally cold, leading to a frank exchange of views that gives us a snatch of cinéma noir-et-blanc.

Sara's very loud, very angry French ex turns up uninvited and colonises the living room where she melodramatically writhes around on the floor. It's a madly over-the-top, heavily accented turn from the estimable Raquel Cassidy (Jack Dee's long-suffering wife in Lead Balloon).

Meanwhile, Sara (Sue Perkins, also the writer) tries to pluck up the courage to ask out the lovely Eve (Shelley Conn). It's fun and sweet-natured and there's great support from Nicola Walker and Dominic Coleman as Sara's friends, dim Justine and precious Jamie.

It's the midpoint of this endearing sex comedy, and romantically inhibited vet Sara (Sue Perkins) still hasn't nerved herself to ask beautiful dog-owner Eve (Shelley Conn) out - and Eve's labrador has finally run out of ailments for her to treat. Even worse, Sara's French ex, Sabine (Raquel Cassidy) has turned up, and is making extremely Gallic scenes (filmed by director Natalie Bailey in moody monochrome). Don't miss Perkins's rendering of the words "susceptibilité puerile!"

Another desperate bid to salvage his career sees Rick (Jack Dee) take a presenting job on a downmarket shopping channel - much to his wife Mel's (Raquel Cassidy) bemusement, and writing-partner Marty's (Sean Power) unconcealed disdain. On the other hand, housekeeper Magda (Anna Crilly) is seriously impressed by Rick for the first time ever... Beautifully observed, this sitcom is full of quiet exasperation.

Jack Dee was born with a scowl. Which is pretty much all you need to know about Lead Balloon (BBC2), the sitcom in which Dee does his middle-aged moany thing, although he's pretending to be a failed comic called Rick Spleen.

It's an act that's so familiar by now that all returns have diminished, though Lead Balloon does give the excellent Raquel Cassidy the chance to air her full range of withering scorn. Aside from her, Lead Balloon just goes down like the proverbial.

Jack Dee's Rick Spleen is back for another series of suburban angst and tonight he's trying to write his first novel.

He's also desperately trying to make his family seem more interesting than they really are when a magazine comes to interview his partner Mel (Raquel Cassidy) for an "at home with...".

The most interesting thing about Mel and Rick is that they're still together despite having nothing in common.

Is there some mind-blowing sexual chemistry going on behind closed doors that we don't know about?

If so, I think we should be told. But what they need, Rick decides, is some exotic kind of pet - like a pig.

Like Rick's novel, the plot is a little short on inspiration, but the performances, especially from Antonia Campbell-Hughes and Rasmus Hardiker - as his teenage daughter Sam and boyfriend Ben - and Anna Crilly, as Magda, keep things ticking over.