My TV Christmas Cracker: The Bleak Old Shop of Stuff

The Mark Evans-scripted comedy series kicks off with a truly festive special starring Robert Webb and Stephen Fry...

TV review: The Bleak Old Shop of Stuff

The cast is stellar and the acting's great. Shame the script is so bland and unfunny.

As an avid Radio 4 listener tvBite was pleased to hear that Mark Evans's Bleak Expectations was getting the big money transfer to TV.

But while there are good bits, (As hero Jedrington Secretpast Robert Webb is great at being silly and the names remain excellent) the transition isn't entirely successful. What had been a lovely half hour radio show, at an hour feels stretched longer than Ricky Gervais's joke. Also, while some people liked Stephen Fry being evil, others thought he was too, well, Stephen Fry. Depends on where you stand on Stephen Fry, really.

If you're a glutton for Dickens (and you'll need to be, with the BBC already stuffing its schedules with the forthcoming bicentenary of his birth), jolly spoofery abounds in The Bleak Old Shop of Stuff, which features Robert Webb as an upstanding Victorian retailer of nonsense items thrown into sudden penury by bewhiskered evil Stephen Fry in a stovepipe hat. Ah, what larks, trying to out-grotesque the master, though the irrepressible, unending fun of it can jam your parody receptors after a while.

Interview: Robert Webb stars in Charles Dickens spoof

To mark Charles Dickens's 200th birthday, Robert Webb stars in a new BBC comedy entitled The Bleak Old Shop Of Stuff. He tells the Metro more about the show...

It's never too early to start feeling festive, right? The Bleak Old Shop of Stuff might be airing midway through December, but it's the perfect show to get you in the mood. From the writer who pens the popular Radio 4 series Bleak Expectations, this Dickensian spoof focuses on a shopkeeper - played by Robert Webb. Actually, the cast is perfect: Stephen Fry, David Mitchell, Katherine Parkinson and Celia Imrie are among the stars taking part. Both silly and a period drama - should be fun winter viewing.

The Bleak Old Shop Of Stuff: What the Dickens?

In London there are three significant clocks, according to new BBC Two comedy The Bleak Old Shop of Stuff. There's Big Ben of course, but also Massive Morris and Tiny Terry...

Robert Webb and Katherine Parkinson interview

Robert Webb and Katherine Parkinson tell TV Choice more about their roles in the seasonal spoof episode of The Bleak Old Shop Of Stuff.

Behind The Scenes of The Bleak Old Shop Of Stuff

Production is underway of the new show The Bleak Old Shop Of Stuff, starring Robert Webb. We've already got some exclusive behind the scenes pictures and quotations...