Kate & Koji
- TV sitcom
- ITV1
- 2020 - 2022
- 12 episodes (2 series)
Sitcom about the owner of a seaside café, and an asylum-seeking African doctor. Stars Brenda Blethyn, Okorie Chukwu, Blake Harrison, Barbara Flynn, Victor McGuire and more.
Episode menu
Series 1, Episode 1
Broadcast details
- Date
- Wednesday 18th March 2020
- Time
- 8pm
- Channel
- ITV1
- Length
- 30 minutes
Repeats
Show past repeats
Cast & crew
Brenda Blethyn | Kate |
Blake Harrison | 'Medium' Dan |
Barbara Flynn | Councillor Bone |
Victor McGuire | Mr Mullholland |
Jimmy Akingbola | Koji |
Gary Lammin | Postman |
Kris Saddler | Nick |
Sarah Twomey | Young Woman |
Diana Payan | Elderly Lady |
Andy Hamilton | Writer |
Guy Jenkin | Writer |
Ben Kellett | Studio Director |
Andy Hamilton | Producer |
Guy Jenkin | Producer |
Debbie Pisani (as Debs Pisani) | Producer |
Jimmy Mulville | Executive Producer |
Mark Williams | Editor |
Jo Sutherland | Production Designer |
Suzanne Crowley (as Susanne Crowley) | Casting Director |
Gilly Poole | Casting Director |
Martin Hawkins | Director of Photography |
Natalie Rogers (as Natalie Rogers-Wenzel) | Costume Designer |
Nichola Bellamy | Make-up Designer |
Philip Pope (as Phillip Pope) | Composer |
Adam Jenkins | 1st Assistant Director |
Saskia Schuster | Commissioning Editor |
Press
What a pedigree Kate & Koji appeared to have. Co-stars in Brenda Blethyn and Jimmy Akingbola, written by Guy Jenkin and Andy Hamilton (Drop The Dead Donkey, Outnumbered), and a bonkers-but-might-work premise about an asylum-seeking African doctor setting up a temporary surgery in a seaside caff in exchange for square meals from the reactionary biddy of an owner.
My, it's grim, and what were you at all thinking, our sainted Auntie Vera? There are jokes about 70s TV detectives, oat milk, newfangled "podcasts". One running gag is that everyone looks to their phones after the microwave pings. It is amusing precisely once. At one stage Kate (Blethyn) reprimands Koji (Akingbola) for getting pedantic about apostrophes with "all right Doc, no need to go all Rees-Mogg on us!", as if one had to go to Eton (because it's posh, see!) in order to have an outside chance of grasping the basics of the English language: it's that kind of lowest-com-denom writing. Utterly unhelped - in fact, hog-tied at the knees - by a canned laughter track that gives it not just the content but the feel of something that could have surfaced a full 30 years ago. There's even a rival - snobby - interfering councillor in the shape of Barbara Flynn.
It's not unsalvageable. There's a (slight) warmth to be had in Kate's unthawing towards the 21st Century, her refreshing lack of the old prejudices. Some gags show spark, but you don't even get to enjoy the spark, already tensing at the collective awfulness of the wave of laughter that you know is bound to tsunami in.
Euan Ferguson, The Observer, 22nd March 2020Kate & Koji review
It's not brilliant, but I'd like it to do well. Somehow, though, in post-Brexit Britain I can't see it being a mainstream hit, though I'd love to be proved wrong. Whatever the Guardian might say I think its heart is in the right place.
Bruce Dessau, Beyond The Joke, 19th March 2020Kate & Koji, review: a poor imitation of Rising Damp
Perhaps it will be a hit. The success of Mrs Brown's Boys shows there is definitely an appetite for big-hearted, broad comedy accompanied by audience laughter. But I'm not sure that sympathy for asylum seekers sits comfortably in that genre.
Anita Singh, The Telegraph, 19th March 2020Kate & Koji review
Kate & Koji is funny - and funny enough to make me snort with laughter. The script is well-honed by Andy Hamilton and Guy Jenkin, who wrote Outnumbered. But what raises this show far above the ordinary are the performances by Brenda Blethyn and Jimmy Akingbola as the title characters.
Christopher Stevens, Daily Mail, 19th March 2020Kate & Koji revels in outdated prejudice
The makers of Outnumbered have created a distasteful comedy about a cafe owner and an asylum seeker, that even the talent of Brenda Blethyn and Jimmy Akingbola can't save.
Ammar Kalia, The Guardian, 18th March 2020Kate & Koji review
Whisper it, but ITV could just have created that rarest of creatures - a mainstream sitcom that's constantly funny; deserving of critical praise as well as strong audiences.
Steve Bennett, Chortle, 18th March 2020Kate & Koji review
Unfunny, uninspired, oppressive propaganda. There's nothing wrong with the basic set-up, nor the talented actors assembled, but this sitcom isn't in any way satirical or thought-provoking.
Sean O'Grady, The Independent, 18th March 2020