Monday Monday

Bad day at the office

ITV1's new recessionary comedy drama, Monday Monday, is set in the head office of a struggling supermarket chain, though it could be the head office of pretty much any struggling business, so generic is the writers' idea of a white-collar workplace. Departments like "marketing" and "human resources" are more or less interchangeable; the only visible staff members are the heads of said departments and their PAs; and the plot of the first episode was hung on such overfamiliar dramatic hooks as an office party and a hazily rationalised PowerPoint presentation.

I do love a comedy drama. The head office of a supermarket chain has moved from London to Leeds, which gives some of the characters the chance to leave messy lives behind and start again. We're talking the office environment as a source of comedy here. So the head of HR is a hopeless alcoholic. The boss is a bumbling fool. A new hotshot manager is parachuted in, complete with tarty bimbo secretary, whose job description includes sleeping with hotshot manager boss... No, you're the sexist, for thinking that she's a he, and he's a she. Unless you saw it, of course, in which case you're an idiot for not switching over to The Street. Because Monday Monday is hopeless - lame and laboured, tired and predictable, it's as if The Office never happened. It's my fault, I'm the idiot, for wanting respite from the misery.

If BBC Three's Personal Affairs hasn't put you off office-based comedies forever, try this slightly more pleasing effort from ITV. Set in the Leeds HQ of a failing supermarket group, it sees Fay Ripley lead the charge as the firm's incompetent alcoholic Human Resources manager, Christine, with Morven Christie as Sally - her put-upon PA whose love life is even worse than her work situation. While well-known faces such as Jenny Agutter and Miranda Hart are left largely on the sidelines in this first episode, it's a rare complaint for a sitcom to have too many classy actors, even if the script is fairly mediocre.

Fay Ripley (star of Cold Feet and Reggie Perrin) is the best thing about this new series set in the head office of supermarket chain Butterworth's.

As the alcoholic, incompetent head of Human Resources the only reason why she still has a job must be that she's the one in charge of all the hiring and firing. But despite considerable odds, Ripley manages to make an unlikeable and unlikely character human and watchable.

The company has relocated from the capital to Leeds, and a new boss has been brought in to oversee the old boss, but that's where all similarities with The Office end as this only serves up broad cliches of office life.

You'll spot Jenny Agutter as a Battenburg-baking secretary and you might recognise Tom Ellis - Oliver Cousins in EastEnders.

He was the doctor who fell in love with Little Mo and then left Walford for a new job in Leeds. Spookily, that's exactly where Monday Monday is set and his character Steven is the tastiest item on Butterworth's stocklist, being tussled over by his own boss (Holly Aird) and put-upon PA, Sally.

Fay Ripley plays a drunken, shambolic mess of a human being in this likeable if lightweight comedy-drama series.

She's Christine Frances, head of human resources at the HQ of a struggling supermarket chain, holding things together only thanks to her trusty yet savagely abused PA, Sally (played by Morven Christie) - and looking as if she's finally facing the chop when a ruthlessly ambitious management troubleshooter (Holly Aird) comes to shake the firm up.

Sally herself, meanwhile, has fallen for hunky Steven (Tom Ellis), the arrogant guy who's personal assistant to this new bigwig - only to find he and bossy-drawers have more than just a working relationship.

A strong cast also includes Jenny Agutter, Neil Stuke, Peter Wight and Saikat Ahamed.

I don't know. You wait years for a dismally unfunny, fatuous series about personal assistants, then two come along at once. Monday Monday joins the witless pantheon (alongside BBC3's Personal Affairs) and stars Fay Ripley as the inept, alcoholic head of human resources whose secretary does all the work. I think we are meant to find the whole idea of human resources intrinsically absolutely hilarious, but we've got to be given something to laugh at. Ripley's character sleeping off a hangover in her car is not, in itself, funny. The cast is good, but ill-served, particularly Holly Aird as a tough new boss who's having an affair with her empty bimbo of a male secretary. The dialogue is pitiful - any series that makes an off-colour gag based on the word "stuffing" deserves to go back to the 1970s where it belongs.

The ratings for this new series will not be great, let's face it - and that's only in part to having to compete with The Street. This comedy drama set in a supermarket head office's HR department wi... oh, sorry, I must have dozed off. Fay Ripley stars as the alcoholic department boss, apparently. Backed up by a cast including Holly Aird, Neil Stuke and Miranda Hart, I can only hope that the show is better than all the pre-publicity suggests.