Motherland
- TV sitcom
- BBC Two / BBC One
- 2016 - 2022
- 20 episodes (3 series)
Comedy about middle-class parenthood and juggling kids, school, and other parents. Stars Anna Maxwell Martin, Diane Morgan, Paul Ready, Lucy Punch, Philippa Dunne and more.
Press clippings Page 13
Why Motherland may be a perfect depiction of parenting
Whereas Catastrophe hilariously captured the minutiae of married life, Motherland does the same with parenting.
Catherine Phillips, Metro, 13th November 2017The pilot episode of Motherland last year just oozed what I would like to call commissionability, if that weren't such a hateful word: the resultant return of a whole series a triumphant vindication (should they need it) for creators Sharon Horgan and Graham Linehan. They might have set out to ridicule the notion of any perfect, "having it all" supermum, but in creating Anna Maxwell Martin's Julia - beset at every turn by a lazily crap ex, a rubbish boss, the passive aggression of the queen bees and tiger mums - have actually, despite themselves, created a supermum for our times. Helpfully, the kids don't get a look-in: this is all about mums. The lifelong panic of being a mum. It is, also helpfully, appallingly funny: best comedy of this year.
Euan Ferguson, The Observer, 12th November 2017Motherland review: A perverse comedy of manners
Please, do not watch Motherland (BBC2, Monday) while your children are in the room.
David Stephenson, The Daily Express, 12th November 2017You should enjoy Motherland, which features the brilliant Diane Morgan (though not here in her usual faux naive alter ego Philomena Cunk), Anna Maxwell Martin and Lucy Punch in a comedy of middle-class manners and mores - think of it as Mumsnet with a more pronounced sense of self-irony. Punch plays the character and anti-hero Amanda, an intensely annoying alpha mum who is a mash-up of Nigella Lawson, Joanna Lumley and Rachel Johnson (by which I mean the worst bits of all of them). Not the funniest thing on the telly, but pretty good satire, and worth catching.
Sean O'Grady, The Independent, 11th November 2017Review: Motherland, episode two, BBC2/iPlayer
If you are or you've been a parent you'll love it, but you'll be watching it through your fingers.
Bruce Dessau, Beyond The Joke, 11th November 2017TV Review: Motherland and Man Down
This fourth series of Man Down seems to be operating on a system whereby one week is excellent and the next is merely very good. I've told you before how much I love the anarchic, weird Man Down, so let's look at Motherland.
Jane Cassidy, The National (Scotland), 11th November 2017Motherland's achievement: its near universal appeal
Both parents and the happily child-free will enjoy this borderline revolutionary BBC Two comedy.
Rachel Cooke, The New Statesman, 9th November 2017Belly Laugh? Motherland (BBC2); Detectorists (BBC4)
Both funny, but in different ways. The question is which way around should I watch them?
Shouting At The Telly, 9th November 2017Motherland: a brutally honest depiction of parenthood
Expect terrifying alpha-mums, chaotic childcare and party politics, says Johanna Thomas-Corr.
Johanna Thomas-Corr, Evening Standard, 9th November 2017Motherland (BBC2) returns, after a pilot, for a series. Good news for middle-class metropolitan breeders for whom it is a funhouse mirror they can point into and chuckle. When I say "they", I mean we. And actually everything is terrifyingly recognisable, testament to the writers' (loads of well-known people) powers of observation, but also why I find it a teeny bit ghastly. Golly, doesn't Anna Maxwell Martin's overwrought Julia annoy well? Thank heavens for Lucy Punch's fabulously Stepfordy queen bee Amanda, and for Diane Morgan's super-droll Liz. And for Ben Crompton, Animal Man, rubbish children's entertainer. Rubbish AND racist. "If your act was amazing I'd put up with a tiny bit of racism," says Liz. Ha!
Sam Wollaston, The Guardian, 8th November 2017