Julia Davis and Marc Wootton's "Couples" is met with great response

26th March 2015|Marc Wootton

The new semi-improvised comedy show written and performed by Julia Davis and Marc Wootton, "Couples", was met with a great critical response. They portray a series of couples in therapy with the renowned therapist Dr Tanya Ray-Harding, as played by Vicki Pepperdine.It was selected as Joe Clay's [The Times] Critics' choice "Two minutes into Couples and you can start to visualize how it would work on television. It's a three-hander with Julia Davis and Marc Wootton playing multiple roles - a la Paul Whitehouse's tour de force in Nurse, the latest radio 4 comedy to make the transition from radio to the small screen - as a series of damaged couples in counselling with the renowned therapist Dr Tanya Ray-Harding (Vicki Pepperdine).Couples is semi-improvised and how Wootton keeps a straight face as Davis inhabits a deranged Finnish woman who detests kissing her partner's small mouth is a wonder. (A bizarre plan is concocted with Dr Tanya involving a blow-up doll and a packet of processed of ham.)Davis and Wootton both specialise in grotesques and the characters they play here are mostly repulsive, but hilariously so. Take Wootton's monstrously self-important John, who abondons his wife as she goes into labour. "If it was up to me I'd pop those little children back and where they came from."Couples is only a pilot at the moment, so it is porbably a bit hasty to already be talking of taking it to telly. However, given the duo's superb track record, the BBC's comedy commissioner should get in there before Sky comes calling..."Also, The Guardian stated that Couples was a "parade of hysterical eccentrics that's a joy from start to finish". For the full review, head to http://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2015/mar/26/couples-julia-davis-marc-wootton-review?utm_medium=twitter&utm_source=twitterfeedWritten and Performed by Julia Davis and Marc Wootton, you can catch up now http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b05mrdn9