The Bear being considered a comedy is mad, says BBC commissioner

By Nick Forbes, PA Scotland

A BBC comedy boss has said it is “sort of mad” that hit US series The Bear is considered a comedy, saying that budget constraints and other challenges make real comedy “so much more challenging” to make.

Speaking in an Edinburgh TV Festival discussion on British TV comedy, Jon Petrie, director of comedy commissioning at the BBC, said there was still a big appetite for new comedy but that getting co-financers to take a risk on funding it was hard.

He said comedy was seen as higher-risk than other genres, and that potential funders “want to sort of see a series of something before they decide whether they can invest in it”.

He added that the rise of US streaming platforms and the success of shows like Fleabag had popularised comedy dramas and made it “easier” to get co-financing for them, adding that “it’s just harder to sell out and out silly British sitcoms”.

At one stage Kiell Smith-Bynoe, who was chairing the discussion, put to the panel that labelling something as a comedy drama could be seen as a way for someone “to get a show in, rather than the show they want to create”.

Mr Petrie replied: “I find it sort of mad that The Bear is being put up as a comedy. And it sort of annoys me because I think it’s sort of doing down comedy.

“And actually comedy is so hard to make, and the budget so much more challenging. It’s just so much harder, and it’s so evergreen. A hit lasts for so long.”

This was echoed by Alison Carpenter, creative director of Monumental Television, one of the production companies on hit BBC TV show Ghosts, which starred Smith-Bynoe.

She said that despite the success of the show, “every series was a struggle to finance”.

“We were in the lucky position of having a hit show that we knew people wanted, but it’s still a commercial exercise,” she said.

She added that compared to drama, comedy felt “much more exposed”.

She said: “I sometimes wonder if that’s part of the thing to do with comedy dramas being more prevalent than straight comedies on TV.

“Because you know if you’re hitting it or failing to write comedy – are people laughing?”

She added that for genres other than comedy “you don’t really know if the audience have enjoyed it in the moment, but you really know if you put a straight out and out comedy on screen going ‘guys, we’re going to make you laugh’.

“You might fail, you never know. Whereas if you go ‘we are going to make you laugh, but there’s also a great character story and there’s other stories going on’, the pressure’s off. It feels safer.”