Filming wraps on Please Help Me

Lucy Pearman has made a comedy short for BBC Three.

In Please Help Me, the former Edinburgh best newcomer nominee plays a  girl living and working on an isolated farm in Oxfordshire who is trapped in a mundane and claustrophobic life as her grandmother's only carer.  But as life becomes increasingly fraught she develops bizarre and inexplicable magical powers.

Pearman also wrote the 15-minute short which has just finished filming on location. It also stars Anna Calder-Marshall, Harry Peacock, David Mumeni and Edward Bluemel and will be broadcast later this year on BBC Three’s iPlayer channel.

Pearman - who previously starred alongside Spencer Jones in both The Mind Of Herbert Clunkerdunk and Mister Winner  on BBC Two  - said: ‘I’m very excited and also scared to be writing and creating a project for the BBC.

‘I can’t believe how much admin is involved in making 15 minutes of TV but I’m having the time of my life. I’ve got an amazing cast and crew and I finally get to work with a Shetland pony, what more could a girl ask for?

The short is being made by Tiger Aspect, whose comedy chief

David Simpson said: ‘Lucy is a true original. Her script is brilliantly crafted and simultaneously warm and charming and wildly funny. We can’t wait for people to see it.’

BBC commissioning editor Ben Caudell added: ‘Lucy is an absurdist auteur who has given us a thrilling slice of comic magic realism that defies categorisation, even though I just called it comic magic realism.

‘It’s been an absolute joy to be tangentially involved with it, not least because I get to send emails where the subject line is "PLEASE HELP ME" and it be a straightforward work email rather than my regular desperate cry for urgent assistance.’

Please Help Me will be released under the Comedy Threesome banner, even though there is only one episode.

Made by: Tiger Aspect Comedy
Commissioned by: Fiona Campbell, controller of BBC Three
Director: Ben Mallaby
Producers: David Simpson and Wajeeha Sheikh
Commissioning editor: Ben Caudell

Published: 14 May 2021