Sketch show becomes the broadcaster's sweariest programme

David Mitchell and Robert Webb’s new sketch show contains more C-bombs than any other Channel 4 show,

The broadcaster’s chief content officer, Ian Katz, said that one episode ‘has broken the record for the most number of C-words I have had to sign off on than any other programme. so if you’re faint-hearted this is not for you’.

A recurring sketch called Sweary Aussie Drama - written by Webb’s wife Abigail Burdess - is largely responsible, along with another scene set in the show’s writer’s room.

Webb said of the Aussie sketch – one of the few recurring ideas across the series: ‘That gets funnier the more you see it. So by the by the sixth one, there is a sort of sense of hysteria.’

Katz, who has been with Channel 4 for eight years, made his revelation at a screening of Mitchell and Webb Are Not Helping at the British Film Institute on London’s South Bank this evening, ahead of its broadcast on Friday.

At the event, Mitchell spoke about why he loved sketch comedy, saying: ‘There's something really liberating about sketch comedy, because you don't have to care about any bit except the bit you're doing. Make that funny then you have succeeded.

‘Whereas with anything, with a fucking story, you might do a really funny bit that there isn't room for because the programme must remain comprehensible. You know, funny bits are not enough in any, any other kind of fiction, but in sketch company, it doesn't have to fit with anything else. It doesn't have to fit the other bits.

‘So if you're being funny on that morning with that bit of material, you can give yourself a big tick and move on with your life.’

Webb concurred, saying: ‘We love sketch comedy and… it turned out we spent 15 years politely waiting to be asked [to do it again].

‘Then we started writing together, and suddenly it all felt very natural and good, and  it was a really joyful writing experience.’

Producer Gareth Edwards also recruited Kiell Smith-Bynoe, Stevie Martin, Lara Ricote and Krystal Evans to write and star in the series. 

Edwards explained that ideas were knocked around in six three-hour writers’ room sessions before the cast went away to commit the ideas to a script.

‘I tend not to do them for more than three hours, because people start to suffer from oxygen deprivation,’ he explained. ‘Then everyone starts to lose it completely. And the only thing that helps is that you can deploy one bottle of beer each, and that'll give you another half an hour – after that it falls right off a cliff.’

He also said he tried to keep the cost of filming each idea out of his mind until the last minute.

‘You want to let the idea develop in complete freedom, running through the pastures, having a lovely time. And then once the ideas got as fully developed as it can be, that's when you introduce it to the reality shark to bite its head off. 

‘But more often than not, there is a way of doing something.’

Comparing his budgets to the fortunes spent on the TV shows or movies the show parodies, he said: ‘It only has to hold up for, you know, two minutes. A friend of mine described it by  saying, "Oh, you're not going for quality. You're going for the illusion of quality." So that's my motto for sketches.’

Mitchell admitted that they were probably a bit less savage in their writing than in their youth, adding: ‘I think you get older, and you perhaps give the world a break a bit more. You realise more of your own failings. And that there are two sides to every story – and that slightly gets in the way of some of the more the meaner lines.

‘But our approach hasn't really changed. I think we still, when we're writing, sit down and we think of something that is a bit annoying or doesn't quite make sense. It’s not in order of how serious they are or how important. It's just an order of how completely we think we can make a joke out of their wrongness.’

Webb added: ‘Thee sweet spot you're looking for is the thing that you've noticed that other people have noticed without quite noticing that they've noticed.  That is absolutely what we've always done, and still do. We haven't in any way grown.’

One of the sketches in the new series got trumped by reality – as the team came up with a spoof reality TV show based on musical chairs called Hot Seat. 

Mitchell explained: ‘When we were shooting Hot Seat, the news came in that, I think a subsidiary of Endemol in Spain are making a game show based on musical chairs. I would like to put on the record that we had that idea ourselves – what we thought was an exaggeration of how low reality TV had come. We have not ripped off Endemol Spain.’

The real format is actually called Game Of Chairs and comes from the Spanish arm of Endemol parent company Banijay, which called it a ‘vibrant competition, blending tactical and skill-based challenges.’

When the show was announced in March, company executive  James Townley, boasted: ‘Nostalgia, tension, strategy, and knowledge come together in this original concept, which appeals to a wide demographic.’

At the BFI event, Smith-Bynoe also talked about the unique experience of playing himself in the recurring sketches set in the writers’ room. He said: ‘I've been myself, of course, on TV, but I've never played myself as an actor, so that was like a new challenge. So I was  trying to work out if I'm doing it right, watching videos of me…’

Published: 3 Sep 2025