Tuesday 27th October
“The. Best. TV romance. Ever.”
Robert Rorke, The New York Post (USA)
“I’ve never laughed so much at foetal abnormality and cervical dysplasia…Comedy is bloody hard to do: which is why, when something as wonderfully funny as Channel 4’s Catastrophe appears, it feels so very, very exciting”
Grace Dent, The Independent (UK)
After broadcasting in the UK, USA and in multiple territories around the world to universal acclaim, Catastrophe returns to its home on Channel 4 for a brand new second series after launching in January this year (the fastest return of a sitcom on the channel since Father Ted).
Written by and starring ROB DELANEY and SHARON HORGAN, Catastrophe is a comedy following an Irish woman and an American man who, after making a bloody mess as they struggled to fall in love in London, have embarked on a series of best-attempts to clear it up and generally do the right thing. The stakes are higher as we rejoin the now married Sharon and Rob who are struggling to stay in love – and lust – while taking their trademark mayhem into parenthood. A monstrous family (CARRIE FISHER, Star Wars) and crazy friends (ASHLEY JENSEN, Ugly Betty), also seem hell-bent on ensuring that whatever new life-journey Rob and Sharon embark on will be anything but simple. With times having changed for our turbulent lovers, and with their new arrival back home; at the start of the series we rejoin the chaos as they decide on an ill-considered party to get the introductions complete in one hit. Unfortunately for Sharon, the gathering coincides with a visit from Rob’s eBay obsessed (and “card-carrying sadist”) mum, a disturbing revelation about her father’s health and an unfortunate incident with the family dog.
Catastrophe has a 100% rating on Rotten Tomatoes (representing the percentage of professional critic reviews that are positive for a given film or TV show) and after transmitting on Channel 4 it is available exclusively in the USA to Amazon Prime Instant Video members, while audiences in Norway, Belgium, Israel, Canada, Sweden, Denmark, New Zealand, Iceland, The Netherlands, Finland, Luxembourg and Australia are also watching the series. In an unprecedented marketing move, Amazon USA made the pilot episode available to a US audience via their Facebook page for 48 hours where it was watched over three million times.
Produced by Avalon Television with co-producers Birdbath Productions and Merman, the show was immediately re-commissioned for a second series by Channel 4. Catastrophe is produced by JACK BAYLES (The Mimic, VIP), directed by BEN TAYLOR (Cardinal Burns, Cuckoo), while executive producers are, RICHARD ALLEN-TURNER, KARA BAKER, ROB DELANEY, SHARON HORGAN and JON THODAY. Avalon Television is also currently in production with: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO), Not Going Out (BBC One), Russell Howard’s Good News (BBC Two), Man Down (Channel 4), Adam DeVine’s House Party (Comedy Central USA), Taskmaster (UKTV) and Workaholics (Comedy Central USA).
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For further information please contact:
Dan Lloyd at Avalon on DanL@Avalonuk.com / 020 7598 8000
Some things the press have said about Catastrophe in the USA
“One of the smartest, most charming and funny shows you’re likely to see all year… This is easily Amazon’s best new sitcom (and no, I haven’t forgotten Transparent).”
Ken Tucker, Yahoo TV
“a charming and decidedly salty series…an awkward yet sweet romance. The show’s distinctly British sense of humor is wonderful… The six-episode first season of Catastrophe aired earlier this year in Britain and has already been picked up for a second season there. One hopes Amazon will decide to pick up the second season as well. If they don’t, it’ll be a catastrophe.”
Amy Amatangelo, The Hollywood Reporter
“It’s quieter and smoother, with an HBO-style gloss, and it spends a surprising amount of time on the sincere-sentimental side of the rom-com equation. It sometimes feels like a darker, more brittle takes on James Corden and Ruth Jones’s sweetly corny “Gavin and Stacey”…Mr. Delaney and Ms. Horgan, as writers and performers, are able to make most of the serious moments believable and bearable, even touching”
Mike Hale, The New York Times
“It is also hilarious, as Horgan and Delaney who wrote the show together, play the characters off each other to perfection. The result may turn out to be the worst – by which we mean the best – new comedy of the year”
Clark Collis, Entertainment Weekly
So what is the secret to a great sitcom? There may not be one, but in the case of “Catastrophe,” it’s great writing with a savvy juxtaposition of comedy and sometimes ugly everyday real life. It doesn’t hurt that the writers and stars are the same people as well. “Catastrophe” is wonderfully misnamed.
David Wiegand, San Francisco Chronicle
“it has built a wickedly funny comedy around two people trying really hard, who seem to be falling in love with each other despite all logic. Sounds like the quintessential romantic comedy idea to me”
Eric Deggans, NPR
“Amazon’s ‘Catastrophe’ is anything but… what’s best about “Catastrophe” is how engaging the characters of Rob and Sharon are, and how quickly we come to root for them. Did I mention there are just six episodes? The real catastrophe would be not getting more “Catastrophe.””
Gail Pennington, St. Louis Post-Dispatch
“the six-episode comedy is distinctive for taking this setup and dealing with the messy complications that naturally occur, but that romantic comedies generally try not to think about… Racy, amiable and honest, Catastrophe doesn’t feel the need to amp up its story with surprises either. It just does the exact thing it’s supposed to”
James Poniewozik, Time
“Catastrophe” is going for laughs, but it also has something to say about people who’ve lived long enough to know that satisfaction doesn’t come with a perfectly tied bow on it”
Hank Stuever, The Washington Post
“In six eventful and bitingly funny episodes that take the rom-com formula to seriously twisted extremes, an American abroad impregnates a wry Irish schoolteacher during a torrid weekend. As they say on either side of the pond, complications ensue: some hilarious, many humbling.”
Matt Roush, TV Guide Magazine
“The. Best. TV romance. Ever.…proves romantic TV comedies don’t have to be awful… The writing is crisp, and its characters are intelligent and realistic in ways that would never occur to most LA-based sitcom writers.”
Robert Rorke, The New York Post
“brings fresh humor to romance…the jokes are fresh, and so is Sharon and Rob’s relationship. The actors have wonderful chemistry together (as seen in their many, many, many sex scenes), but it’s not that cloying kind of chemistry that you so often see in romantic television shows – the kind of attraction that only exists because both participants are excessively good looking. No, Catastrophe rejects the familiar notion of pure romance, often poking fun at traditional form …funny, sharply written and easy to watch.”
Orly Greenberg, The New York Observer
“British TV rom-com ‘Catastrophe’ is far better than the name implies…The Brit import is one of the freshest and funniest new shows you’ll see all summer”
David Hinckley, New York Daily News
“The comedy in ‘Catastrophe’ is dark, but, as critics agree across the board, it’s winning, as is the potent chemistry between Delaney and Horgan. At barely three hours, the season goes by quickly – too quickly – but it will leave you yearning for more”
Sam Adams, Indiewire
Some things the press have said about Catastrophe in the UK
“This startlingly good new adult rom-com sees Horgan, along with co-creator/co-star Rob Delaney, deliver what already looks like one of the comedies of the year: it’s filthy, clever, snappy and heartfelt”
Jack Seale, Radio Times
“Perhaps the chemistry between Delaney and Horgan is so strong, the balance so well done, because the pair have created and written the series together. Certainly, they have created something rare – a good-hearted comedy which still manages to be raw and rude”
Alex Hardy, The Times
“Catastrophe is depraved, sweet and very, very funny…a half hour narrative comedy that bursts with jokes. Solid, delicious chunks of funny pudding rather than the funny-flavoured foam we’ve been doused in lately…For all this degeneracy, it isn’t plain dark or out to shock. It’s genuinely sweet and I care what happens to them. Just not the kind of sweet that gets stuck in your teeth”
Julia Raeside, The Guardian
“Great new sitcom from Sharon Horgan and Rob Delaney which is both believable and hilarious”
Ian Hyland, The Mirror
“restores quality, wit and unpredictability to the romcom genre”
★★★★★
Boyd Hilton, Heat
“it’s a comedy that fires no blanks.”
Mark Wareham, The Mail on Sunday
“A Monday evening staple that will be sorely missed. Thanks goodness a second series has just been commissioned. Very funny”
Mike Bradley, The Observer
“Catastrophe…charged to its conclusion, all the whirlwind and none of the romance, from drunken shag to pregnancy to wedding day in six very funny episodes”
Tim Dowling, The Guardian
“I’ve never laughed so much at foetal abnormality and cervical dysplasia…Comedy is bloody hard to do: which is why, when something as wonderfully funny as Channel 4’s Catastrophe appears, it feels so very, very exciting… As the first series closes, I need another dozen episodes, at least”
Grace Dent, The Independent
“The funniest comedy of 2015 so far comes to a close with Sharon and Rob experiencing typically disastrous hen and stag nights. Yet both somehow cling to the kernel of tenderness that makes their relationship ring true in the face of so many slings and arrows”
Gabriel Tate, The Daily Telegraph
“a TV comedy that’s actually funny”
Kevin O’Sullivan, Sunday Mirror
“TV Gold”
Ally Ross, The Sun
