Not Going Out star Lee Mack is promising fans a mid-life crisis in real time when his new comedy series Semi-Detached begins on BBC Two next week.
Written by David Crow and Oliver Maltman, Semi-Detached is described as "exactly like 24, except instead of following a government agent as he saves the planet, the series follows a perennial loser called Stuart (Mack) as his life goes down the pan in a suburban cul-de-sac".
"All Stuart wants is a quiet life as a wedding DJ, but his family seems to have other ideas," says the BBC.
"On top of barely coping with a (much younger) partner April (Ellie White - Stath Lets Flats, The Other One) and a newborn baby, Stuart also has to look out for his jailbird brother Charlie (Neil Fitzmaurice - Peep Show, Mount Pleasant) and his promiscuous, drug-taking Dad Willie (Clive Russell - Happiness, Game of Thrones).
"Then there's the ex-wife, Kate (Samantha Spiro - Sex Education, Grandma's House), who lives across the cul-de-sac with their teenage daughter Madonna (Sarah Hoare - Chewing Gum, Black Mirror) and Kate's husband, Ted (Patrick Baladi - The Office, Stella), who thinks he's better than Stuart because he sells fish to sushi restaurants."
"The main challenge is that I'm in every single scene," Mack told the BBC. "I think there was one scene, the only time in the whole series, where the camera follows someone else. I'm not in every shot so sometimes it's cut between different characters, but my character is in every scene. I used to complain that actors say, 'I'm tired', but now I'm like, 'I'll keep my mouth shut when actors complain it's tiring'.
"I'm lucky because in Not Going Out I write it, so I turn up and know all the words already. Suddenly I had to remember all these lines which I hadn't written which sounds really obvious but that's not what I've done in the past.
"This time I had to be a proper actor. Well, I'll let the viewers decide that!"
Semi-Detached beings on BBC Two on Thursday, August 6 at 10:05pm.
