Julia Davis in Nighty Night
Julia Davis in Nighty Night is probably the furthest we can go with nasty a protagonist in a comedy. It causes quite a massive dichotomy really. How can Jill, the really unpleasant Beauty Shop propriator be so well formed as a character and yet be so seemingly unaware of her own monsterousness. The plot of Nighty Night is simple. Jill is horrible. Her husband develops a cancerous lump, goes into hospital which prompts Jill into telling everyone he is dead and gives her a new lease of life. In this case trying to shag her doctor neighbour (angus Deayton) and trying to push out his MS suffering wife (a pale and wan Rebecca Front). Julia Davis is magnicent but absolutely unsympathetic. Unfortunately it does not seem that the series has come to terms with what to do when she is found out in her lies, or comes a cropper in any of her thoroughly nasty ruses (I was waiting for someone to blow up last night when she invited the neighbours round for dinner and left the wife locked out on the doorstep). I can’t help but thinking that this creation will get even better once she is left to squirm a bit herself. Easily the best black comedy on British TV for quite some time.
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