91Èȱ¬

The last time any major TV channel tried their hand at disability sit-com, the 91Èȱ¬ gave us - whisper it - All About Me, whose 'lead' wheelchair-using character didn't speak to the rest of the cast until series two and which - how shall we put this diplomatically? - was not well received by most within the disabled community.

This should make us agog with anticipation for I'm With Stupid, a new 91Èȱ¬3 comedy set in a residential home for disabled people, whose original idea came from a young writer with CP, and half of whose cast are disabled. That's actually disabled, not just pretending for the cameras.

The premise is this: Paul Ball (played, perhaps inevitably, by Paul Henshall) is an unusually witty young disabled man who lives in a residential home with many other unusually witty disabled people. After a chance encounter, he invites Sheldon (Mark Benton), a non-disabled homeless man, to move into the residential home with him.

When I ask Cherylee Houston, the actor who plays Dorothy, a resident in Bramble Lodge and one of the lead characters, if she was a bit daunted by the prospect of playing this role, she pointed out that she'd seen the scripts in advance and simply wouldn't have done the job if she hadn't like what she'd read. Plus, she'd seen and like the pilot, and says she was "excited" by the opportunity. Meanwhile, Daniel Peak, the non-disabled portion of the programme's writing team, acknowledges the pressure he was under to get it right and says he "tried not to think about it".

Peak, a veteran of such series as Three Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps and My Hero, wrote the scripts but collaborated with Peter Keeley, a novice disabled writer who came up with the original premise and created most of the characters. One of the things about I'm With Stupid is that, although it's based very firmly in a stereotypical institutional environment, it's not actually a very disabled programme. That's to say the characters don't spend their lives comparing limps or discussing Disability Living Allowance. This was a conscious choice. "It would've been a terrible mistake to treat disability as if it was a character trait," says Peak.

Although some will object to the portrayal of a group of young, funky, disableds living in an institution for no particular reason - the concept of independent living seems to have bypassed the residents of Bramble Lodge - the plethora of disabled characters does mean that there are a variety of personalities on offer: no longer do we have to make do with a single disabled character designed to represent us all at once.

For Cherylee Houston, the role made a refreshing change. As a disabled actor she often finds herself asked to "play a lot of different disabilities." This role had more scope, and she thinks its light touch is useful. "People get to know the characters," she says. "It's a way of people getting their heads around disability, without it being hammered home."

Peak admits that the shift away from disability humour was "an inevitable consequence of [him] writing it." 'Cripple' is not a word you will find in I'm With Stupid: he admits that he would have been "very nervous" about using that and some of the other controversial language beloved of dyed-in-the-wool crips.

Some might be disappointed that I'm With Stupid doesn't engage with the darker, more politicised side of the disabled community. The thing is, that's kind of like complaining that Three Pints of Lager doesn't engage with the realistic, gritty side of life for twentysomethings in Northern Britain. That's not what it's meant to do - it's a mainstream sitcom. "At the end of the day", says Peak, "it's just a bunch of jokes."
I'm With Stupid premieres on 91Èȱ¬3, this Sunday 10 September at 10 PM. It is repeated on Monday at midnight and Tuesday at 9.30 PM.