7 guide 14-20 Oct 2017 televisiontelevisiontelevision
She’s unreliable,
eats crap food andlooks as if she could
do with a good bathf you throw yourself off
this building it’s going to
be really bad ... for me,”
groans Marcella in the darkly
comic GameFace (Thursday,
9.30pm, E4). She only popped
up to the office roof for a ciggie
and now she’s stuck trying to talk
down a stranger who’s intent on
ending it all.
To be fair, life hasn’t been
kind to Marcella either. She
is, as she explains to Suicidal
Woman, an actor who hasn’t
had a part in four years and
who, in between temping jobs,
is reduced to playing fairy
princesses at children’s parties
on Saturday mornings with a
banging hangover. Furthermore,
Marcella is £28K in debt and still
mourning the ex who dumped
her after 12 years and promptly
married a woman he’d known for
six days. “And I’ve got fat hands,”
she adds, triumphantly.
“Christ, it sounds like you
should jump, mate,” says Suicidal
Woman, not unreasonably.
Set in London, GameFace
is the brainchild of writer and
actor Roisin Conaty, last seen
propping up Greg Davies in
Man Down. With her tragicomic
portrait of a woman whose life
has unravelled, there are echoes
of Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s brilliant
Fleabag here, though GameFace
is far from an imitation, not least
because the pilot was screened
two years before Fleabag aired.
Still, there are similarities,
particularly in Conaty’s‘I
protagonist who, rather than
being winsome and lovable, is
gratifyingly messed up. Marcella
is in her 30s, which, in sitcom-
world, usually signals a husband,
a brace of kids and a neutral,
“age-appropriate” wardrobe
that will see her all the way to
retirement. Not here. Not only
is Marcella single, up for a night
out and partial to a push-up bra,
she is unreliable, eats crap food
and looks as if she could do with
a good bath. You can practically
smell the booze on her as she is
ejected from yet another kids’
party and totters home in a giant
princess dress, teeth stained
with red wine, her hair caked
in something unmentionable.
Whether drunk-texting her
ex, getting lost while camping
in a wood or trying to hide the
full extent of her hopelessnessfrom her life coach, Graham
(the sessions were a birthday
present from her mother), life
conspires to deliver a fresh kick
in the teeth every day.
“How do you deal with
stress?” asks Graham. “Carbs,
fags, wine,” Marcella shrugs.
Where Fleabag centres on a
woman undone by self-loathing,
underneath Marcella’s Barbie-
meets-Bet Lynch exterior is a
woman fitfully trying to get it
together. GameFace’s parade of
brilliantly awkward set-pieces
is underpinned by Marcella’s
essential optimism that things
will get better. It’s the kind
of big-hearted comedy that
somehow manages to make
depression and catastrophic
loneliness funny.
Self-sabotage is a running
theme as Marcella routinely
forgets the driving lessons that
will, she hopes, give her new
independence. Elsewhere, she
does battle with her conspiracy-
theorist neighbour, listens
patiently to the brocialist
prattling of her flatmate’s
boyfriend and dutifully turns
up to auditions and gives them
her all, even if it means rubbing
onion in her eyes to make
herself cry. GameFace isn’t just
about one woman’s nightmare.
It’s an affectionate paean to
all the Marcellas out there
gamely staggering through life,
screwing up and getting screwed.
Seriously, have a drink, babes.
You look like you need it The other side
Fiona Sturges raises a glass
to Roisin Conaty in new
sitcom GameFace
ILLUSTRATION: JULIA SCHEELE