As one door opens, another one closes, as it were. As ITV airs new comedy stand up shows Out There and The Stand Up Sketch Show it cancels its two sitcoms, Birds of a Feather and Bad Move.
ITV’s Kevin Lygo announced that the future of ITV scripted comedy looked “quite bleak” adding that “ITV was never quite the home of sitcom”.
Sitcom classic Birds of a Feather, starring original leads Linda Robson, Pauline Quirke and Lesley Joseph, made its return to ITV five years ago, 16 years after the original run ended. Despite a successful relaunch, attracting just under eight million viewers, the audience numbers slowly declined and Lygo says the show has “come to a sort of natural end”.
Bad Move, starring Jack Dee, Kerry Godliman and Miles Jupp was launched in 2017 and has enjoyed two series and an audience that averaged 3.4 million in number.
