#114 If You’ve the Spark, You’ve the Solution
20/02/25 09:25
There’s a place for criticism, particularly in reviews. Now and then I like to do a jolly nitpick, though only if something is big and ugly enough to take it. But usually I prefer to gush, because I know how hard TV is, after working in the industry for more than 20 years. People in telly are great, and there’s so much talent out there – it just needs recognising and trusting and nurturing. Oh, and funding. It needs fucking money throwing at it. Not in the form of bonuses for the bigwigs in their high-rise corner offices, but support for the people at the bottom, starting out. Flash the cash at them, and rewards will follow for everyone.
Right now, I just want to do a big fat gush about Alma’s Not Normal. I watched the first series last year and really enjoyed it, and I just finished the second series and loved loved loved it. ‘Fabulous’, as Alma would say. It made me laugh, it made me cry and it made me rage. It’s got everything. In fact, don’t even bother with this, just get on iPlayer and watch it right now and you’ll see what I mean. But if you need persuading, then read on.
The incredible Sophie Willan plays Alma Nuttall, who is a fictionalised version of Sophie Willan, since this show is semi-autobiographical. Alma isn’t normal, in the sense that her mum Lin is a heroin addict with a schizophrenic boyfriend, and her Grandma Joan, who mostly raised her, is a randy egomaniac. Alma is an often unemployed, some-time sex worker who has been through (and let down by) the care system. Her family is dysfunctional and she’s largely unsupported, emotionally or financially, by any of them. This all sounds pretty bleak, but it’s not. It may not be normal, but it’s joyous and warm and life-affirming, with a banging soundtrack.
This show is FUNNY. So many sitcoms, sadcoms and comedy dramas don’t actually bring the lolz; more of a wry grimace or a knowing look to camera. This series is properly hilarious, giving you so many set pieces that provoke genuine laughs. In the second series, Grandma Joan, trying to give up smoking, exchanges cigarettes for party blowers – ‘the same catharsis as a fag, with no harm and a fun little noise.’ Alma’s extended family, who turn up for great-grandma Alice’s funeral, are a deranged bunch of miscreants, Joan’s semi-estranged sister-coven featuring self-serving thief Aunty Evie, and self-indulgent narcissist Aunty Ange (played by Hayley from Corrie). AND you get Steve Pemberton as Uncle Dickie thrown in for good measure: ‘who put 50p in Knobhead?’ When the siblings get riled, they like to bellow animal noises at each other. They’re ALL knobheads. But boy, do they know how to party. Together they provide a fitting send-off for Alice; even her coffin, nicked from Ghouls R Us, misbehaves.
Alma, at the heart of all this, is a vibrant pop of colour against the beige Bolton backdrop. She wears fluffy pink fur coats, and vivid trouser suits, topped off with that dazzling thatch of red hair. She has ideas and schemes and plans that always start with a punchy ‘WOO!’ and even if they inevitably end in failure, at least she’s trying. She’s relentlessly upbeat, despite all that life throws at her. There’s no self-pity here, though there is occasionally fury and despair. It’s the jaunty insouciance and lack of guile that make her a particularly endearing character, one who you root for even as she fucks up. She keeps bouncing back, although there are no soft landings.
This show made me cry, like all good sitcoms should. To misquote Martin Amis, if you don’t know what’s serious then how do you know what’s funny? The second series features two funerals, and one is a real tear-jerker. Almas’s speech at her mother’s court hearing is a truly moving slapdown, and demonstrates how political, and righteously indignant, is the underlying message here. After years of Tory austerity decimated the state system, support for mental health - support for anything – has vanished. People like Lin fall through the cracks, and there’s no one to drag them up and set them on their feet again. Behind the fiesta of the colourful, plucky Alma and her raucous family conga is a laser-focused rage against the machine.
This show is CLEVER. Because it’s so cheerful and loopy, it would be easy to overlook the craft and cunning; the pin-sharp plotting of each episode, the deft pacing, the lovely callbacks – an unfortunate excess of piñatas exquisitely repurposed as Joan’s punchbags, for example. Like the furiously paddling feet of the swan, hard work is required to make the action look effortless.
The performances are extraordinary. Siobhan Finneran, as the gruff, twitchy, vulnerable arsonist Lin, is a powerhouse - I could spend whole scenes just watching her teeth, and what she did with them. Her prize-winning prison poem, the hamster madly wheeling in her cage, is delivered with raw energy and verve, pulling the rug from under your feet – like her oddly brilliant art, it’s surprisingly powerful and effective. Lorraine Ashbourne, as Grandma Joan, brings shameless pizzazz to the part, but also huge warmth and matter-of-fact affection. She’s not Alma’s rock, exactly – she’s too restless and unsentimental for that – but she’s a buoy to cling to in times of trouble. Until she floats away, that is... Oh God, I’m going to start sobbing again, I need a party blower to distract me.
By the end of the second series, which will be the last*, I’d started to beg a God I don’t believe in to give Alma the success she deserved. The final shot – I won’t spoilt it for you – answered my prayers. Art imitated life, and back again, in a glorious mic drop. Brava, Alma, and brava, Sophie.
And brava, the BBC. Auntie threw money at her. They nurtured her, trusted her. They gave a hamster matches. And look at the fire she started! FABULOUS.
*There might be a Christmas special. PRAY FOR IT.
Right now, I just want to do a big fat gush about Alma’s Not Normal. I watched the first series last year and really enjoyed it, and I just finished the second series and loved loved loved it. ‘Fabulous’, as Alma would say. It made me laugh, it made me cry and it made me rage. It’s got everything. In fact, don’t even bother with this, just get on iPlayer and watch it right now and you’ll see what I mean. But if you need persuading, then read on.
The incredible Sophie Willan plays Alma Nuttall, who is a fictionalised version of Sophie Willan, since this show is semi-autobiographical. Alma isn’t normal, in the sense that her mum Lin is a heroin addict with a schizophrenic boyfriend, and her Grandma Joan, who mostly raised her, is a randy egomaniac. Alma is an often unemployed, some-time sex worker who has been through (and let down by) the care system. Her family is dysfunctional and she’s largely unsupported, emotionally or financially, by any of them. This all sounds pretty bleak, but it’s not. It may not be normal, but it’s joyous and warm and life-affirming, with a banging soundtrack.
This show is FUNNY. So many sitcoms, sadcoms and comedy dramas don’t actually bring the lolz; more of a wry grimace or a knowing look to camera. This series is properly hilarious, giving you so many set pieces that provoke genuine laughs. In the second series, Grandma Joan, trying to give up smoking, exchanges cigarettes for party blowers – ‘the same catharsis as a fag, with no harm and a fun little noise.’ Alma’s extended family, who turn up for great-grandma Alice’s funeral, are a deranged bunch of miscreants, Joan’s semi-estranged sister-coven featuring self-serving thief Aunty Evie, and self-indulgent narcissist Aunty Ange (played by Hayley from Corrie). AND you get Steve Pemberton as Uncle Dickie thrown in for good measure: ‘who put 50p in Knobhead?’ When the siblings get riled, they like to bellow animal noises at each other. They’re ALL knobheads. But boy, do they know how to party. Together they provide a fitting send-off for Alice; even her coffin, nicked from Ghouls R Us, misbehaves.
Alma, at the heart of all this, is a vibrant pop of colour against the beige Bolton backdrop. She wears fluffy pink fur coats, and vivid trouser suits, topped off with that dazzling thatch of red hair. She has ideas and schemes and plans that always start with a punchy ‘WOO!’ and even if they inevitably end in failure, at least she’s trying. She’s relentlessly upbeat, despite all that life throws at her. There’s no self-pity here, though there is occasionally fury and despair. It’s the jaunty insouciance and lack of guile that make her a particularly endearing character, one who you root for even as she fucks up. She keeps bouncing back, although there are no soft landings.
This show made me cry, like all good sitcoms should. To misquote Martin Amis, if you don’t know what’s serious then how do you know what’s funny? The second series features two funerals, and one is a real tear-jerker. Almas’s speech at her mother’s court hearing is a truly moving slapdown, and demonstrates how political, and righteously indignant, is the underlying message here. After years of Tory austerity decimated the state system, support for mental health - support for anything – has vanished. People like Lin fall through the cracks, and there’s no one to drag them up and set them on their feet again. Behind the fiesta of the colourful, plucky Alma and her raucous family conga is a laser-focused rage against the machine.
This show is CLEVER. Because it’s so cheerful and loopy, it would be easy to overlook the craft and cunning; the pin-sharp plotting of each episode, the deft pacing, the lovely callbacks – an unfortunate excess of piñatas exquisitely repurposed as Joan’s punchbags, for example. Like the furiously paddling feet of the swan, hard work is required to make the action look effortless.
The performances are extraordinary. Siobhan Finneran, as the gruff, twitchy, vulnerable arsonist Lin, is a powerhouse - I could spend whole scenes just watching her teeth, and what she did with them. Her prize-winning prison poem, the hamster madly wheeling in her cage, is delivered with raw energy and verve, pulling the rug from under your feet – like her oddly brilliant art, it’s surprisingly powerful and effective. Lorraine Ashbourne, as Grandma Joan, brings shameless pizzazz to the part, but also huge warmth and matter-of-fact affection. She’s not Alma’s rock, exactly – she’s too restless and unsentimental for that – but she’s a buoy to cling to in times of trouble. Until she floats away, that is... Oh God, I’m going to start sobbing again, I need a party blower to distract me.
By the end of the second series, which will be the last*, I’d started to beg a God I don’t believe in to give Alma the success she deserved. The final shot – I won’t spoilt it for you – answered my prayers. Art imitated life, and back again, in a glorious mic drop. Brava, Alma, and brava, Sophie.
And brava, the BBC. Auntie threw money at her. They nurtured her, trusted her. They gave a hamster matches. And look at the fire she started! FABULOUS.
- Alma’s Not Normal, two series, BBC iPlayer
*There might be a Christmas special. PRAY FOR IT.
