Paul Abbott

The week in TV: The North Water; Wolfe; My Childhood, My Country; Imagine: Tom Stoppard; Big Age

A dark whaling tale brings out the wonderful worst in Colin Farrell, Paul Abbott goes cartoonish with a bipolar pathologist, plus author Bolu Babalola’s sparky new comedy

Barbara Ellen

12, Sep, 2021 @8:30 AM

Paul Abbott: ‘I have written two scenes I can’t bear to watch’

Shameless plundered his bleak childhood for comedy. Now, he’s written a ‘funny forensics’ show, Wolfe, informed by his own bipolar diagnosis. The hit writer talks therapy, all-nighters and why his seven-year-old adores gore

Stuart Jeffries

23, Aug, 2021 @11:05 AM

Sex, Succession and sci-fi nightmares: the must-see TV of autumn 2021

More teenage hookups in Sex Education, a killer Olivia Colman and the long-awaited return of the Roy family … here is all the unmissable TV coming soon

Hannah J Davies and Kate Abbott

23, Aug, 2021 @7:00 AM

The week in TV: The Halcyon, Silent Witness, No Offence, Unforgotten, Sherlock and Taboo

From grand wartime hotel to lamplit Georgian shocker, via top-notch crime action, TV drama is on a hot streak

Euan Ferguson

08, Jan, 2017 @8:00 AM

Joanna Scanlan: 'I'm a sexual being. I feel I'm attractive to men – including my husband'

As Paul Abbott’s all-female cop comedy No Offence returns, its star talks putdowns, poetry – and why sexuality should stop being associated with youth

Helen Pidd

04, Jan, 2017 @11:04 AM

Paul Abbott: ‘Shameless became too hysterical. I was glad to see it off’

As No Offence returns to Channel 4, the award-winning scriptwriter talks about former hits, problems with pitching, and State of Play 2

Andrew Anthony

01, Jan, 2017 @6:59 AM

Downton Abbey profits to fund TV writers from ‘below stairs’

Hit dramas will play a part in helping a new generation to write for more diverse audiences

Vanessa Thorpe

17, Oct, 2015 @11:03 PM

Clocking Off box set review – ‘shocking tales of ordinary people with dark secrets’

Set in a Manchester bed linen factory, Paul Abbott’s dramas deal with infidelity, rape and racism – and there’s no guarantee of a happy ending

Hannah Verdier

02, Jul, 2015 @3:05 PM

No Offence to return for second series on Channel 4

Filming of Shameless creator Paul Abbott’s comic police drama, starring Joanna Scanlan, set to begin in early 2016

John Plunkett

22, Jun, 2015 @11:02 PM

No Offence: why female coppers are the making of Paul Abbott's drama

DC Kowalska is a maverick and DI Deering is a glorious monster of a boss. It just so happens, both are women

Natalie Haynes

01, Jun, 2015 @5:00 PM

No Offence; The Detectives – review: Paul Abbott’s Channel 4 drama was almost as chilling and moving as the real thing

The third episode of Abbott’s latest creation is a riot and flashes by at breakneck speed, while The Detectives finishes its finely judged and unsensationalist record of painstaking police work

Lucy Mangan

20, May, 2015 @6:00 AM

24 Hours in the Past: the randomest collection of participants in the BBC’s weakest historico-reality-doc-thing yet

The appearance of Ann Widdecombe working in Victorian conditions makes for frustrating and pointless watching, and is not redeemed by the ex-politico famemonger’s ironic push for workers’ rights in this week’s episode