Sitcom debut pulls 3.2million viewers

BBC 1's black sitcom The Crouches has got off to a solid start in the ratings.

Although mauled by critics, the opening episode attracted an audience of 3.2 million last night, according to unofficial overnight figures.

The show was beaten by the ITV news's 3.6 million, but it still attracted a fifth of all available viewers - a respectable figure.

However, if the audience share the reviewers' opinion of the show, that figure may slump sharply next week.

The Guardian's Gareth McLean said: "Ian Pattison, writer of The Crouches, should be dipped in honey then fed to a battalion of fire ants."

The Sun's Ally Ross called it "terminally unfunny" and The Mirror's Jim Shelley, "desperately hackneyed, predictable and lame".

And many, like Joe Joseph in The Times, decried the "off-the-shelf black stereotypes" employed by white Pattison.

Published: 10 Sep 2003