Six-part series Changing Ends to air next year

ITV has picked up Alan Carr’s autobiographical sitcom for a six-part series.

The project, Changing Ends, made headlines last year when Carr put out a casting call for a lookalike to play him as a child as he was developing the show.

It attracted more than 500 audition tapes, with the comic saying: ‘Some were heartwarming, some were just downright offensive, but there was one boy who really stood out from the rest.’

That child actor was Oliver Savell – who appeared in Kenneth Branagh’s Belfast – and producers Baby Cow have now released a YouTube video showing Carr surprising him with the news.

In it, he tells the delighted youngster that the broadcaster was so impressed with the tester footage that they commissioned the full series to air next year.

Changing Ends is based on Carr’s life growing up as a gay teenager in 1980s Northampton, where his   father, Graham, was manager of the local football team.

The comedian – who previously described his upbringing in the bestselling 2008 autobiography Look Who It Is – co-wrote the script with by Two Doors Down creator Simon Carlyle. This week, Carlyle gave an interview about growing up in Ayr, which he described as ‘just an awful place to be gay’.

Carr previously said that the sitcom would be realistic, saying: ‘This is about a young boy on the cusp of puberty starting his journey in this very masculine world of lower league football.’

He is currently on tour with his Regional Trinket stand-up show. Alan ​ Carr tour dates.

Published: 12 Nov 2022