The Sitcom Trials is a stage and TV show devised, produced, and presented by Kev F. Sutherland

Kev F. Sutherland

-Career:Since 2005, Sutherland has written, produced and performed as The Scottish Falsetto Sock Puppet Theatre, appearing at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 2007, 2008, 2009 and 2010, in theatres internationally and on television...

. Beginning in Bristol

Bristol

Bristol is a city, unitary authority area and ceremonial county in South West England, with an estimated population of 433,100 for the unitary authority in 2009, and a surrounding Larger Urban Zone with an estimated 1,070,000 residents in 2007...

 in 1999, it showcases new sitcoms

Situation comedy

A situation comedy, often shortened to sitcom, is a genre of comedy that features characters sharing the same common environment, such as a home or workplace, accompanied with jokes as part of the dialogue...

 and comedy items in a head-to-head format. The audience then vote for the one they like best and only see the ending of the winner.

History

The Sitcom Trials takes place in London, at the Leicester Square Theatre, and previously at The Comedy Pub (main venue 99-06), also Canal Cafe Theatre

Canal Cafe Theatre

The Canal Cafe Theatre is a 60-seat fringe theatre venue in Little Venice, London, specialising in comedy performances.-Location:The theatre is above the Bridge House pub in Little Venice, on the corner of Westbourne Terrace Road and Delamere Terrace, at the meeting point of the Grand Union and...

, Finborough Theatre

Finborough Theatre

The Finborough Theatre is a fifty seat theatre in the Earls Court area of London, United Kingdom , which presents new British writing, UK and premieres of new plays, primarily from the English speaking world including North America, Canada, Scotland and Ireland, music theatre, and rarely seen...

, Soho Theatre

Soho Theatre

Soho Theatre is a theatre in the eponymous Soho district of the City of Westminster. It presents new works of theatre, together with comedy and cabaret....

, Ealing Studios

Ealing Studios

Ealing Studios is a television and film production company and facilities provider at Ealing Green in West London. Will Barker bought the White Lodge on Ealing Green in 1902 as a base for film making, and films have been made on the site ever since...

, The Green Room Club

Green Room Club

The Green Room Club was a London gentlemen's club, primarily for actors, but also for lovers of the theatre & the arts. It was established in 1877 and was dissolved in 2000.-History:...

, Hen and Chickens Theatre

Hen and Chickens Theatre

The Hen and Chickens Theatre is a fringe venue for theatre and comedy situated above a pub at Highbury in the London Borough of Islington. The theatre management was awarded to actress Felicity Wren in 1999.-External links:*...

. The show began at The Comedy Box in Bristol

Bristol

Bristol is a city, unitary authority area and ceremonial county in South West England, with an estimated population of 433,100 for the unitary authority in 2009, and a surrounding Larger Urban Zone with an estimated 1,070,000 residents in 2007...

. Producers have been Kev F Sutherland (99-06), Simon Wright & Declan Hill (07-09), and James Parker (09-).

In 2008 the Sitcom Trials won the Fringe Report

Fringe Report

Fringe Report is an online magazine relating to contemporary fringe theatre published in the United Kingdom. Fringe Report publishes 2 or 3 times a week on London performances as well as regional performances in the United Kingdom. Fringe Report dates from 2002....

 Award for Best Encourager of New Talent.

The Sitcom Trials appeared at the Edinburgh Fringe

Edinburgh Fringe

The Edinburgh Festival Fringe is the world’s largest arts festival. Established in 1947 as an alternative to the Edinburgh International Festival, it takes place annually in Scotland's capital, in the month of August...

 in 2001, 2002, and 2004. The first TV series was a Carlton

Carlton Television

Carlton Television was the ITV franchise holder for London and the surrounding counties including the cities of Solihull and Coventry of the West Midlands, south Suffolk, middle and east Hampshire, Oxfordshire, south Bedfordshire, south Northamptonshire, parts of Herefordshire & Worcestershire,...

 production for ITV1

ITV1

ITV1 is a generic brand that is used by twelve franchises of the British ITV Network in the English regions, Wales, southern Scotland , the Isle of Man and the Bailiwicks of Jersey and Guernsey. The ITV1 brand was introduced by Carlton and Granada in 2001, alongside the regional identities of their...

/HTV, broadcast live from Bristol over eight weeks in 2003. The first Hollywood Sitcom Trials took place in 2005.

The Manchester Sitcom Trials has taken place in 2010 and 2011 at The Lass O'Gowrie, Manchester, as part of the LassFest Festival.

In 2010 Declan Hill and Simon Wright, who produced the Sitcom Trials in 2007 and 2009 launched a similar event called The Sitcom Mission.

At the 2004 Edinburgh Fringe The Sitcom Trials auctioned on eBay

EBay

eBay Inc. is an American internet consumer-to-consumer corporation that manages eBay.com, an online auction and shopping website in which people and businesses buy and sell a broad variety of goods and services worldwide...

 the chance to have your script in the show. This was won by Liam Mullone

Liam Mullone

Liam Mullone is an alternative comedian, journalist and writer born in Leicester, UK and brought up in Hong Kong, now living and performing in London....

 who starred in his own sitcom, along with Isy Suttie

Isy Suttie

Isobel "Isy" Suttie is an English stand up comedian, actress, writer, and musician. She is best known for playing the role of Dobby in the British sitcom Peep Show.-Career:...

, Duncan Edwards

Duncan Edwards

Duncan Edwards was an English footballer who played for Manchester United and the England national team. He was one of the Busby Babes, the young United team formed under manager Matt Busby in the mid 1950s, and one of eight players who died as a result of the Munich air disaster.Born in Dudley,...

, Ed Petrie

Ed Petrie

Edward 'Ed' Oliver James Petrie is a British actor, comedian and television presenter. He was born, and grew up in, the seaside resort of Rustington, and was educated at Broadwater Manor in Worthing and the independent school Ardingly College in the village of Ardingly in West Sussex...

 and Andy Bone.

Performers who have appeared in The Sitcom Trials over the years include Miranda Hart

Miranda Hart

Miranda Katharine Hart Dyke , known professionally as Miranda Hart, is an English actress, writer and stand-up comedienne. She writes and stars in the BBC sitcom Miranda...

, Neil Mullarkey

Neil Mullarkey

Neil Mullarkey is an English actor, writer and comedian.Mullarkey studied at Robinson College, Cambridge; while he was there he was Junior Treasurer of the Cambridge Footlights in the academic year 1981 to 1982 and was president in the year ending 1983...

, Richard Vranch

Richard Vranch

Richard Leslie Vranch is a British comedian, actor and musician.Vranch improvises comedy on stage with the Comedy Store Players every Wednesday and Sunday at The Comedy Store in London. He has voiced British Airways TV and radio commercials since 2003, and he narrates TV documentaries...

, Suki Webster, Tony Robinson

Tony Robinson

Tony Robinson is an English actor, comedian, author, broadcaster and political campaigner. He is best known for playing Baldrick in the BBC television series Blackadder, and for hosting Channel 4 programmes such as Time Team and The Worst Jobs in History. Robinson is a member of the Labour Party...

 (Baldrick

Baldrick

Baldrick is the name of several fictional characters featured in the long-running BBC historic comedy television series Blackadder. Each one serves as Edmund Blackadder's servant and sidekick and acts as a foil to the lead character...

), Wanda Opalinska

Wanda Opalinska

Wanda Opalinska is a British-Polish actress, best known for playing the part of Polish immigrant and Underworld factory worker Wiki Dankowska in Coronation Street.-Early life:...

, Gerard Foster, Charity Trimm, Dominic Frisby, Waen Shepherd

Waen Shepherd

Waen Shepherd is an English actor and comedian. Originally from Yorkshire, England, he later moved to London.-Career:Following his days as a stand-up poet and fringe actor , Waen started out performing bizarre experimental monologues at the early Cluub Zarathustra, touring with spoof techno band...

, Laura Solon

Laura Solon

Laura Solon is an English comedian, actor, writer, and winner of the 2005 Perrier Comedy Award, only the second woman to win as a solo performer .-Background:...

, James Holmes

James Holmes (actor)

James Holmes is a West Midlands-born comedy actor, best known for playing the character of Clive in the 2009 BBC sitcom Miranda. He has appeared in various off-West End and regional theatre productions, including playing Lady Bracknell in The Importance of Being Earnest for the New Players Theatre...

, Justin Lee Collins

Justin Lee Collins

Justin Lee Collins, commonly known as JLC, is an award-winning English comedian and television presenter.A Bristolian, he's well known for his strong West Country accent, shaggy appearance and colourful shirts....

, Russell Howard

Russell Howard

Russell Joseph Howard is an English comedian best known for his TV show Russell Howard's Good News and his appearances on the topical panel TV show Mock The Week...

, Mark Olver

Mark Olver

Mark Olver is a Canadian professional ice hockey centre for the Lake Erie Monsters of the American Hockey League. Mark's older brother Darin also plays professionally in Germany with Eisbären Berlin.-Amateur:...

, Aaron Barschak

Aaron Barschak

Aaron Alexander Barschak styles himself as a "comedy terrorist" and fringe UK politician. In 2003, he attracted media attention by surreptitiously joining Prince William's 21st birthday party.-Background:...

, Emily Lloyd

Emily Lloyd

-Early life:Emily Lloyd Pack was born in London, the daughter of Sheila , now known as , a theatrical agent who was a longtime secretary at Harold Pinter's stage agency, and Roger Lloyd-Pack, a stage actor, well-known as Trigger in the British hit sitcom Only Fools and Horses. Her grandfather,...

, Danny Robins, Dan Tetsell

Dan Tetsell

Dan Tetsell is a comedian and writer for radio, television and stage. He has worked on a number of projects, including The Museum of Everything, That Was Then, This Is Now and Parsons and Naylor's Pull-Out Sections....

, The Scottish Falsetto Sock Puppet Theatre

The Scottish Falsetto Sock Puppet Theatre

The Scottish Falsetto Sock Puppet Theatre is a comedy act that began in the UK in 2005 and has performed nationally and internationally since. They first appeared as part of The Sitcom Trials in London. They appeared in the Gilded Balloon at Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 2007, 2008, 2009, and 2010,...

, Lucy Porter

Lucy Porter

Lucy Donna Porter is an English actress, writer and comedienne.She has performed at the Edinburgh Fringe, the Brighton Festival and many clubs around Britain. She has also a regular voice on BBC Radio 4 in various panel shows, including Quote.....

, Nick Ewans, Louisa Gummer, Anne-Marie Draycott, Dan March, Rich Johnston

Rich Johnston

Rich Johnston is a writer who writes about the comic book industry.-Early life:Johnston grew up in Pontefract, West Yorkshire, studied politics at University of Newcastle upon Tyne, and was an advertising copywriter until 2009; he currently lives in Kingston Vale, London, with his wife, Janice...

, Simon Treves

Simon Treves

Frederick Simon Treves, known as Simon Treves, is an English actor, director and writer probably best known for playing Harold 'Stinker' Pinker in three series of ITV's Jeeves and Wooster.-Biography:...

, McNeil and Pamphilon.

Having written and appeared with Kev F. Sutherland

Kev F. Sutherland

-Career:Since 2005, Sutherland has written, produced and performed as The Scottish Falsetto Sock Puppet Theatre, appearing at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 2007, 2008, 2009 and 2010, in theatres internationally and on television...

 in the predecessor of the Trials, Situations Vacant in 1996 (clip can be found on YouTube

YouTube

YouTube is a video-sharing website, created by three former PayPal employees in February 2005, on which users can upload, view and share videos....

), Inbetweeners writer Iain Morris

Iain Morris

Iain Morris is an English writer and comedian. Morris is best known for writing The Inbetweeners with his writing partner Damon Beesley and co-hosting a show on London radio station XFM with stand-up Jimmy Carr...

 went on to name one of the main characters in the series (Neil's dad) Kevin Sutherland

Kevin Sutherland

Kevin John Sutherland is an American professional golfer.Sutherland was born in Sacramento, California and graduated from Christian Brothers High School. He attended Fresno State University and made the golf team as a walk-on freshman...

.

Miranda

Miranda Hart

Miranda Hart

Miranda Katharine Hart Dyke , known professionally as Miranda Hart, is an English actress, writer and stand-up comedienne. She writes and stars in the BBC sitcom Miranda...

's eponymous sitcom, now on BBC 2, first appeared as part of The Sitcom Trials at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2001. It featured Miranda, working in a joke shop that sells penis pasta, with a diminutive blonde sidekick, originally played by Charity Trimm, and the love interest in the cafe, played then by Gerard Foster. The camp character played in 01 by Dan Clegg went on to be played in the TV series by James Holmes who, coincidentally, was the star of the 2002 Edinburgh Fringe Sitcom Trials.

2009/10

Judges at the 2009 10th Anniversary Sitcom Trials included David Quantick

David Quantick

David Quantick is a freelance journalist, writer and critic who specialises in music and comedy.-Career history:...

, Iain Morris

Iain Morris

Iain Morris is an English writer and comedian. Morris is best known for writing The Inbetweeners with his writing partner Damon Beesley and co-hosting a show on London radio station XFM with stand-up Jimmy Carr...

, Bill Dare

Bill Dare

Bill Dare is an English producer and devisor of radio and television comedy programmes.The son of the actor and broadcaster Peter Jones, he is a graduate of the University of Manchester who subsequently became an actor, director and writer...

, Katie Tyrell, David Schneider

David Schneider

David Schneider may refer to:*David Schneider , English actor and comedian*David Schneider , American film writer , director and actor*David Schneider , former pro tennis player...

, Laura Lawson, Ashley Blaker, Daniel Maier

Daniel Maier

Daniel Maier is a comedy writer and performer for television, radio, print and the stage.Since 2002 he has been part of the writing team for ITV1's Bafta Award-winning Harry Hill's TV Burp...

, Nev Fountain

Nev Fountain

Nev Fountain, born Steven John Fountain, is an English writer, best known for his comedy work with writing partner Tom Jamieson on the radio and television programme Dead Ringers.A native of Stamford, Fountain attended the University of Warwick...

, Carrie Quinlan

Carrie Quinlan

Carrie Quinlan is a British actress, comedy writer and journalist. She mainly works in satire for BBC radio comedy, writing material for satirical comedies such as The Now Show. She is also a regular panellist on The News Quiz. She is the youngest child of Mary and Michael Quinlan.-History:Quinlan...

, Michelle Farr, Marc Blake and Tom Price

Tom Price

- People :* Tom Price , British actor* Tom Price , former ice hockey player* Tom Price , American composer, arranger and conductor* Tom Price , Olympic gold medalist in rowing 1952...

.

The winner of the 2009 10th Anniversary Season was End To End by Steve McNeil & Sam Pamphilon. Spring 2009's winner was Riga To Rotherham by Dean Hardman. Autumn 07's winner was New Zealand team sitcom Sweet As.

The first Manchester

Manchester

Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...

 Sitcom Trials took place at the Lass O'Gowrie pub theatre in July 2010.

Reviews for the show have ranged from the Leicester Mercury

Leicester Mercury

The Leicester Mercury is a British regional newspaper, owned by the Daily Mail and General Trust, for the city of Leicester and the counties of Leicestershire and Rutland...

s "We were screaming with laughter... move over Friends

Friends

Friends is an American sitcom created by David Crane and Marta Kauffman, which aired on NBC from September 22, 1994 to May 6, 2004. The series revolves around a group of friends in Manhattan. The series was produced by Bright/Kauffman/Crane Productions, in association with Warner Bros. Television...

", through the London Evening Standard

Evening Standard

The Evening Standard, now styled the London Evening Standard, is a free local daily newspaper, published Monday–Friday in tabloid format in London. It is the dominant regional evening paper for London and the surrounding area, with coverage of national and international news and City of London...

s "We're not watching stand-up

Stand-up comedy

Stand-up comedy is a comedic art form. Usually, a comedian performs in front of a live audience, speaking directly to them. Their performances are sometimes filmed for later release via DVD, the internet, and television...

, we're watching comedy history", to Metro

Metro (Associated Metro Limited)

Metro is a free daily newspaper in the United Kingdom published by Associated Newspapers Ltd . It is available from Monday to Friday each week on many public transport services across the United Kingdom.-History:The paper was launched in London in 1999, and can now be found in 14 UK urban centres...

's notorious review of the 2002 Edinburgh Fringe show: "I would happily have voted to have my own eyes gouged out with hot spoons rather than endure another moment."

Episode guide TV series 1

• Episode 1 - "Policevets In Casualty vs Do You Think They'll Cotton On?"

Police comedy by Stephen Dinsdale, vs Brian Meenagh's behind the scenes TV producers. All episodes hosted by Kev F Sutherland.

• Episode 2 - "Go Wild In The Country vs The Client"

Divorcee returns to school reunion, by Jane Simon, vs office romance & ructions by Harris, Blakewill & Wainwright

• Episode 3 - "Cardinal Sin vs Nemesis"

Two historical costume comedies by Andrew Barclay and Sam Elsden

• Episode 4 - "Improv Special"

The Comedy Store Players Neil Mullarkey, Suki Webster, Niall Ashdown & Richard Vranch present two contrasting sitcoms from audience suggestions.

• Episode 5 - "What An Anchor vs A Producers Tale"

Behind the scenes with an anchorman, by Adrian Peck & John Kelly, and a dysfunctional producer, by Roland Moore

• Episode 6 - "Jimmy James vs On The Job"

A solo writer-performed sitcom with multiple characters by James Holmes, vs HTV's Television Workshop's group creation

• Episode 7 - "Perfect 10 vs Football R For Revenge"

Political shenanigans at No 10 by Rich Johnston, vs terror on the terrace by Matt Bowdler & Ben Manning

• Episode 8 - "The public vs the public"

Two scripts selected from entries sent in by the viewers, head to head

The Sitcom Mission

Declan Hill and Simon Wright, who produced the Sitcom Trials in 2007 and 2009 launched a similar event called The Sitcom Mission, the first Grand Final of which was in the New Diorama Theatre on Monday 31 May 2010. In Feb 2011 Hat Trick Productions

Hat Trick Productions

Hat Trick Productions is a British independent production company that produces television programmes, mainly specialising in comedy.-History:...

announced their support of the 2011 Sitcom Mission season