Jack Whitehall's Bad Education returns for anniversary special and new season
The BBC has announced several new commissions, including specials for both Bad Education and Detectorists.
Jack Whitehall is bringing back Bad Education, the BBC Three sitcom in which he played Alfie Wickers – "the worst teacher ever to grace the British education system".
The comedy series set in a fictional British school and co-starring Gavin and Stacey's Mathew Horne ran for three seasons and later a film.
The BBC has commissioned a 10-year anniversary special followed by a new six-part season, penned by a team of "breakthrough writers".
The announcement was made during a speech by Jon Petrie, Director of BBC Comedy, who unveiled a package of new commissions and goals set out by the broadcaster, before committing to an extra £10 million for new half-hour comedy pilots over the next two years.
Alongside Bad Education, the much-loved gentle comedy-drama Detectorists will also return for a new special, while Mawaan Rizwan’s comedy pilot Juice has been taken to series.
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Petrie said that BBC Comedy is doing "phenomenally well", revealing that iPlayer had 538 million requests for comedy shows last year.
"The BBC is by far the biggest fish in the pond when it comes to comedy... There is no other broadcaster that can provide as many services," he said.
"The BBC remains the best place to develop and nurture new comic voices... We want to invest more in our development process... along with scripts, pilots for BBC Sounds and tasters, we’re going to double the number of half-hour pilots that we make."
He continued: "More than anything else we want shows that connect with our audience – whether they’re big and broad or weird and provocative. Worlds that the audience can see themselves in often connect in the deepest way... shows that feel uniquely British."
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