Neighbourhood watch

TV Review: In TV production, there's a job called "celebrity booker" - a person with a contacts book to die for, who is expert at approaching Kerry Katonas and Gavin Lambe Murphys and persuading them to go on television - hardly a tall order.

Far more challenging would be the job of "nonentity booker" - the person production companies employ to find crackpots, slobs and loudmouths for reality programmes. I presume such staff exist, even if that's not their job title, and that a crack team of them worked on The Nightmares Next Door.

The concept is based on the theories of Dr George Erdos, a psychology lecturer in the University of Newcastle. Bring five types of neighbours from hell (a family of tearaway children; another of noise-polluters; a household of dog-lovers; a party of students; and one interfering busybody) to a mobile-home village in a Dorset field, he says, and I'll shape them into a viable community. So far, so sociological. But this isn't sociology. It's telly.

Therefore, well done nonentity booker for unearthing Simon, the interfering busybody. Chair of his neighbourhood residents association and self-appointed local litter warden, Simon is a teacher who feels comfortable only in the cloistered environment of a boarding school, where, as an orphan, he grew up. He should freak out nicely in a field in Dorset. Congratulations, too, on finding Wendy, the chain-smoking, alcopop-swilling, foul-mouthed mother of four unruly urchins.

There is immediate animosity between Wendy and Simon, or "Doris" as she calls him ("cos he's dead effeminate"). When a consignment of garden furniture arrives, Wendy's family grab all the best items and bully Simon/Doris into giving them his share.

Outraged at this, the villagers attend a meeting called by Simon, and attack Wendy for her failure to control her children, her use of rationed water to fill a paddling pool and her general mistreatment of Simon. Wendy cries. It's all as gross as it is engrossing, and it gets uglier when the students go on a drunken rampage and vandalise the village, and uglier still when one of the dogs bites a child.

Every now and then, the psychology professor pops up to lend this freak show an air of respectability, and to declare that the experiment is turning out just as he hypothesised. To give him his due, by the end of episode one, a contrite Wendy is calling Simon by his real name ("I don't think he really liked me calling him Doris") and inviting him to dinner in her family's mobile home. But I think this show offers more for Schadenfreude fans than Sigmund Freud fans.

THERE'S A LITTLE more neighbourly love - but just a little - in evidence on Streets Ahead. Each week, a group of householders band together to give their street a makeover, and boost their houses' value in the process. The nonentity bookers came up trumps here too. This week's chosen street, Norfolk Road, Walthamstow, is blessed with such residents as "natural-born control freak" Tracy, her workaholic partner Tony, the next door neighbours they don't speak to, and "men of taste" Michael and Bill.

It starts amicably enough with a meeting at which, guided by developer/presenter Sarah Beeny, the residents agree to effect a modest restoration of the street's original Victorian character, on a budget of £800 per house. The community spirit falls apart quickly, though, as the job falls behind schedule, runs over budget, and residents go off on solo runs (Michael, worried that Sarah's uniform design will have the street "looking like a council estate", insists on painting his and Bill's house pink, and Tracy disappears because the makeover is "not Victorian enough"). Beeny the decorator becomes Beeny the diplomat, constantly modifying her plan to maintain control of it.

Predictably, all problems are resolved in the final five minutes, with the assistance of one of those edited montages beloved of home-decor shows: opening with the words "they have just 24 hours to go", cutting to a person finishing a paint job, then to the presenter mucking in with a shovel, and finishing with a man sweeping up rubble. It is topped off with a shot of the street as it was, dissolving into a shot of the street as it is - a vast improvement, it must be said.

Its success lies in Beeny's accommodation of individual preferences into a cohesive scheme, and the result is a street that looks like a collection of house-proud individuals, rather than a neighbourhood of house-paint-Nazis. With a real task to work on, the residents of Norfolk Street have achieved the aim of The Nightmares Next Door's artificial project: they have become a community that respects difference yet can accomplish a shared goal. In the end, an estate agent turns up to tell them that their houses have each risen in value by £20,000, proving once again that estate agents have absolutely no idea how to value a house.

BBC2 HAS ENGAGED some of the biggest names in comedy for a Thursday night laugh-in consisting of three new series. In Extras Ben Stiller - yes, Ben Stiller - plays what I hope is a caricature of himself, an egomaniacal Hollywood star trying to "give something back" by directing a harrowing film about the Balkan wars. Ricky Gervais plays Andy, a failing actor and one of the extras on the set.

It's written and directed by Gervais and Stephen Merchant, whose last project was a little cult comedy you might have heard of called The Office. Though they can't hope to repeat the runaway success of that highly original show, this much-anticipated follow-up never puts a foot wrong. Gervais is clever enough to stay within his limits as an actor, and in Andy - a bitter bully with a touch of Alan Partridge pathos - he has created a character that is every bit as convincing as David Brent. No, my sides didn't split, but that's not the intention of modern British comedy. It's knowing and subtle, and engages your mind while also tickling your funny bone. You may have to wait for the laughs, but they're worth waiting for.

The Catherine Tate Show is in a more traditional style: sketches backed by a laughter track. If the format sounds unsophisticated, the content certainly isn't. The "catchphrase queen" delivers one brilliantly scripted sketch after another, each one dominated by one of her repertoire of hilarious characters.

Last in the trio is Absolute Power, another series of the satire starring Stephen Fry and John Bird as owners of the PR firm Prentiss McCabe, which is now staffed by an assembly of familiar faces, including James Lance from Teachers and Nicholas Burns from Nathan Barley. In this topical episode, scripted by Mark Lawson, the firm has the unenviable task of selling ID cards to the British public. Just as there'll never be another Office, this is no Yes Minister, but it employs refreshing devices, such as flashing up the company's campaign ads (in one, Osama bin Laden makes the case against ID cards) and, as you'd expect from this formidable team, it's underpinned by an intelligent humour.

When the needle on the laughometer came to a rest after an hour and a half of comedy, I realised I'd been enjoying myself so much that I'd missed the start of Big Brother, which - just possibly - was exactly what BBC2's controllers were hoping for.

PADDY O'GORMAN WAS up Croagh Patrick in Co Mayo this week asking fellow walkers why they're climbing "the Reek". A woman from Florida is going up with her sons to scatter her husband's ashes at the summit. A septuagenarian man is making a pilgrimage on behalf of his 92-year-old friend, a monk who went missing in Scotland a month previously. A group of men from Baileboro, Co Cavan, met in their local pub one morning and said "sure we'll climb Croagh Patrick".

Coincidentally, two men have chosen the mountain as the spot to propose marriage to their girlfriends. There are adults of all ages and nationalities. Some go barefoot. Others just want a good walk and, if the fog clears, a view over to Clare Island.

They have to console themselves with the sight of Paddy and the crew of O'Gorman's Summer emerging from the swirling mists, but most seem happy to share their stories with him. O'Gorman has a knack of exposing the fascinating lives that are being lived all around us every day. If you or I were climbing Croagh Patrick, all these stories would probably pass us by. Paddy O'Gorman lets us know what we're missing.

Hilary Fannin is on holiday