Lee Nelson's Well Good Show

Lee Nelson's Well Good Show is a British comedy sketch show, written and presented by Simon Brodkin[1] and produced by Avalon Television for BBC Three. It featured Brodkin hosting a studio based show as his comedy character Lee Nelson, a happy-go-lucky chav, and also featured television sketches of Brodkin's other comedy characters.

Lee Nelson's Well Good Show
Title card
Genre	Sketch show, Stand-up comedy
Written by	Simon Brodkin
Directed by	Peter Orton
Presented by	Simon Brodkin
Starring	Terry Noble Kathy Berry Ben Willbond
Theme music composer	Dizzee Rascal – "Flex" (instrumental)
Country of origin	United Kingdom
Original language(s)	English
No. of series	2
No. of episodes	15
Production
Executive producer(s)	Richard Allen-Turner Jonn Thoday
Producer(s)	Spencer Millman
Editor(s)	Graham Barker
Running time	30 minutes
Production company(s)	Avalon Television
Release
Original network	BBC Three
Original release	10 June 2010 (2010-06-10) – 13 October 2011 (2011-10-13)
Chronology
Related shows	Al Murray's Multiple Personality Disorder Lee Nelson's Well Funny People
External links
Website
Production website

Production

The BBC commissioned the show in 2009.[2][3] Written by Brodkin, it was produced by Avalon Television.[2][3][4]

Cast

• Lee Nelson, Dr. Bob, Jason Bent & Chris Young – Simon Brodkin[1]
• Omelette – Terry Noble[1]
• Nan – Kathy Berry[1]

Characters and sketches

The programme consists of Brodkin (in character as Nelson throughout) hosting a studio show before an audience, which includes audience interaction, games (which contain unusual prizes, such as a pair of sunglasses, a victory belt and a tree), and features involving the characters Omelette, and Nelson's nan.[5] The programme also includes inserted recorded sketches featuring three other characters also portrayed by Brodkin: due to time limitations, in some episodes only two insert sketches would feature, though in others all three would appear. The insert sketches are:

• 110% Bent, a spoof of fly-on-the-wall celebrity documentaries featuring Brodkin as the bland and unintelligent Premiership footballer Jason Bent, who was briefly a Manchester City player;
• Hospital Life, a parody of daytime medical documentaries, featuring Brodkin as the insensitive 'Dr. Bob';
• Faliraki Nights, a spoof of late-evening 'nightlife' documentaries. This features Brodkin as holiday rep Chris Young, and includes narration by former BBC Three continuity announcer Lola Buckley (who also voices the introduction to 110% Bent)

Some of the characters have appeared previously in Brodkin's earlier TV work: sketches featuring the Jason Bent character appeared in Al Murray's Multiple Personality Disorder, an Avalon production first broadcast on ITV1 in 2009; these featured Murray as a sports reporter conducting post-match interviews with Bent. The same Al Murray series also featured the Lee Nelson character in a run of comic monologues. In 2008, the Dr. Bob character had appeared (as 'Dr. Omprakash') in BBC Three comedy showcase series The Wall.

Reception

Despite popular appeal, the show has received mainly negative reviews from critics. Liam Tucker of TV Pixie writes, 'Lee Nelson's Well Good Show is less ‘well good’ and more a pile of irredeemable crap littered with witless demi-jokes, all limping along on the questionable talent of Simon Brodkin. Presumably someone at BBC Three saw that he looks a little like Kevin Bishop, noticed that Ali G hasn’t been around for the best part of a decade and calculated success on that shaky basis.'[6] Stuart Heritage of The Guardian remarks in an article concerning the justification behind Television Show names that 'BBC3's Lee Nelson's Well Good Show suffers from the fact that it's almost the exact scientific opposite of well good.' Despite the negative reviews, ratings were such that the BBC commissioned a second show, Lee Nelson's Well Funny People.

DVD release

A DVD was released on 22 August 2011 entitled The Complete Series 1. "Lee Nelson Live" was also released on 19 November 2012 featuring a live stand-up routine from Lee Nelson's live 2012 stand-up tour.

Transmissions

Series	Start date	End date	Episodes
1	10 June 2010	22 July 2010	7
2	25 August 2011	13 October 2011	8

Ratings

Series 1

#	Airdate	Total viewers	Audience share
1	10 June 2010	501,000[7]	3%
2	17 June 2010	521,000	N/A
3	24 June 2010	N/A	N/A
4	1 July 2010	711,000[8]	4.4%
5	8 July 2010	612,000[9]	5%
6	15 July 2010	N/A	N/A
7	22 July 2010	N/A	N/A

Series 2

#	Airdate	Total viewers	Audience share
1	25 August 2011	602,000[10]	3.6%
2	1 September 2011	462,000[11]	2.7%
3	8 September 2011	416,000[12]	2.6%
4	15 September 2011	530,000[13]	3.5%
5	22 September 2011	523,000[14]	3.5%
6	29 September 2011	434,000[15]	2.8%
7	6 October 2011	491,000[16]	3.3%
8	13 October 2011	486,000[17]	3.1%

References

1. "Lee Nelson's Well Good Show - Production Details". British Comedy Guide. Retrieved 18 September 2010.
2. "Lee Nelson's Well Good Show". BBC Online. Retrieved 18 September 2010.
3. Parker, Robin (7 July 2009). "BBC3 eyes character-based sketch show". Broadcast Now. Retrieved 18 September 2010.
4. "Lee Nelson's Well Good Show". BBC Online. Retrieved 18 September 2010.
5. "Lee Nelson's Well Good Show". British Comedy Guide. Retrieved 18 September 2010.
6. "Lee Nelson's Well Good Show". TV Pixie. Archived from the original on 17 July 2011. Retrieved 1 October 2010.
7. Laughlin, Andrew (11 June 2010). "'Junior Apprentice' final pulls in 5m". Retrieved 28 September 2011.
8. Laughlin, Andrew (2 July 2010). "BBC's fox attack doc pulls in 4m". Retrieved 28 September 2011.
9. Laughlin, Andrew (9 July 2010). "BBC drama 'Dive' debuts to 1.5m". Retrieved 28 September 2011.
10. Laughlin, Andrew (26 August 2011). "'Show Me The Funny' live final amuses nearly 2.5m". Retrieved 27 September 2011.
11. Laughlin, Andrew (2 September 2011). "'Celebrity Juice' return amuses 1.1m on ITV2". Digital Spy. Retrieved 27 September 2011.
12. Laughlin, Andrew (9 September 2011). "Paddy Doherty's Celebrity Big Brother win seen by 3m". Digital Spy. Retrieved 27 September 2011.
13. Laughlin, Andrew (16 September 2011). "'Torchwood: Miracle Day' finale eclipsed by new Billy Connolly show". Digital Spy. Retrieved 27 September 2011.
14. Laughlin, Andrew (23 September 2011). "'Glee' dances over to Sky1 with 640k". Digital Spy. Retrieved 27 September 2011.
15. Laughlin, Andrew (30 September 2011). "'Shirley' delights nearly 2.7m, 'Glee' loses viewers". Digital Spy. Retrieved 30 September 2011.
16. Laughlin, Andrew (7 October 2011). "'Hidden' is found by 5.2m on BBC One". Digital Spy. Retrieved 8 October 2011.
17. Laughlin, Andrew (14 October 2011). "'Hidden' fends off 'Joanna Lumley's Greek Odyssey' in ratings". Digital Spy. Retrieved 15 October 2011.

External links

• Lee Nelson's Official Website
• Lee Nelson's Well Good Show at BBC Programmes
• Lee Nelson's Well Good Show at Avalon Television
• Lee Nelson's Well Good Show at British Comedy Guide
• Lee Nelson's Well Good Show on IMDb
• Lee Nelson's Well Good Show at TV.com