BBC3 commissions comedy by Friends writer Chase

Published Thursday 27 March 2008 at 15:20 by Matthew Hemley

Roughcut TV, the new production company formed by The Office producer Ash Atalla, has secured its first commission with a six-part series for BBC3.

Called Clone, the show has been created by Adam Chase, who was a writer and executive producer on the US sitcom Friends.

The series, which will be penned by a team of writers, focuses on a doctor who makes the first human clone. The clone is intended to be a prototype super soldier who will eventually replace Britain’s volunteer army, but turns out to be a creation who “is more likely to hug someone than shoot them”.

The BBC described the show as a “fish out of water” comedy about a man seeing the world for the first time. It will be jointly executive produced by Atalla and Chase.

BBC3 controller Danny Cohen said: “I’m thrilled that Adam Chase has come over from Hollywood to work with BBC3 - and it’s great to be working with Ash and Roughcut. It’s also really exciting to be experimenting with the team-writing model on BBC3 - an approach we tend to use less frequently in British comedy.”

Clone was commissioned by BBC controller of comedy commissioning Lucy Lumsden, who said the show was a “brilliant addition to the line-up of BBC’s new audience sitcoms”.