Armando Iannucci on sitcom

In The Times, Armando Iannucci tells Stephen Armstrong about his fears for the future of the sitcom.

“Just as it gets more daring and varied in format and technique, and just as audiences get more and more sophisticated in the breadth of comedy they’re willing to watch, viewing figures for comedy shows are in decline,” he said. “Less comedy is being made for the mass-audience channels, BBC1 and ITV, while the commissioning of comedy shows (for these two channels) is increasingly in the hands of TV professionals from outside comedy production, under pressure from advertisers and schedulers not to take risks.”