TV Critics: Birthday; Running the Shop; An Hour to Save Your Life

“I am usually wary of stage-to-screen transfers but this is a tender and well-executed triumph. It’s touching and tense, and an unexpected delight.”
Rebecca Nicholson, The Guardian

“An often hilarious hour of killer one liners, featuring tremendous performances, that explores far more than the concept of male pregnancy. Watching a man so brutally invaded and man-handled is genuinely an eye-opener. I’ll not be pressing any scientists to make male pregnancy a possibility any time soon.”
Chris Bennion, The Independent

“My initial low moans at the piece’s early role-reversal obviousness turned to squeals of laughter as the indignities of Ed’s labour mounted and then teary compassion as he and Lisa waited to see if their unwell daughter would make it home. Roger Michell’s documentary-style direction showed exactly how to transfer a play to the screen.”
Andrew Billen, The Times

“Surprisingly for a pared-down drama with just the one fairly inevitable outcome – birth – it turned out rather gripping. The marriage of stage and screen rarely presents such bonny offspring.”
Jasper Rees, The Telegraph

“The makers of Running the Shop have taken the least interesting aspects of The Apprentice, added a twist on Undercover Boss by letting the employees take over the shop, and topped it off with one of the old Dragons from Dragons’ Den, who attempts to do a Mary Queen of Shops on the whole messy concoction.”
Rebecca Nicholson, The Guardian

“The experiment did prove the wisdom of seeking out and utilising experience from all areas of a business. And for viewers more interested in people than profit, there was a feel-good factor to be found watching downtrodden Debs discover a range of impressive business skills she never dreamed she might possess.”
Ellen E Jones, The Independent

“This was a clinical and unemotional look at the work of surgeons on maternity wards — informative but unengaging.”
Christopher Stevens, Daily Mail

“A documentary series with much in common with 24 Hours in A&E had more in common with One Born Every Minute. Could the programme-makers not have gently asked Tahira why she was still getting pregnant and investigated what her (never shown) partner’s attitude was to her — and her children’s — consequential traumas?”
Andrew Billen, The Times