Lesley Joseph on more ‘Birds’: ‘Phone calls have been made’

Lesley Joseph has revealed that negotiations are already underway for a new series of Birds of a Feather.

The classic Essex-based sitcom was revived by ITV earlier this month (January) after 15 years off screen – and debuted with a massive 7.8 million viewers, making it the channel’s biggest sitcom launch in over a decade.

The series is now halfway through its eight-episode run and viewing figures are holding steady around the 6 million mark.

Asked whether ITV has asked for another series yet, Lesley Joseph told Attitude this morning (January 27): “I think phone calls have been made. I don’t think anybody will say anything definite until these eight episodes have been aired because people, quite rightly, want to wait and see how the viewing figures are at the end. Because the figures could suddenly drop between episodes four and eight to two million – I don’t think they will though, not in a million years. But if it keeps going as it’s going now, hopefully they will come back and get another one.”

Continuing, Lesley Joseph – who stars as legendary man-eater Dorien Green – admitted that the next series could pose plotting problems for the writers. “I think if we did another one, it would be slightly more difficult because this series has taken you up to where we are now. The next one would be where we are now, so therefore you’d have to make decisions about whether to come up with another story arc, make it sort of like a serial, or simply have one-off funny episodes,” she explained.

“In this series Dorien came back and she was wealthy, but then she found out she was being sued for plagiarism and in episode eight you’ll see the court case. There’s a real story arc in these eight episodes. That could be more difficult in the next lot unless you decide something like, I don’t know, Tracey’s lost all her money and has to sell the house or something.”

Asked whether she and co-stars Linda Robson and Pauline Quirke would be keen to return, though, the actress replied: “Oh, I’m sure we would. I think the only way we’d never be up for it is if you were flogging a dead horse, but that’s so much not the case. I mean, people have really loved it – people tell me that the tweets and everything are fantastic. And I think while that goes on we’d be stupid not to love doing it because it’s still got legs.”

Birds of a Feather continues on Thursdays at 8.30pm on ITV.