A couple celebrate their nine-year anniversary in a remote country cottage, only for one of them to end up in a bath of cement. A primary school teacher is haunted by his beloved predecessor and becomes the victim of a ritualistic sacrifice at the hands of his pupils. A wedding photographer is forced to confront his own failing marriage – and the fact that he has kept his cleaner captive in the basement for years.
No other TV series has such a vast, imaginative scope as Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton’s anthology comedy Inside No 9. And no comedy has managed to turn such everyday, even anodyne, scenarios into some of the most stomach-turning and laugh out loud television in recent memory.
But after a decade on BBC Two, the programme is going on an “indefinite hiatus”. Ending on the ninth series is no accident, says Pemberton: “We do feel that there’s a synchronicity between ending Inside No 9 on series nine.” Shearsmith concurs. “Poetically, it’s the right time to end,” he says. “We just wish we’d called it Inside No 2.”
We’re speaking in one of the many bedrooms of Arley Hall in Cheshire, a stately home with creaking floors and labyrinthine staircases around every corner. It’s been Joanna Lumley’s plush estate in Netflix’s Fool Me Once, the venue of Dierdre Barlow’s funeral on Coronation Street and – most recognisably – Tommy Shelby’s mansion in Peaky Blinders. Today, it’s the home of a celebrated 17th-century composer, played by Eddie Marsan.
“We’ve been thinking about doing this one for a while, but we wanted to save it for the ninth series,” says Pemberton. “It’s all about a superstition in classical music that once you’ve composed your ninth symphony, you’re going to die. We thought it was quite fitting for us to have that over us. But it’s also about writer’s block. Hopefully, we don’t drop down dead.”
When it began in 2014, Inside No 9 was darker, bolder and a hell of a lot weirder than other comedy on television – including Pemberton and Shearsmith’s previous works, Psychoville and The League of Gentlemen. The first episode, “Sardines”, was set entirely in a cupboard where the attendees of an engagement party (played by Pemberton and Shearsmith, as well as Katherine Parkinson, Tim Key, and Luke Pasqualino) were embroiled in a game of hide and seek. As they each entered the same hiding spot, their conversation turned dark, exposing secrets affairs, incest, and child sexual abuse.
“Sardines” was adored by critics and pulled in an audience of 1.1 million – impressive for a brand-new comedy, especially one with no concrete storyline to keep an audience coming back for more. But we did keep coming back. For among the body horror and shocking twists, Pemberton and Shearsmith tell stories with real pathos – a typical episode (though one could argue there is no such thing) can make you laugh, cry and gag in the space of half an hour.
Take 2016’s “The Devil at Christmas”, an episode inspired by 1970s horror about the folk tale of Krampus, a demon who punishes children at Christmas. Soon, it’s revealed that we’re watching a “movie”, complete with director’s commentary (voiced by Derek Jacobi). It’s hilarious, all dodgy acting and fake moustaches, but a gut-wrenching twist comes at the end when – spoiler alert – it is revealed to be a snuff film and the commentary is in fact the recording of a police interview. Laughter turns into despondent silence fast.
In the years since, Inside No 9‘s audience has more than doubled (last year’s Christmas special, “The Bones of St Nicholas”, was watched by 2.7 million, making it the most successful episode yet) and it has a cult following – fans fervently discuss the show online post-broadcast and there are entire groups dedicated to spotting the hare figurine that surreptitiously appears in every episode.
Storylines for the six new episodes had been percolating for a while. “I’d say there’s only a couple that we hadn’t already thought of,” says Pemberton. “There’s one with an escape room setting, which feels very apt for Inside No 9 given that they are little puzzle boxes of episodes.”
“There’s one on the underground,” says Shearsmith, coyly. The true nature of the story is typically clandestine but pictures from this episode – opener “Boo to a Goose” – show Pemberton standing on a tube platform in full drag.
Talking to the writers about the upcoming series is an exercise in subterfuge and avoidance. Inside No 9 has come to rely on its ability to pull the wool over its audience’s eyes, tricking them into thinking one thing and shocking them with another. That means keeping secrets, and on more than one occasion, the writers have duped the press into believing an entirely different episode was to air, complete with fake press releases and interviews. Last year, they promoted “Hold on Tight”, a fake episode set on board a number nine bus that was a decoy for the real broadcast – a false pilot for a Lee Mack-fronted quiz show that culminated in Inside No 9’s distinctive bloody drama.
Today, they’re desperate to keep as much of the ninth series under wraps as possible. “We’ve enjoyed playing with the form of television,” says Shearsmith. “But that’s hard to do these days. Our programme benefits from watching it when it goes out, which people don’t really do anymore. It’s a rarity.”
He’s right. In October 2018, Inside No 9 aired its first (and only) live Halloween episode, which pushed the boundaries of TV storytelling. Advertised as a creepy but run-of-the-mill ghost story, the episode descended into chaos when destructive spirits “took over” the broadcast.
In an attempt to put the evening back on track, the BBC launched a re-run of an old episode (all pre-planned and part of the fun, of course) but even that was interrupted by the malevolent phantoms, before they haunted the continuity announcer and tormented Pemberton and Shearsmith, which we watched through a live CCTV feed into their dressing room. It was exhilarating, immersive event television – at one point, the Shearsmith on screen tweeted, “Are me and Steve Pemberton on BBC Two now?”, the message appearing on his feed in real time and directly involving those of us enraptured by the action. A rewatch on iPlayer doesn’t quite have the same effect.
Inside No 9 still feels like it is at the height of its popularity. Actors are banging down the door of No 9 for a role; Derek Jacobi, Helen McCrory, Simon Callow, Jessica Hynes, Sheridan Smith and Lee Mack are just a few guest stars who have murdered – and been murdered – over the previous eight series. Eddie Marsan, Siobhan Finneran, Susan Wokoma, Katherine Kelly, Charlie Cooper and Hayley Squires will make appearances in the new series.
Why on Earth, then, have Pemberton and Shearsmith decided to call it a day? Have they run out of ideas?
Well, sort of. “The moment a show like this becomes predictable and you start to second-guess it, or you think, ‘Oh, they’ve done that little twist before’, it’s dead,” says Pemberton. “There’s a tyranny that comes with coming up with something new every week,” says Shearsmith. “We’ve done so many different things – a lifetime of ideas. We want to finish it thinking, ‘Yes, that was a really good last six’.”
They come bearing some good news, though: “We are talking about possibly doing a stage version,” says Pemberton. “It’s something we always wanted to write together, but we need our brains to fill up with ideas first. We’ve had a relentless 10 years of coming up with 55 different, complete worlds.”
Since our interview, a theatre production has indeed been announced. Aptly titled Inside No 9 Stage/Fright, the play will see Pemberton and Shearsmith tread the boards of London’s Wyndham’s Theatre next January, a production that promises “big comic moments, but also something a bit spooky and more dramatic”. No word on the plot yet – it’s not even been written – but tickets will go on sale this week.
You’d imagine the denouement to an all-time great comedy might leave its creators emotional. Not these two. “It doesn’t feel any different,” says Shearsmith, and while Pemberton thinks filming the final ever episode will be “hard and weird”, he’s adamant that they’re “not treating it too different to any other series”.
“People keep asking us how we feel,” he says. “But I think we’re just focusing on making this series as good as all the others.” Who knows? The whole “final series” could be just another well-devised trick. I wouldn’t put it past them.
‘Inside No 9’ returns to BBC Two at 9pm on Wednesday. Tickets for ‘Inside No 9: Stage/Fright’ go on sale at 7pm on Wednesday from Insideno9onstage.com.
