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Main Characters
Matt LeBlanc
- Played by: Matt LeBlanc
- Adam Westing: Conceited, egotistical serial adulterer(!) Matt LeBlanc.
- Archnemesis Dad: Matt and his father have an insanely dysfunctional relationship.
- The Atoner: Goes back and forth on this. On some issues he'll show genuine remorse while on others he'll dig his heels in.
- Belligerent Sexual Tension: With Beverly.
- Bilingual Bonus: In episode 4, Matt makes fun of Beverly with the Lincolns' cleaning lady in Spanish.
- Hidden Depths: Matt is a massive tool, but genuinely cares for his kids (or at least tries to). "I'm a terrible husband but an excellent father." He's also fluent in Spanish, and is a skilled cook.
- Hollywood Pudgy: Matt is criticised by the execs for gaining weight; Sean can't even see a difference.
- Jail Bait Wait: Rather creepily implied with Matt and Labia. She'd been stalking him for years by the time he slept with her at eighteen and it's unlikely that she just suddenly turned hot the moment she became legal.
- Jerkass Has a Point: While Matt royally screws Sean and Beverly over by passing on their script after begging them to write it for him in the first place, they ultimately agree with him that it's crap.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Matt, pretty much. He's completely self-centered, doesn't have much of a conscience, and quite often has no clue how terribly he treats people, but he's very amiable and jovial... and in his own way, he does care.
- My Eyes Are Up Here: Gender-flipped when Matt catches Beverly looking at his Gag Penis.
- Really Gets Around: Matt is...not discerning when it comes to who he sleeps with, whether it's other people's wives or his own stalker.
- Sad Clown: He's the star of a comedy series and in his personal life has to deal with custody battles for his kids, a stalker, the tabloids fat-shaming him, his dwindling bank balance and a strained relationship with his father.
- Smoking Hot Sex: After sex with Beverly.
- Supreme Chef: Surprisingly, Matt is a really good cook.
- The Friend Nobody Likes: Matt has apparently become this to the rest of the Friends cast.
- "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Beverly gives Matt several, but Sean's one to him in the final episode takes the cake.
- Wimp Fight: Sean and Matt have the "vicious but technically inept" kind after Matt sleeps with Beverly.
Sean Lincoln
- Played by: Stephen Mangan
- A Man Is Always Eager: He'll deny any attraction to Morning, but it's eventually proven that he's only as faithful as his options.
- Deadpan Snarker: It seems to be his only coping mechanism.
- Downtime Downgrade: Justified by Beverly's infidelity. The second season thus becomes a Will They or Won't They Get Back Together?.
- Failure Is the Only Option: Every time the Lincolns try to stop Merc and Matt from altering their show, they fail. Even a series cancellation doesn't last very long.
- Hands-On Approach: Sean teaching Beverly to ice-skate. Played For Heartwarming as she'd earlier lamented that what she missed most since they broke up was him holding her.
- Improvised Weapon: Sean and Matt's Wimp Fight escalates into throwing things at each other, and crosses a line when Sean sprays cologne in Matt's face and they take a break to rinse his eyes out.
- Informed Ability: Sean & Beverley's writing ability and the quality of Lyman's Boys. The bits of Pucks! we see are of varying quality at best, and that can't be entirely the fault of
Executive Meddling... - Wimp Fight: Sean and Matt have the "vicious but technically inept" kind after Matt sleeps with Beverly.
Beverly Lincoln
- Played by: Tamsin Greig
- Belligerent Sexual Tension: With Matt.
- Berserk Button: Calling her "Betsy".
- Brief Accent Imitation: Beverly does LA Valley Girl—"oh my god, I love your accent"—when telling Sean how much she wants to go home.
- Creator Backlash: In-Universe — Beverly openly states in the fourth episode that she hates what their show was turned into.
- Downtime Downgrade: Justified by Beverly's infidelity. The second season thus becomes a Will They or Won't They Get Back Together?.
- Embarrassing Nickname: "Betsy".
- Failure Is the Only Option: Every time the Lincolns try to stop Merc and Matt from altering their show, they fail. Even a series cancellation doesn't last very long.
- Good Adultery, Bad Adultery: Beverly cheats on Sean mistakenly thinking he'd cheated on her with Morning, and they break up when he finds out. While they're separated, he does sleep with Morning, but feels guilty about it and tries to keep it a secret.
- Hands-On Approach: Sean teaching Beverly to ice-skate. Played For Heartwarming as she'd earlier lamented that what she missed most since they broke up was him holding her.
- Informed Ability: Sean & Beverley's writing ability and the quality of Lyman's Boys. The bits of Pucks! we see are of varying quality at best, and that can't be entirely the fault of Executive Meddling...
- Informed Judaism: During a conversation with Carol in the Season 5 premiere, she mentions being Jewish, which plays absolutely no part in the rest of the show.
- Limited Social Circle: Lampshaded - Carol jokes that Beverly "know[s] three people".
- My God, What Have I Done?: Invoked by Beverley word for word after sleeping with Matt.
Hollywood
Merc Lapidus
- Played by: John Pankow
- Blatant Lies: Pretty much most of what Merc says to Sean & Beverley.
- Cluster F-Bomb: Merc's reaction when he thinks a travel agent has let his wife know about his plan to take Carol on a trip.
- Dude, Not Funny!: In-universe;
- At a party, Merc's blind wife is talking about the charity she works with, whilst Merc is miming apologies before pretending to kill himself, thinking he's actually being pretty funny. Everyone else at the table is just looking around awkwardly.
- Indeed, a running gag through the series is Merc constantly joking around his wife from fondling female guests to other lewd actions, acting like it's hysterical when everyone else just stares in disbelief.
- At a party, Merc's blind wife is talking about the charity she works with, whilst Merc is miming apologies before pretending to kill himself, thinking he's actually being pretty funny. Everyone else at the table is just looking around awkwardly.
- Faux Affably Evil: He's a very friendly and extroverted guy. He's also a massive liar who will manipulate anyone for a dollar or a screw.
- Good Adultery, Bad Adultery: Merc and his wife frequently cheat on each other. He seems to be unaware of hers, but she knows about his.
- Hidden Depths: Seemingly invoked when we are introduced to Merc's wife, Jamie. She's sweet, charitable, and blind. Everyone's pleasantly surprised, and it seems like there's more to Merc than meets the eye. Five minutes later, we see that Merc gleefully belittles her in public, has been cheating on her for years, and is even more of a slime ball than everyone first thought.
- Idiot Ball: After he finally confronts his wife about her affair with Matt and learns he's been fired Merc is being driven home by Carol as she says now they can finally be together. Merc immediately says he can't leave his wife now because without a job, it'll be harder to pay her half his money. Carol finally realizes her dream of being with Merc is just that and drops him off in the rain in a slum neighborhood.
- Ironic Echo Cut: Merc giving his speech about winning a Man of the Year award at a charity on how great it feels to be supportive while we see workers packing up his office as he's been fired from his job.
- Nobody Poops: Merc insists on having a ratings discussion with Carol while he's sitting on the toilet.
- Poor Communication Kills: Merc and his wife trying to book separate romantic getaways through the same travel agent fall victim to this, along with the agent assuming they're traveling together, and end up booked on a trip together.
Carol Rance
- Played by: Kathleen Rose Perkins
- Functional Addict: Possibly. Beverly thinks so, and she jokingly agrees.
- Has a Type: Carol cannot seem to refrain from sleeping with her boss (regardless of said boss's gender).
- Opinion Flip-Flop: Carol is an expert at this.Carol: I head about the heatwave you're having! And they say there's no global warming.Exec: There's no global warming.Carol: I know, right? Come on, people, it's called "weather"!
- Shameful Strip: After a messy breakup, Helen forces Carol to strip to the waist, since she'd borrowed Helen's singlet and sports bra.
- The Stoner: Carol at first seems very normal and secure, then reveals later into Series 1 that she is a stoner (seemingly not a light one either as she carries pre-rolled joints in her bag) and shares a smoke with Beverley. From this point onwards, her insecurity and eccentricities aren't hidden as much and she continues to appear less and less well-adjusted each episode.Beverly: [As Carol turns up on her doorstep holding two joints] And you claim you don't have a problem.
Morning Randolph
- Played by: Mircea Monroe
- Adaptational Sexuality: Her character in "Lyman's Boys" was originally a lesbian.
- Age Insecurity: She sometimes starts brining up celebrities she had worked with in the past or her work from as far as the seventies, only to sheepishly stop talking mid-sentence, prompting at least one reaction of "Just say it already". Also, see Mum Looks Like a Sister.
- Commuting on a Bus: Gradually became less involved in the plot of episodes by Series 3.
- Consummate Professional: She grows to hate "Pucks" and her diminished role, but still has standards and is appalled by Matt being drunk on-set.
- Dawson Casting: In-Universe. She's well over 40 and manages to get cast in roles that would normally go to actresses much younger than that. Irony is that her actress Mircea Monroe was actually 28 in real life when the show first started.
- Mama Bear: Morning is very protective of her 18-year-old daughter.
- Master of the Mixed Message: Morning frequently gets rather intimate with Sean throughout the first season (somewhat justifying Beverly's paranoia about them), but later claims she never meant anything by it. Then she hooks up with Sean twice in the second season.
- Ms. Fanservice: She's a busty blonde bombshell and the art department does nothing to downplay it.
- Mum Looks Like a Sister: Morning and her daughter Dawn.
- Odd Friendship: Slowly comes to mostly get along with Beverly despite being intimate with Sean during Beverly and Sean's separation.
- Older Than They Look: Apparently Morning was playing grown women on TV in the 1980s and is older than Beverley, who seems to be in her mid-40s.
- Romantic False Lead: For Sean.
- Took a Level in Dumbass: Morning is noticeably more of an airhead in Series 2.
- White-Dwarf Starlet: Since nobody under the age of 50 remembers her breakout role.
Andy Button
- Played by: Joseph May
- Camp Gay: He uses his sexuality to sue Merc when he fires him.
- Those Two Guys: With Myra.
Myra Licht
- Played by: Daisy Haggard
- The Ditz: Myra is pretty brainless.
- Eskimos Aren't Real: A group of Hollywood TV executives discuss a potential premise for their network's vampire style show. Many ideas are mentioned, culminating in Myra recommending the paranormal creatures in their show should be Gypsies. She recommends it twice, before somebody tells her that Gypsies are real.
- Informed Attribute: Played for laughs. She shows absolutely no sense of humor, despite her job revolving around it.
- Noodle Incident: Myra's pregnancy in Series 4, which is only ever acknowleged by Carol and Andy.
- Verbal Tic: "Mmm..."
Castor Sotto
- Played by: Chris Diamantopoulos
- Ax-Crazy: Merc's successor Castor. A paranoid schizophrenic who furiously masturbates in his office, borderline rapes Carol several times and experiences wild mood swings.
- Mr. Fanservice: He's very buff and his constant working out means he spends a lot of time topless and glistening.
- Raging Stiffie: Castor frequently gets these as a side-effect of his psychosis medication. On one notable occasion, it was prompted by a news broadcast about an earthquake in Peru.
Helen Basch
- Played by: Andrea Savage
- Lipstick Lesbian: She gets Carol in on it as well.
Andrew Lesley
- Played by: Oliver Kieran-Jones
- Always Someone Better: While Sean and Beverly are contractually tied to a critically-panned sitcom they're desperate to abandon, Andrew is getting his passion projects greenlit and never seems to have any issues with creative control.
Tim Whittick
- Played by: Bruce Mackinnon
- Jerkass: Antagonises Beverly and threatens to sue Sean if he doesn't give him any royalties or creative control over their old pilot script.
Eileen Jaffee
- Played by: Andrea Rosen
- Keet: Her desk is set above a treadmill as she's so energetic.
Supporting Characters
Jamie Lapidus
- Played by: Genevieve O'Reilly
- Blind Mistake: A couple of times, for example needing a minder at a funeral to make sure she doesn't "go in the hole."
- Good Adultery, Bad Adultery: Merc and his Jamie frequently cheat on each other. He seems to be unaware of hers, but she knows about his.
- Hidden Depths: Despite being blind has her own affairs, and far more aware of her husband's behavior than she lets on.
- Put on a Bus: Jamie Lapidus leaves Matt when she figures out that he'd cheated on her and never appears again.
Diane
- Played by: Fiona Glascott
- Will They or Won't They?: Has this with Matt in Series 4.
Labia
- Played by: Sophie Rundle
- Fanservice: Labia's prolonged nude scene. In fact, just about the only part of Labia's anatomy we don't see is, well...
- Jail Bait Wait: Rather creepily implied with Matt and Labia. She'd been stalking him for years by the time he slept with her at eighteen and it's unlikely that she just suddenly turned hot the moment she became legal.
- Put on a Bus: Labia has just one appearance in Season 3 where it's revealed that she's got a boyfriend and finally overcame her infatuation with Matt.
- Stalker with a Crush: She's a Loony Fan who's been obsessed with Matt for fifteen years, ever since he took her sick 8-year-old self to Disneyland for Make-A-Wish. Oh right, and he slept with her once. Make that twice.
- When she does finally move on from Matt, she starts dating a guy called "Joe". Yeah...
Rob
- Played by: James Purefoy
- Romantic False Lead: For Beverly.
