Psychoville is a dark and twisted comedy thriller written by and starring League of Gentlemen actors Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton.
The duo play a group of seemingly unconnected characters who are linked by a blackmailer who sends them the ominous message: 'I know what you did'.
There's Mr Jelly (played by Shearsmith), who is an angry one-handed clown; David Sowerbutts (Pemberton), a serial-killer obsessed man who lives with his Bontempi-playing mother Maureen (Shearsmith). Then there's Joy Aston (Dawn French), a nurse fixated with a doll she treats as a real child and Oscar Lomax (Pemberton), a blind millionaire who spends his time ordering rare stuffed toys to complete his collection. And finally there is Robert Greenspan (Jason Tompkins), a panto dwarf who is in love with his co-star Snow White.
Guest stars in the series include multi-award winners Eileen Atkins and Imelda Staunton, while Mark Gattis completes the original League of Gentlemen line-up with a one-off appearance.
Interestingly, the title Psychoville came from the name used for The League of Gentlemen when it was sold to Korea.
Steve Pemberton explains: "They renamed it Psychoville because it's this mad place. So in this show it's not a place as such, it's more a state of mind. It sounded intriguing... and I thought it was really nice that there was a link with The League of Gentlemen... that there was a little bridge between the two."