Graham Linehan has told Sky News he believes satire is “dying” and that it would be “impossible” to make his hit shows Father Ted or The IT Crowd today.
The comedy writer was arrested at Heathrow Airport earlier this month over social media posts sharing his views on trans rights.
Appearing on Sky News’ Sunday Morning With Trevor Phillips, Linehan said he is planning to sue the Metropolitan Police over his arrest, on grounds of “false imprisonment”, and also addressed US talk show host Jimmy Kimmel being taken off air for comments he made following the death of Charlie Kirk.
Speaking about his own work, Linehan said: “It would be impossible to do a comedy like Father Ted or The IT Crowd now. The feeling of a thousand people looking over your shoulder as you write would be intolerable, and the thousand people looking over your shoulder are the various supposed minority groups that TV executives think need protecting.”
In comedy, everyone should be a target, Linehan said. “It’s how you show someone’s humanity, you show that they’re not perfect, that they’re funny, that they make mistakes.
“But all these, I have to say, white, middle class TV executives, they look down on everybody. So they think that when you make a joke, you’re punching down. It’s impossible to create comedy in that kind of atmosphere.
“The only people who can survive in that kind of atmosphere are people who simply never say anything interesting.”
‘We’re going backwards’
Asked if satire is dead, Linehan said it is “dying” – and also highlighted Chris Morris’s “boundary breaking” Brass Eye, another satirical show from the 1990s and early 2000s.
“It is impossible to imagine it being made now. And so we’re going backwards. We’re not moving forwards, we’re going backwards.”
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Linehan said he now lives in the US as he could not stay in the UK. He was arrested after landing at Heathrow at the beginning of September.
In one of the posts he says he was questioned about, Linehan wrote: “If a trans-identified male is in a female-only space, he is committing a violent, abusive act. Make a scene, call the cops and if all else fails, punch him in the balls.”
After his arrest drew criticism of the police and government from some politicians and supporters, Met Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley said his officers were in an “impossible position” and should not be “policing toxic culture wars debates”.
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Linehan said he was “surprised” to be arrested over “tweets that were mostly harmless”.
He continued: “One which was good safeguarding advice for any woman. And two silly things that I just kind of you know, conversationally threw online. I never thought that anyone would be so offended by them.”
Sky News has contacted Met Police for comment.
Linehan was interviewed as other comedians and writers were speaking out about Kimmel being taken off air in the US.
Tom Walker, better known as the ranting fictitious newsreader Jonathan Pie, told Sky News’ Daily podcast he believes the UK has to be “careful” and protect free speech as debate becomes “more and more toxic” on both sides of the Atlantic.
“I certainly don’t think that the Trump administration should be influencing decisions made by TV companies, that’s definitely not on,” Linehan said when asked by Phillips about the issue.
“But I do find it quite ironic, or I’m not sure what the word is, that nine or 10 days after a man was shot through the neck for literally trying to speak – you know, the symbol of Charlie Kirk’s life is the microphone, not only in the sense that he used it himself, but he handed it to others and allowed them to make their points, without interrupting, without being superior or arrogant or argumentative – and he was silenced forever.
“So the idea that Jimmy Kimmel is some sort of hero of free speech is quite absurd after that happened.”
