Vent: A Comedy on Life-Support

The Complete BBC Radio Comedy Series 1-3

By: Nigel Smith

Narrated by: Fiona Allen, full cast, Josie Lawrence, Leslie Ash, Neil Pearson

Length: 9 hrs and 13 mins

Publisher's summary

All three series of the BBC Radio 4 sitcom, plus the hour-long special Locked In

Vent charts coma patient Ben’s journey from the depths of unconsciousness, where he travels through the distinctly odd landscape of his own mind, to recovery and his attempts to readjust to the real world.

In Series 1 and 2, as his mum and wife Mary sit round his bedside and wonder how to wake him up, Ben’s mind is busy elsewhere. In his imagination, he lives with his 2-year-old daughter Blitz (now miraculously grown up), encounters celebrities such as Sue Lawley, Elvis Presley and Tom Paulin, relives memories from his past and gets into a compromising situation with a fellow inmate at a strangely familiar Torquay hotel. Meanwhile, an imaginary sitcom written by him, about coma patients in a hospital, plays in the background.

Locked In, first broadcast as a Friday Play in 2009, sees Ben free of his coma, but suffering from locked-in syndrome. Unable to engage with the world around him, he takes refuge once more in the safety of his unconscious – while the hospital debate whether to send him to a rehab unit or a care home.

Series 3 finds Ben taking the ambulance home to begin life in a wheelchair. But life outside hospital is a little fraught. Fortunately, he can still escape into his fantasy world, where he meets Buzz Aldrin, invents a panel game and gets some relationship advice from Lord Byron.

Based on writer Nigel Smith’s own experience of being hospitalised with a brain lesion, this moving, darkly funny sitcom stars Neil Pearson as Ben, with Fiona Allen as Mary, Josie Lawrence as Mum and Leslie Ash as Blitz. Guest stars include David Mitchell, Robert Webb and Jeremy Paxman.

©2019 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd (P)2019 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd

Critic reviews

"Bold, beautiful, daring radio." (The Telegraph)

A surreal trip through a real life and trying times

I first caught this program just by catching the tail end of an episode on BBC radio 4. I was so intrigued by the use of the multiple storylines in play, the main character’s imaginary life, his real life, his memories, and his life as a sitcom, I found myself urgently tracking this series down. I was happy to find that the entire series was made available for distribution as I feared it might never be due to the extensive use of popular songs as an integral part of the story. While still periodically streamed on BBC 4X, this version allows one to hear all 3 series AND the bridging special as a continuous set (something that isn’t always possible on the BBC rebroadcast schedule.
Vent tells the story of a man (Ben - Neil Pearson) trapped in his own mind as a result of a major brain lesion. Ben narrates his troubled recovery through its various stages, coma, locked-in syndrome, and return to his home. Ben is a struggling writer who maps his life onto a theoretical sitcom that allows the story to broadly skewer the politics of healthcare and relationships. He is guided in his imaginary life by a thirty-something version of his 2 year old daughter (Blitz -Lesley Ash) , who as a product of Ben’s imagination, is an embodiment of Ben’s responsibilities and conscience.
Fiona Allen and Josie Lawrence as Ben’s wife (Mary) and mother respectively are brilliant and are a major part of the story’s real life time line. Flashbacks to Ben and Mary’s relationship are also part of the series framing that cements what on the surface might appear as fraught and even a mistaken love story as being strong enough for the situation it finds itself in.
On the whole the story is quite moving and it does in many ways achieve one of the fictional Ben’s goals of writing a great novel of ideas. Given that the series writer, Nigel Smith, created this series after suffering a coma from a serious brain lesion himself, this is probably not accidental. The series is sprinkled with cameo appearances of various personalities as Ben imagines them like Lord Byron, Disraeli, and Buzz Aldrin. While it may not handle these topics with the depth of a BBC radio 4 documentary, it does so with humor and a thorough distaste for pedantry - exemplified perhaps by Ben’s frequent forceful exits of an imaginary Tom Paulin from his dream world.
For the listener I would advise that outside of Ben’s health trajectory, this story is not linear. Frequent trips back in time through Ben’s memories and side trips through his imagined worlds requires careful listening. Each episode is more like a puzzle piece in the series that explains Ben’s journey from dreams to reality.
If I were to fault one thing with this version of the series is the lack of production information including episode (chapter) titles. As a result there are also no detailed credits from many notable guest voices and supporting cast such as Jo Martin as the ITC nurse. Other notable guest voices include Lucy Montgomery, David Mitchell, and Robert Webb. I would refer the curious to the BBC series page for more information