A NEW comedy about a teenage girl growing up in Derry in the 1990s is to be broadcast on Channel 4.
Derry Girls will be set in the run-up to the first IRA ceasefire and will be based on the experiences of writer Lisa McGee, who previously created 2013 sitcom London Irish.
The six-part sitcom will follow 16-year-old Erin and her friends in 1994 as they navigate daily ups and downs, including romantic and family dramas, conflicts at school and body insecurities.
McGee, who grew up in Derry at the time, said: "Anything set during the Troubles tends to be a bit grim and bleak, but that just wasn't my experience of Derry as a child and a teenager, it was a joyful place.
"I'd like to celebrate that. It was also hugely matriarchal, so I was keen we have a large and varied cast of female characters.
"There were other things going on in Northern Ireland at that time, there were other stories, I'm excited to have the opportunity to tell some of them."
The show was announced by Channel 4 at the Edinburgh TV Festival, and Nerys Evans, deputy head of comedy at the channel, said: "Derry Girls may have a unique setting but it's a really warm family sitcom, seen through the eyes of teenager Erin. Lisa's writing is truthful, brave and laugh-out loud funny."
The channel also announced new comedy The Bisexual, about the difference between dating men and women.
Created by Girls actress Desiree Akhavan, who will also star, the series will follow New Yorker Leila as she adjusts to the dating scene in London after breaking up with her girlfriend.
