Respectable

We stumbled across this show by accident one evening, flicking across the channels before bed, and instantly loved it. It features a lonely, unhappily married man called Michael who visits Debonnaire, a brothel - not for sex but for the company and companionship of one of the girls, Hayley. He is very attracted to her, but is in denial about the fact that she is a prostitute, and likes to think of her more as a close friend who he can talk to.

The characters who work in Debonnaire are varied, and each one is hilarious in her own way. Maureen is the owner of the establishment, 60 if she's a day, and has catchphrases that would make your hair curl. She "takes her turn" along with the rest of the girls and wouldn't change her job for anything. Yelena is Serbian, and her direct man-hating attitude and sneering attitude to the other girls makes her one of the best characters for me. Kate is a student, working there to finance her way through her studies, and sees the job as a practical means to an end. Hayley is very naïve, and has a childlike personality but there is something very endearing about her and we can all see why Michael likes her so much.

If you haven't seen the show, I'd recommend you watch it - it's full of great lines and fantastic characters, and will have you laughing from start to finish (and for days afterwards as you remember parts again!)

This show was introduced to me as "The Office... set in a brothel!", and while it's a somewhat accurate description, it is actually an entirely different animal underneath.

What we have here is simply a very tender love story between Michael, the disaffected and lonely middle-aged married man, whose marriage is staler than a six week old kebab in a student's flat, and Hayley, the coquettish prostitute with whom he maintains a "talking" relationship.

What could have been a smutty exercise in "phwoar, phwoar!" puns and unpleasant set-pieces, actually turns out to have enormous heart and warmth in a beautifully understated manner, without the saccharine fairy-tale moments of something like "Pretty Woman."

"Respectable" deserves full respect for being witty, charming and incredibly down-to-earth... with a happy ending.