The new series of Channel 4’s Catastrophe is due to start on Tuesday 28th February and will be a “fitting tribute” to Carrie Fisher, who played Rob Delaney’s mother in the show. Phil Clarke, Channel 4’s comedy chief said that this series contains “emotionally powerful” scenes with Carrie.
The series does not deal with Carrie’s death however and writers Rob Delaney and Sharon Horgan have not yet worked out how to deal with it in the show. Sharon said: “It’s hard to know think about what to do. Hopefully, time will pass and we’ll have a fitting finish to that story.”
Carrie Fisher’s character features in one episode in the third series, her busy schedule meaning she wasn’t available for much time. Sharon Horgan said: “For series three we wrote a bigger part for her character and we got to spend a lot more time with her. She was funny all the time. She was an incredibly witty person and liked saying arse-holey things to everyone but also a really kind, lovely, supportive person.”
Speaking at the Catastrophe press screening Sharon and Rob told the story of how they came to cast Carrie in the role of Rob’s mother. “We wanted Rob to have an awful mother, and luckily she was in the market for an awful woman.” Sharon said.
After being impressed by a speech honouring Graham Norton by Carrie the pair decided to ask her to play the character. After a failure to get her attention on Twitter (which is how Rob and Sharon met) they contacted her agent with the scripts and Carrie agreed to play Rob’s mother.
Sharon said: “She flew over and did her bit for a day or two and of course we wanted to get to know her better, we idolised her, But we didn’t really have a chance.
Then in series three we wrote this bigger, chunkier part for her in episode 6 and got to spend time with her and she became part of the gang. We feel very privileged and honoured.”
In the recently commissioned fourth series of Catastrophe the death of Rob’s mother will be addressed.
