Using the conventions of a glossy sketch show, Boom Town will see real people cast in what will be a first for the sketch show genre. Whilst the place itself, Boom Town, will be entirely fictional, the people are real life characters and will appear to live there as a community. Fake road signs and carefully selected geography shots will all help create this illusion.

 

Cast from all over the country, the characters will have their own catchphrases, eccentricities and larger than life personalities, none of which will be scripted for them; they’ll be simply playing themselves.

 

Karl Warner said: "Boom Town will be the first sketch show to make stars out of real people. Some of the characters we've already met are laugh-out-loud funny and would sit well in any scripted comedy.

 

BBC Three is always keen to try trying new things and this feels like an original proposition which we're looking forward to making with Knickerbockerglory."

 

Jonathan Stadlen, Executive Producer for Knickerbockerglory, said: "Using real people to create a documentary sketch show is a unique challenge from a genre point of view, but we are all really excited about working on such a radical departure in terms of form.

 

"Boom Town sets out to play on the conventions of the comedy sketch show - and I really hope we can pull it off.

 

We are looking forward to working with Karl Warner and Zai Bennett to create a very different, and hopefully very funny, new genre of TV."

 

Boom Town will be executive produced by Karl Warner for the BBC and Jonathan Stadlen for Knickerbockerglory. The director will be Hannah Springham.