I’ve been looking on the internet for any info on the 1996 Paramount Comedy program “Asylum” and there doesn’t appear to be that much so here’s what I remember.

Almost every one played characters with the same names a the actors. It stared Simon Pegg and Jessica Stevenson of “Spaced” fame, Julian Barratt from the brilliant “Might Boosh”, stand up comic Adam Bloom, “Red Dwarf” computer (the good one) Norman Lovett, and was written by “Little Britain’s” David Walliams. Actually I’m convinced that Daivd Walliams and Matt Lucas were both in at least one episode although IMDB can’t confirm this.

Norman Lovett played the head Psychiatrist, Dr. Lovett, of a mental hospital however you were never sure if the patients should be there or not, it was quite possible that people had been kidnapped and were being held there - kind of like a comedy version of “The Prisoner”.

Simon Pegg’s character was a pizza delivery boy who had come to drop off a pizza that Dr. Lovett had ordered who became incarcerated in the Asylum. The staff spent the entire run of the show trying to convince Simon that his life as a pizza delivery boy was a delusion. In the final episode Simon breaks into the Asylum garage and finds his moped and discarded pizza boxes. I have often wondered I the character of Fry in “Futurama” was based on Simon in “Asylum”.

It’s really amazing that this show has been all be forgotten when you consider the hit shows that that the people behind it when on to create and star in.