Sun, sea and saucy secrets

It’s Lily Allen’s first acting role on TV since she was three – and she’s superb in a comedy drama set in Margate that will be lapped up by fans of Motherland

This engrossing comedy drama about the relationship between four sisters is set in Margate, the English seaside town whose glory days as a tourist magnet are long gone (despite more recent attempts to attract hipsters). Dreamland is Margate’s optimistically named amusement park. It’s an ambiguous title for the show, intended ironically because the town is anything but a dreamland, but also as a reference to the siblings’ hopes and ambitions.

The sisters all have different fathers, none of whom stayed, so they are very close to their mum, Cheryl (Frances Barber). Trish (Freema Agyeman) is the oldest. She and her husband have two boys and she’s pregnant again, but after three miscarriages in two years, this is an anxious time. In the first episode she’s throwing a pink-themed baby shower to convince the universe to give her a baby girl.

Clare (Gabby Best) works for the local paper, where her very real talent as a writer is wasted on trivial stories about unfeasibly large pets and the like. Leila (Aimee-Ffion Edwards), the youngest sister and a bit daffy, works on the refuse bins but has ambitions to drive the truck – once she’s learnt how to drive.

But uh-oh, who’s this swaying down the street, swigging Stella from a can and clad head to toe in black? It’s Mel (Lily Allen, right with Agyeman), the fourth sister, who’s been living in France and is returning under a cloud. ‘Smashed in the middle of the day?’ Clare hisses at her when she staggers into Trish’s party.

But Mel is guilty of more than just day drinking. She’s keeping a secret that could split the sisterhood.

This is being billed as Allen’s TV debut, though she was briefly in a Comic Strip Presents episode when she was three.

Is she any good? Yes. Mel is someone whose life isn’t turning out the way she expected, and Allen is excellent at conveying vulnerability and regret.

Another standout performance comes from Best as Clare, who has some of the funniest lines. ‘What did you do? Let a model eat your sandwich?’ she asks on hearing that Mel has lost her job in fashion.

Dreamland grew out of a comedy short by Sharon Horgan and is made by Merman, the production company Horgan co-founded. You can see the resemblance to other Merman hits, such as Bad Sisters and Motherland. Like its sister shows, Dreamland is funny, but it also has plenty to say about all sorts of serious issues.