'Fleabag's Brett Gelman to star in Channel 4/Showtime Comedy 'Entitled'

With the race for content as hot as it's ever been, and the entertainment budgets tight for public television stations like the BBC and Channel 4, the number of co-productions has skyrocketed. European and U.K. networks that would otherwise never have programming cross the pond now regularly work with high-profile U.S.-based producers like HBO, PBS, and Netflix, in exchange for those networks having exclusive rights to the series in the American market. The latest team-up is a Channel 4 comedy that sounds very British in concept but will be co-produced by Paramount's Showtime and stream over here on Paramount+, called Entitled.

Entitled stars Bret Gelman, best known to British audiences for his turn in Fleabag (but better in America as the paranoid conspiracy theorist/relationship guru Murray on Stranger Things). The new comedy features Gelman as Gabe, an American who just lost his British-born wife. After discovering he has inherited her giant fortune and a crumbling gothic mansion in the English countryside, he finds himself confronted with her estranged family, who has been residing there since she left. The family desperately tries to make nice to their new patriarch, hoping he'll allow them to continue living in the manner to which they are accustomed.

The series was created by Matt Morgan (Mister Winner), who is executive producing the project alongside Gelman. The two have teamed up with Two Brothers Pictures, the producers behind Fleabag. As part of the press release, the head of comedy at Channel 4, Fiona McDermott, said: "The series is a brilliant marriage of Brett and Matt's talents; wicked and hilarious, Entitled promises to deliver a comic ensemble with a ruthless, mischievous and gripping story." Gelman added that the series was "a deliciously twisted world."