PUG-NOSED FACE: Ricky Gervais, David Bowie and Ashley Jensen from Extras. Subscribe to Archivestuff Have your say Damn Ricky Gervais and Monday night's Extras (Prime, 9.30), where David Bowie composed a tune mocking Andy Millman, star of the camp, catch-phrase-ridden sitcom When the Whistle Blows.

Now I find myself walking round the place singing "See his pug nose face. It's an ear worm lodged in there for at least a month thanks very much. The strange thing was that when Bowie was sitting there tickling the ivories and giving voice as Andy shrank Jack Hornering in the corner, Gervais looked like a young Bowie with more fat.

They share the same arch of the eyebrow and that old fashioned to-the-side cow lick of hair, don't you reckon? But then again the gin's very good at my place. Andy is so desperate for attention, respect, validation - you name it - that he will do anything to get it.

His cringe-making exchange with a homeless person as he thought overly long and hard about giving him 20 quid in order to buy him good word-on the-street press, was painful to watch. Andy wanted to know the general theme of the anecdotes the homeless bloke would say about the infamous actor, and didn't like what he heard. I do hope Blanket Man wasn't watching and getting ideas about dishing out ratings from the pavement.

Andy is a great destroyer of moments and when he was in with a chance with an attractive female neighbour who was moving into his apartment block, he had to go and ruin her good first impression of him by getting his gal pal Maggie to pretend to be a fan and approach him for an autograph. A simple soul, Maggie bungled her lines and when Andy asked her who he should sign it to she replied artlessly "Me". He could have thumped her but he doesn't because when he did (metaphorically speaking) in the first series of Extras he loathed himself for it and had to apologise in a very moving episode about the necessity of good friendships being watered by tact and pruned by diplomacy.

It is Gervais' ability to make you laugh but feel the tragedy as Andy exposes himself to the withering contempt of friend and foe a-like, that makes him so brilliant. The "proper" actor who is always boasting about the high quality plays he has been lucky enough to be cast in never misses an opportunity to dump on Andy for catering to the lowest common denominator and actually carries round Andy's bad reviews in his breast pocket to read aloud. It's not that he's a nasty person, it's just that he cares so desperately and so deeply about what others think of him that he leaves no stone unturned to get a compliment.

Fame isn't all that it's cracked up to be, as Bowie sings in his legendary song Fame - "Bully for you, chilly for me" - and when Andy goes to the local pub he is set upon by a fan of such creepy odium that he rushes from the bar and tells his off-siders to hurry and drink up and scarper because he is being got at by a chap from the "hills have eyes". The trip to a smart club where he briefly gets to sit in the VIP section before being tossed out by the arrival of Bowie and his entourage, is not the safe haven he imagines and the episode ends with him returning to the local bar. There he rushes headlong into the bosom of the "hills-have-eyes" mob who treat him like a king and great is the back slapping thereof.

Maggie, his constant companion looks at her friend sideways as she sees him lowering himself to the very group he so soundly spurned a few hours ago. So true to life, so human, so brilliant, it takes your breath away and still we continue to like Andy in spite of himself. And it's not only Andy who is a great character - Darren Lamb, his tall blonde agent, is so like Gareth from The Office, and even the one episode characters are gems you want to see more of.

What about Count F-a lot named because he has to bonk anything he sees, and even the tall bouncer at the posh club was worth another look. Gervais is the master of selfparody and his genius is such that it makes you want to go up to the television set and kiss the screen he walks on. To kiss his pug, pug, pug nosed face.

Do you agree with this review? Send us your and we'll publish your comments. PUG-NOSED FACE: Ricky Gervais, David Bowie and Ashley Jensen from Extras.