That's nice! BBC1's bawdy cross-dressing comedy Mrs Brown's Boys is set to return for a fourth series.

Brendan O'Carroll, the Irish comedian behind the unlikely sitcom sensation, has previously said he would finish at the end of the current series, which has two more weeks to run.

But O'Carroll, who is also taking the comedy to the big screen with Mrs Brown D' Movie, said he is now planning a fourth, which will be welcome news to BBC1 controller Danny Cohen.

O'Carroll was speaking after his show won best sitcom at the National Television Awards on Wednesday.

Mrs Brown's Boys, despite being unloved by the critics, is the most popular comedy on BBC1, out rating Miranda with around 8 million viewers a week.

The Christmas Eve special on BBC1 had a consolidated audience of more than 11 million viewers, beating EastEnders, Downton Abbey and Call the Midwife.

O'Carroll said: "I always said it would be three series but it's been so successful, once we've finished the movie there may be the possibility of a fourth series.

"I certainly didn't think I would be so fond of it after three series. I honestly thought I would be fed up."

He added that his live tour had sold 250,000 tickets by Christmas. "With that kind of response, you really do want to go on," he said. The big screen adaptation of the sitcom will appear next year.

The sitcom, born out of a character created by O'Carroll 20 years ago for Irish radio, began with fewer than 3 million viewers when it first aired on BBC1 in 2011.

O'Carroll said he was not phased by critics' lukewarm, and occasionally hostile response to the show.

"I wouldn't worry about that. We do it for the audience, I don't want to write something that somebody in such and such newspaper would like. I can only write what makes me laugh, and as a writer you hope the audience will agree."

Accepting his award, O'Carroll thanked fans of the show, which stars many of his real-life family including his wife, his sister and his daughter. He added: "The only person that's not in the show is my mother and that's because she is dead."

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