Stephen Mangan will write and star in a new comedy about an unconventional therapist, Channel 4 has announced.

The Episodes star will play Dr Richard Pitt, a therapist with a chequered professional career who finds himself at a crossroads in life.

British Academy Television and Craft Nominations Party – London
Stephen Mangan (Ian West/PA)

The six half-hour episodes of Hang Ups, adapted from the Emmy-nominated US series Web Therapy starring Lisa Kudrow, will follow Dr Pitt after the collapse of his previous group therapy practice, when he is no longer able to conduct traditional 50-minute sessions with his patients.

He develops a new form of therapy in which he holds weekly quick-fire sessions online through a webcam to discuss his patients’ issues of neuroses, phobias, issues, anxieties and psychopathies, while balancing interruptions from his demanding family.

Mangan said: “People are complex and complicated and they lead messy, knotty lives.

British Academy Televsion Craft Awards – London
Stephen Mangan (Ian West/PA)

“We’ve tried to put some of that all-too-familiar turmoil on screen and the result, I think, is chaotic, glorious and disturbing.”

The show, which was announced at the Edinburgh International Television Festival, will be written by Mangan and Robert Delamere and heavily improvised.

It will begin filming later this year and will air on Channel 4 in 2018.

Fiona McDermott, head of comedy at Channel 4, said: “Stephen Mangan and Robert Delamere have achieved the almost impossible task of creating a brilliantly farcical show that is at heart a family sitcom.

“An ambitious, modern comedy, Hang Ups is a timely, inventive and very funny exploration of the ridiculous pile up of challenges we call modern life.”