I’m feeling pretty badly for Lily Allen right now. Apparently her new television show, Lily Allen and Friends, was so bad that her audience – chosen from her online ‘friends’ – walked out during the taping for BBC three. The show was to be a major launching pad for the revamped network, but might not be quite what they were looking for.

More than a third of the studio audience refused to watch the entire recording of Lily Allen and Friends because it was “horrible” and “limp”, according to the Daily Mail.

“We were all told when to clap and laugh but a lot of people, including me, were very uncomfortable,” one disappointed fan said.

“I do think she’s got a nice voice but she didn’t sing at all — I think everyone was expecting she would.”

A jammed autocue saw the ‘Smile’ singer revert to handwritten cue cards, but only to launch into an attack on the criticisms people had dealt her on online chat forums during her interview with comedian David Mitchell from British sitcom Peep Show.

“It was terrible: even David Mitchell had to remind her not to criticise the very people who would be watching the show,” another fan said.

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The show then relied on a YouTube-style video of animals mating for laughs. Cuba Gooding Jr, another guest on the show, summed it up pretty accurately by saying “I don’t know what’s sicker, animals having sex or you clapping.” Then again, this is what the internet has brought us, along with endless spam about ‘Forward this on or you’ll die in the next 3 days and your dog will turn into a squirrel and you’ll switch genders at the mortuary.’ It’s not entirely inappropriate to use internet footage when the show is being marketed as an interactive show, tied in with a website, and is youth orientated. After all, America’s Funniest Home Videos uses endless reams of footage of men getting hit in the crotch.

Also, given what Lily has been through in the last few weeks, it might be nice to cut her some slack. She’s just suffered a miscarriage, split up with her boyfriend, and now she is performing on her first ever episode of a television show that had technical problems. I suspect that the reason many people left was due to how long it took to record the show, rather than actual issues with the content.

Although, I could be wrong. Check out the BBC three promo for the series below. It looks a little strange.

Picture note by Celebitchy: Lily Allen and her unnamed guest are shown outside Finch & Partners’ Pre-BAFTA Party on 2/9/08, thanks to WENN. She looks a little worse for wear.