Father Ted shows while at the same time writing for sketch shows such as "The All New Alexei Sayle Show" and "The Fast Show". One of these ideas was for a comedy mockumentary series called "Irish Lives", with six episodes, each focusing on a different character living somewhere in Ireland. They scripted an episode centring on a priest named Father Ted Crilly, who visits his friends in the seminary in Maynooth College. Producer Geoffrey Perkins suggested that the episode's concept be dramatised and rewritten as a sitcom. Mathews was originally intended to play Ted, but decided he lacked the acting ability the
New Jack City (Father Ted) torments Ted and Dougal. Stack's torments include deliberately driving Ted's car into a wall and then telling him all about it and saying that all that mattered was that he liked it, insulting Ted and his friends in the priesthood, getting Dougal drunk on Jack's whiskey, drilling holes in the living room wall for no particular reason and blasting jungle music at 3 o'clock in the morning (Ted labels him "worse than Hitler", because "you wouldn't find Hitler playing jungle music at 3 in the morning"). Fed up with Father Stack, Ted and Dougal kidnap Father Jack back from Jurassic