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The dictates of women's magazine think-pieces require just three instances of a given phenomenon to qualify for bona-fide 'trend' status and the column-inches that go therewith. Currently shaping up as this season's must-have dinner-party conversation topic, then, is the hardly-revelatory news that gay men get on rather well with heterosexual women, all the confirmation you need being delivered by this Autumn's TV schedules. Starting with already-familiar terrain, you've got the 'nice apartments' GAP-clad version with Channel 4's ongoing Will And Grace, while at the other end of the aspirational scale there's BBC1's returning Gimme Gimme Gimme. But it's ITV's Manchester-set Bob And Rose that's going to have the Notting Hill set spluttering into their consomme, with its central coupling of Alan Davies as Bob, the gay man who not only falls in love with Lesley Sharp's Rose, but also has an awful lot of irrefutably heterosexual sex with her.

Which, of course, rather suggests that Bob isn't gay. Only he is. And it makes a vague sort of sense to find that the writer behind this less-than immediately graspable concept is Queer As Folk-creator, Russell T Davies, a man whose already seen the aforementioned think-pieces at work. "It's awful, isn't it? Will And Grace has spawned so many of those articles saying 'Aren't gay men lovely as best friends?'," he snorts. "There was one in the Guardian saying you could have pedicures with your gay men friends. Pedicures!?" Russell's response was immediate and emphatic, taking the form of a note to The Guardian's letters page, suggesting that the writer might wish to cultivate some black friends, adding "I'm told they have great rhythm".

Russell's all-too aware of the challenge he faces in persuading a label-prone public to accept Bob and Rose as a plausible couple, but also has one rather handy trump-card when it comes to the inevitable "But surely he's bi-sexual?" debate. Bob and Rose's relationship, however elusive its dynamics may initially appear to us, is based on a real couple. And with Manchester's gay community being the close-knit affair that it is, the news that one of their own was moonlighting with the opposite sex took little time to spread throughout the city. "This man was practically excommunicated," recalls Russell. "Every single gay man was bitching away behind his back, and if I'm honest, what makes it even more interesting for me is the fact that, well, so was I."

When Russell finally met the real-life 'Bob' in person, however, an alcohol-fuelled heart-to-heart made sense of the nonsensical. "You can take the piss all you like," he says, freely admitting to no small sense of shame, "but I'd never for one single second allowed for the fact that the relationship might be real. That maybe in his own little way he'd broken the rules, but that he'd really fallen in love with someone. Funny, isn't it?" he frowns. "You grow up gay, with all that prejudice bollocks around you, then you sit there and realise how prejudiced you are."

In perhaps not the most obvious bit of casting, the part of Bob is played by Alan Davies. As Russell explains, "It's hard, because the show's for ITV, so you've got to have a star name. And as far as gay stars go, there aren't any. They don't exist. Every other male actor seems to be dripping in testosterone.The reason Alan was the first choice, was that we needed a gay man to fall in love with a woman in the first ten minutes. Alan isn't macho, and that's very rare in a straight leading man."

Alan, for his part (and in common with every actor involved in the series) was too impressed by Russell's writing to let any other considerations enter the equation. "Red Productions sent me the scripts for episodes one to three in November last year," he explains, "and I read them into the small hours, sat there thinking about it and decided I had to meet these people. If there was a negative reaction, I suppose yes, it was about encountering homophobia. Then I got over that, and just looked forward to doing the shows - the scripts are great. Scene after scene - it's a real triumph."

Red Productions is the Midas-touch company that brought us Queer As Folk and Clocking Off, the baby of double-BAFTA winner, Nicola Shindler. She recalls her meeting with Alan as one of the fastest and easiest catings she's ever been involved in. "Alan got it straight away - immediately understood what was required of him. You never question either that he's gay, or that he's in love with Rose. Which are the two key things he's got to pull off, really." The role of Rose goes to Lesley Sharp, in what Nicola describes as "a real breakthrough role. Lesley gets to be warm, witty, sassy and attractive, where often she's played more subdued characters. But she's so attractive in this - so warm. She's a real star in this, actually."

Even before the first episode reaches its end, Nicola's comments are resolutely confirmed by Lesley's performance. When we first meet Rose, she's floating aimlessly around on a relationship plateau, where the dawning notion that this is as good as it gets is tempered by the realisation that "As good as it gets" isn't good enough. Enter Bob, and as Lesley explains, "the connection that they have is bigger than the circumstances, bigger than the labels we attach to human beings on a day-to-day basis. They're just two people who unexpectedly fall in love with each other."

Watching this process from a close distance is the character of Holly, Bob's best (female, platonic) friend, played with nothing less than sheer brilliance by Jessica Stevenson. Holly would be the think-piece friend: loves Bob as a friend, loves going to bars with him, loves being part of his world. Until, of course, that world appears to offer the prospect of something above and beyond the platonic. At which point, Holly's reaction is a wholly natural one, namely intense jealousy. "When she initially finds out that Bob's been having relations with a woman, her immediate reactions are quite strange, and I don't think she quite knows why she's behaving like that," explains Jessica. "She's acting from a very unsettled point and I don't think at that stage that Holly realises she's fallen in love with him. So her behaviour is quite bizarre and out-of-character for her. And - looking in from the outside - quite inappropriate and meddling."

The cast and crew's universal insistence that this unusual premise is nothing more sensational than a particularly touching love story may sound faintly disingenuous to a cynical observer, but again, what we see onscreen makes perfect sense of it all. It's an impossibly sweet and charming romance, with the two protagonists cautiously shedding their 'seasoned romantic' skins as they revert to the adorable awkwardness of nervous, first-time daters. All that remains is for the viewers to suspend their need to categorise and enoy it. Would that it could be so simple. "I'm sure there'll be some people who'll turn off because there's a gay character," admits Lesley. "And there'll be some people saying 'There you go - homosexual men, all they need is a good woman.'"

Russell echoes her concerns with another "So what?" shrug. "I think there's a genuine worry that when idiots get hold of this, idiots will be standing up and saying that it tells us all a gay man needs is a decent woman." He grins at the absurdity of it. "Like I'd think that? It's just so not true. We're very careful about that all the way through."

Of course, there's the reaction of the gay community to contend with as well, specifically regarding the old chestnut of representation. The mere mention of the word sees Russell's eyes rolling. "There's a lot of gay drama that is label label label, representation representation representation, and ooh, must do this, and ooh, must be politically correct... and it's not proper drama." Russell discusses the issue with humour, but the idea that he should feel answerable to a community is one he's clearly tired of. "Oh to be a straight writer," he laughs. "If I were a straight writer, I could write 'Scene 1; enter big, fat, boozing, smoking, violent, wifebeating bastard' without worrying that all straight men might be angry about it. That must be absolutely wonderful."

As far as Alan's concerned, there is no representation issue. "Russell will get that all his life," he frowns. "I think he gets a bit hurt by it, but he's also defiant about it. He's entitled to write stories - why can't he write a gay person's story? It doesn't have to be representational. The fact is, Russell has an extraordinary ear and eye for human relationships - throughout this story all the straight relationships are handled so beautifully well. In short, whatever your situation, whoever you are, there is somebody going through your agony in Bob And Rose."

Put it to Russell that the central premise of Bob And Rose represents an unassailable challenge to the public's trusty pigeon-holing system, and that defiance becomes all-too clear: "You know, I don't actually care," he smiles. "I really don't. I don't let it enter my head when I'm writing, because then that's censorship. Self-censorship, in fact, and that's the worst thing you can do to yourself. I'm well hardened to vociferous opinions, and I've yet to encounter one that's made me want to change the path I'm on. If you look at the 27 million different opinions abut Queer As Folk, if I'd listened to them I wouldn't be in a job."

Links:

• Sunday Times - http://www.sunday-times.co.uk/