Rolling UK Comedy Thread - "Ricky Don't Lose Larry David's Number

That Andrew Lawrence must have been doing a 'bit', right? No one's talked in those kinds of cliches since Alf Garnett.

Doing a bit of what?

bit of politics

http://mothinabutterfly.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/44975680_ben_elton_1990_466bbc.jpg

It's not, in fairness, as funny as describing Frankie Boyle as 'achingly PC'.

The Shambolic Skeptic • a day ago
Nothing worse than the giggling, smirking, grinning, self-appointed, self-congratulating elitist cabal that call themselves comedy performers.

Who watches these so not funny morons anyway?

Toast of London is back - not quite as funny as I'd remembered but worth a go if you're bored.

Some people have put two and two together and got pretty much 4 to explain why Dapper Laughs got commissioned:

There is still one question that remains from the fallout of the whole Dapper Laughs debacle. Namely: why on earth would ITV commission such a controversial comedian to make a blatantly sexist show? If you take Dapper out of the equation though, it suddenly starts to make a lot more sense…

And so Dapper Laughs has laughed his last. Two days ago, Daniel O’Reilly was forced onto Newsnight in a sombre turtleneck, first to have Emily Maitlis repeat his punchlines back at him (in the same humourless-yet-hilarious style she once delivered Frankie Boyle’s “I’m so old, my pussy is haunted” line) and then to ceremoniously slit the throat of his ‘creation’, Dapper Laughs.
A lot has been written about the whole Dapper Laughs imbroglio – pieces about free speech and censorship, pieces about comedy and classism, pieces about online bullying, rape culture and the place of satire in the 21st century. All of that has been scrutinised in minute detail by thousands of commentators and there is no reason for us to revisit or rehash it any further.
The only question that still seems to be plaguing people is this: why on earth would ITV commission Dapper Laughs in the first place?
Here’s one possible answer for you.

Dapper Laughs: On The Pull is listed as having been co-devised by two companies. One is Big Minded Limited is a production company headed up by Jolene Ellis and Chris Graves. The other is Proper Moist Limited is a company which lists Daniel O’Reilly as a boardmember. Both Graves and O’Reilly are also listed as executive producers of the show alongside one other man: Dan Baldwin.
Daniel Peter Baldwin is the man listed as the Managing Director of Hungry Bear Media – the company which actually produces the show. (They have since removed any mention of Dapper Laughs on their homepage, but pics are still floating about on their domain.)

If you know his name, it won’t be as Managing Director of Hungry Bear Media. It’ll be for one of his other achievements. To people in the industry, he made his name at ITV as the producer of Ministry Of Mayhem – the Saturday morning successor to SM:TV. To the general public though, Daniel Baldwin is better known for something else.
Being the husband of Holly Willoughby.
Holly Willoughby, in case you’ve never had the pleasure, is one of ITV’s golden geese. She is the presenter of ITV’s flagship daytime magazine programme This Morning; the presenter of ITV’s primetime feel-good family show Surprise, Surprise; and, up until recently, a team captain on ITV’s specialist programming for the feeble-minded, Celebrity Juice.
How does all of this connect to Dapper Laughs? Very simply.
Willoughby and Baldwin don’t just enjoy a close personal relationship, they enjoy a close professional one too. In fact, their careers are almost atomically intertwined. Although Baldwin recently stood down as secretary of Peaches Productions Ltd (Willoughby’s personal production company), he has served as producer or executive producer on a number of her shows – including Ministry Of Mayhem, Holly and Stephen’s Saturday Showdown, Lemon La Vida Loca and Celebrity Juice.
That’s a pretty hefty bargaining chip, especially considering that ITV almost lost Willoughby to the BBC once (when she left Dancing On Ice to host The Voice). They couldn’t risk that happening again. Certainly not over some paltry little internet show that they could commission for a single six-part series, stick in the schedules on Monday at 10:30pm and then quietly shelf citing poor ratings.
The Baldwin-Willoughby alliance wouldn’t have been the only consideration though, obviously. But guess which pair of geniuses are also credited with having come up with the idea for Celebrity Juice? Jolene Ellis and Chris Graves – head honchos at Big Minded Ltd and fellow Dapper devisers.
Celebrity Juice is a massive vehicle for ITV2. It’s the most watched show they’ve ever broadcast – drawing in over 2 million viewers for a single episode at its peak. They do not want to piss off anyone involved in that. Not the people who devised the show, but particularly not producer/creator Dan Baldwin.
It’s easy to see why the commission was a no-brainer. The creative team behind On The Pull already had their feet lodged right in under the table at ITV, so ITV couldn’t very well bounce them out on the street. Dapper’s 500,000 strong Vine following and million fans on Facebook might have sweetened the pot, but this literally was an offer they couldn’t refuse. The potential repercussions were too great.
Even with all the furore and negative publicity the show has caused, it would probably still be worth ITV2 commissioning it if they had their time again, because the alternative could have been much worse for them. It might even be why they were championing the show right up until the bitter end. Sure, they have some temporary egg on their face right now, but the talent – both on-screen and off – remain relatively happy. And, more importantly, remain at ITV.
Of course, we are in no way suggesting that Holly Willoughby had anything to do with the commissioning of Dapper Laughs directly. Not at all. The extent of Holly Willoughby’s involvement probably goes no further than getting her mate (Mike Skinner from The Streets) the job of composing Dapper Laughs’ theme tune.
No, this appears to be Dan Baldwin’s burden to shoulder. And the weirdest part of it all is that Baldwin actually inadvertently prophesied this whole backlash months ago.
Back when the commission was announced, Baldwin stated – in all earnestness – that “I actually believe [Dapper Laughs] is the new Cilla Black.” Oh, how right he turned out to be. For the only person at ITV who is still, to this day, spoken about with greater disdain than Dapper Laughs?
Forever and always, Cilla Black.

PS: The company records for Hungry Bear Media also list the chairman as being one Peter David Jones. The same Peter David Jones who dishes out money on Dragons’ Den and has also appeared as a guest star on… Celebrity Juice.

Should I know who Dapper Laughs is?

If you live in the UK and have access to the media, probably.

I do and I do and I still don't. It's some kind of internet nonsense I assume?

Started off on vine, had an incredibly misogynistic programme on ITV, media shit storm ensued, now claims the whole thing was an ironic character piece and has retired the persona. It was all over my FB news feed for a few days.

Traditional media covered it as well though, there was a Newsnight interview.

Wow, Catastrophe is actually extremely funny.

some of the forced outrageousness of the humour is kind of eye rolly at times but yeah, surprisingly good

the unsteadicam annoyed me.

Just renewed for a second series and picked up by Amazon Prime in the States...

enjoying it a lot

Yeah, it's funny, which is always good in a comedy.

Nice that they've just taken a simple classic set-up then made up some good characters and written some good jokes.

She is actually talented, which unusual.

what's unusual?

I know I go on about Pulling, but that was excellent too

Catastrophe is GREAT GREAT GREAT heavy lollage

(xp) unusual for someone involved in UK/Irish comedy to have actual talent.

checked out Catastrophe thanks to this thread. Seriously great.

Maybe we need a separate thread for Catastrophe? It's really one of the best things on UK TV right now.

Maybe wait until someone has something interesting to say about it?

there was a particularly affecting moment right at the end of the last episode i saw *SPOILER* the one where they're worried about Downs syndrome. I won't spoil it too much, but it was extremely well done and made me nearly do a little cry.

Yeah, that was nice. I don't have anything particularly new or insightful to say about Catastrophe other than I wish I'd watched Pulling now.

Really enjoyed the last episode of Catastrophe. Consistently excellent writing throughout, I assume if I enjoyed this I should seek out Pulling ASAP?

long shot here but does anyone here have any of the collections of danny baker radio shows? few multi-gig torrents floating around but with zero seeders

There are lots on Soulseek though they are maybe not of the vintage you're looking for - mostly mid 2000s at this moment.

Pulling also starts with hen-do scenes which made me love it so guess that's kind of her forte. Also a couple of other touches which are in Catastrophe. It's like the younger obnoxious sibling vs Catastrophe's jadedness. Can't believe you all haven't seen it, get on it asap. There's a Christmas special which is a bit odd iirc but still good?

xpost thanks, hadn't thought of ssk!

Brian Pern is gigging...

http://www.beyondthejoke.co.uk/content/1747/news-brian-pern-hits-road-real

Is there a Horrible Histories thread?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIIN_4dFP0E

First episode of Not Safe For Work was decent.

Not Safe For Work finished. Good show. Vacillates between near-slapstick comedy and dark drama, so the tone's a bit all over the place, but I liked it enough.

Thought it started quite well but fell flat. I really didn't care about any of the characters at the end, except maybe Jeffries? And I didn't really 'get' how Zawe Ashton was playing Katherine. There didn't really seem to be any stakes. I dunno why I watched it all, really. Maybe because it looked like my workplace.

i have been enjoying TaskMaster over on dave. yeah, it's 7 people on the brink of televisual overexposure acting like idiots but...

(dave also currently showing new-to-terrestrial-tv episodes of Parks and Rec and that Last Man On Earth thing, the first episode of which showed promise. also kristen schaal. neither of which are uk comedy i realise now. but i can't untype what i've already typed.)

xp it had its bum notes and yeah sometimes I felt like it lacked the necessary empathy/drive for me to care enough about all the characters, but something about it rang 'true' to me. this is a good take on it, comparing it to This Life and Peep Show http://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/tvandradioblog/2015/jun/30/channel-4-not-safe-for-work-drama-this-life-lost-generation

People Do Nothing went quite sharply downhill in its second series. In retrospect the first probably wasn't all that funny, it was just the novelty of seeing that world depicted with any kind of accuracy.

Steves is still classic though.

yeah, people do nothing went downhill after the pilot, really. so disappointing how much it lost what made it great

Guys, there's a BBC Scotland show called Mountain Goats that is a genuine contender for worst BBC sitcom of all time. Shows levels of sophistication that makes Miranda look like Stewart Lee. Seriously, you've got to iPlayer it.

The trailer alone was the worst thing I have seen on TV this year.

In episode one, the token daft woman says "sucked off" repeatedly for nearly five minutes while the rest of the cast fall bout and the laugh track goes into overdrive.

Oh Christ I think I had that on in the background last night while on my laptop and I had to turn it off which is saying something

I have managed to get through all four and it never rises above execrable.

I'll be charitable - in the third episode when she lies on the car bonnet talking about Gourmet Night it could possibly be an homage to Fawlty Towers, which by even associating with it would be the nearest it gets to comedy.

There's a Brentford Nylons parody in ep 4 ffs.

Please can you and Autumn Almanac liveblog it like with The Wright Way?

i have been enjoying TaskMaster over on dave. yeah, it's 7 people on the brink of televisual overexposure acting like idiots but...

Yeah, have been laughing myself silly at this, sad it's ended. It's also the first time I think I've ever really found Greg Davis funny. New series of Modern Life is Good-ish replacing it next week.

seeing Doon Mackichan reduced to appearing in this was depressing in a 'Jack Docherty in Badults' sort of way