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

no-one in the uk version of the office is supposed to be likeable in the same way their american counterparts are, tbf

I find Dawn and Tim miles more likable than their American counterparts.

Like Tim's smugness is undercut with self deprication and vulnerability, whereas often Jim just comes across as smug and nothing else.

the thing i found the oddest is that Tim is also sharing the pornography, hiding the doldoes etc, things that would be o_O in any 2018 office = he's a dick. jim's practical jokes only ever get as bad as replacing dwight's desk with cardboard...

Loved the UK Office when it first ran, but find it unwatchable now. Partly its the surfeit of cringe comedy since, partly its Gervais-malaise. I definitely prefer the warmth and redemption of the US series.

Everyone's likeable in US sitcoms, that's one of the problems with US sitcoms.

*cough* Seinfeld, It's Always Sunny, Larry Sanders, etc etc

Generalization. I don't know what It's Always Sunny is tbh.

Comedy of douchebaggery

I know it now I've seen the full title but if it's not on Freeview I've never seen it. Who's hidden my Werthers?

I just couldn't be bothered typing out the whole title. It's good, inasmuch as I ever comment on or care about stuff

Gervais is unwatchable now for me but I thought the cruelty and pettiness of the 2 proper seasons of the Office, before he disappeared up Freeman's colon, were horribly real

That kind of comedy of cruelty feels anachronistic in this day and age, in that its a more overtly cruel era for the world and British comedy seems to have got gentler. The humour in Detectorists or People Just Do Nothing is more in a sort of quiet desperation but everyone is essentially likeable.

Same goes for This Country as well. I'm probably the first person to have ever described PJDN as 'quiet' but I think you get what I mean.

It's not unaffectionate towards its hapless characters, yeah. It's near impossible for a writer to really hate their characters and not come across as a nob a la Gervais

I think The Xmas special 2-parter is the best thing anyone involved will ever be in, easily one of the best things I’ve ever seen. The rest of it is funny but much more often grim and sad but it kinda felt that way back then too.

And things like this still crack me up

https://youtu.be/13Bn-PT9TKE

everyone is essentially likeable.

Well apart from Grindah.

Speaking of hateable characters, has anyone watched Julia Davis's new thing? Caught the first episode and wasn't particularly moved to continue

I never watch anything she's done, oh so transgressive misanthropy seems like her entire shtick

OTM.

Yeah, she does only have one trick. But I enjoyed Camping and Human Remains is a classic

i don’t know where to put this so i’m putting it here: someone’s been going around norwich spraying “LES DENNIS” on walls

the connection with “uk comedy” is that i’m on a tram and am trying really really hard not to cry with laughter

about 20-30 years ago Glasgow was covered with graffiti that simply said

AL JOLSON

new Big Night Out on bbc4 from wednesday

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0btc4d3

Sweet

i don’t know where to put this so i’m putting it here: someone’s been going around norwich spraying “LES DENNIS” on walls

― calamity gammon (Autumn Almanac), Friday, 23 November 2018 07:23 (yesterday) Bookmark Flag PostPermalink

Beats east London's "NAT HAS HERPES" slogan on every wall

sally4ever's first couple of episodes were good. really ott sex sequence juxtaposed with nerdy, awful, cuckolded fiancé flossing etc. to the sound of "china in your hand" had me in stitches

objections to julia davis' schtick above are noted, and i don't really disagree, i just find the stuff funny despite the one-note nature

Catastrophe starts again tonight on ch4. the last series, iirc, was more arguing than comedy but i'll give it another go.

taped blackadder 4 the other day (the hospital spy episode) and it was painful to watch. i deleted the other episodes unwatched.

the Upstart Crow / Christmas Carol mashup though, was quite well done, i thought. (sat on the same table as one of the producers during some training just before christmas, he was telling me about this and vic and bob's latest show)

(speaking of vic and bob, were the parkour and the ghost hunter bits of the last season from somewhere else? i remember seeing similarly themed webisodes somewhere before)

oh,

http://www.youtube.com/watch?reload=9&v=pI-MUrrbV3E

Vic and Bob's Afternoon Delights. sponsored by fosters. pre-runner to the alan partridge things?

I think the Alan Partridge one was the first and there was a Fast Show one too?

Catastrophe starts again tonight on ch4. the last series, iirc, was more arguing than comedy but i'll give it another go.

this is generally a bugbear of mine too, fwiw, that writers think bickering and arguing between couples is interesting or amusing to watch but Catastrophe was one of the rare examples that pulled it off, imo.

Who's afraid of Virginia Woolf is another example.

Both leads on Catastrophe are so likable and funny that the sloppy writing is excusable.

is the windsors as terrible as it looks?

― (main prostitute from Game Of Thrones) (bizarro gazzara), Wednesday, 11 May 2016 17:32 (two years ago) Permalink

The Windsors has turned out to be one of the best Brit comedies of the last few years IMO. The Richard Branson thing they're doing now is pretty good, too.

I tried Flowers and couldn't really cope with it: the forced eccentricity on every inch of the screen and in the script left me no room to breathe. It had the whiff of farce about it, too. Does it calm down?

i wouldn't know

my interest in the whimsical sadness of posh eccentrics ran its course for me halfway through my second wes anderson movie

No, Flowers doesn't calm down. If anything it gets worse.

Ta for the tip on The Windsors, I had been avoiding it.

latepass for Stath Lets Flats here - lovely stuff, proper Cypriots, proper slapstick, I lolled

This season of Catastrophe is so weird!!

- It looks like it's shot in LA. the locations are recognisably London, but everything is suffused with a golden-hour glow and the saturation looks like it's been subtly amped

- Everyone's hair looks better, and everything in general just looks more expensive (but this always happens on successful sitcoms)

- the two leads are written as over-broad dickheads when.. i didn't really see them that way before? Everyone's a Seinfeldian asshole now??

- Ashley Jensen as Fran is my favourite character now

- tho when it's just Horgan and Delaney they still got it

director of S1-S3 moved on to do Sex Education

yeah. there's something lifeless about it now tbh

It looks like it's shot in LA.

Most of the locations are walking distance from my house so I'd never think this.

The quality has been patchy since the first season imo, this one no more or less. Thinly written but well performed. Always very watchable.

i did say it's recognisably London - but it's always sunny! it's like there's some kind of Instagram filter they've applied to it

Where is the big park where Rob confronted the youths?

Sharon being a dick to the kid who was afraid of her was totally out of character, I guess they were going for a seinfeld/larry david awkwardness thing but it really didn't work.

Where is the big park where Rob confronted the youths?

Shoreditch Park - very recognisable from that wheel sculpture thing. Actually a fairly small park!

Oh and re:

i did say it's recognisably London - but it's always sunny!

Judging from the state of the grass it was filmed last summer, so that's real genuine heatwave sunshine.

Currently being dug up (this is a safe bet for many London parks but it's also true, my commute takes me past there)

Last night's Imagine about Jo Brand was fairly good and has some interesting stuff about her childhood and teenage years.