little britain

[MJ_junkie86]

just wondering if any of you yanks had seen this, and how u would feel if it was an american show.
the show basically takes the michael outta sterotypes of people

http://www.bbc.co.uk/comedy/littlebritain/clips/

MJ

[Idnew]

Looks funnier than some of the American shows I see.

[MJ_junkie86]

yeah its a gread show.
tho gettin a little boring now (on the 3rd series)

jus wondering coz all americans seem strongly pro america, and if a show was there takin the p*** of the people of america, i jus wonder how it would go down with the masses

MJ

[Serendipity]

Yeah but no but yeah but.....

What grates with me about LB is that so many people regurgitate its catchphrases. It has some incredible funny bits, it must be said, but I stopped watching TV a while ago (except for important things like the footy and University Challenge), so I don't know what the 3rd series is like. Matt Lucas is a brilliant comic actor, I must say.

[MJ_junkie86]

yeah i must say a havent seen much of the 3rd series due to working. what i hav seen i wasnt too impressed about.

i dislike little briatain now than when i 1st saw it, at least 2 yrs ago, for the reason you cave. too many people use the catchphrases. at work one day someone even said, computer said no, it was totally out of place and uncalled for. and it bugs me how all the little kids now watch it.
it was better was it was still unheard of and me and my bro used to watch it, knowin we were in on something others knew nothin about.

and that cartoon show monkey dust. that used to follow LB on bbc3. those were the days.

MJ

[dave404]

Vicky Pollard is a nicely observed character, but I'm not a huge LB fan. It just gets boring after a while. I'm more of a League of Gentlemen kind of guy, though I haven't heard whether the movie is any good yet.

Note for Americans, not the Extraordinary League of Gentlemen. This one:

http://www.leagueofgentlemen.co.uk/

[sinecure]

I gotta admit that I have a LOT of trouble understanding most Brit comedians... It's a language/idiom/accent problem.

Benny Hill was hillarious, although there were some of his characters that I had trouble with. His sight-gags were wonderful!

John Cleese is funny as heck, but when he speaks fast, I'm usually lost. ...or when he's making some arcane exclusively-Brit reference.

The rest of these are unknown to me... and are most likely destined to remain so. :clueless :confused :sleep

[Serendipity]

I understand the US has a remake version of The Office. I've not seen it, but the Brit original probably wouldn't go down well in the US (due to the Britishness of it), but it was painfully funny. Wisely, they stopped making it before it turned sour - I wish someone would tell the makers of Friends that they should have stopped years ago.

[DustyBottoms]

Absolutely Fabulous... :lol

[ZenziC]

I quite liked Little Britain and it's here on BBC America (if you have digital cable in America).

I thought the new season was somewhat offensive with David Walliams' character with the incontinence (peeing everywhere and not noticing it). Some British newspapers commented on this being really offensive.

The Office was really good. They reran some good shows over christmas as a treat on the BBC like Only Fools and Horses and Open All Hours.

I shall miss watching Eastenders (with several classic sitcom stars like Are You Being Served's Wendy Richard and Carry On's Barbara Windsor), Hollyoaks, University Challenge, and Neighbours. There were some good Christmas specials such as French and Saunders which was great.

Dusty, you can check out French and Saunders if you like Ab Fab, heh.

[ZenziC]

I understand the US has a remake version of The Office. I've not seen it, but the Brit original probably wouldn't go down well in the US (due to the Britishness of it), but it was painfully funny. Wisely, they stopped making it before it turned sour - I wish someone would tell the makers of Friends that they should have stopped years ago.

It's too hard to try to copy such a successful British show. There was this show called Coupling (which I sometimes watched on BBC America) that was Americanised and it was quite a dismal failure.

The Office, here, seems that it's different from the British show. I haven't watched it yet.

[Serendipity]

The original Coupling was another painfully funny show, even though it seemed to me to be aimed at pleasing the US market, as it looked more like an American show than British. I have a bad feeling about the US version of The Office, however, as often US comedy relies on over-the-top or energetic characterisation, and the original has very understated characterisation. Except when David Brent did the Rev. Hammer dance... I laughed til it hurt.

[dave404]

IIRC, they also tried to export Men Behaving Badly, but that's another comedy that doesn't translate. Sank w/o trace, I believe.

I've always been a bit mystified as to why Fawlty Towers and Monty Python seem so perennially popular in the US. I like them just fine, but a lot of the humour is very peculiarly British. Maybe the slapstick is enough to get people giggling, and the surrealism does the rest? Not sure.

[sinecure]

Uhhhh.... you wouldn't suppose that with Python and Towers we colonists are laughing AT you Brits instead of WITH y'all?:question :think :clueless :wink


:rofl

[dave404]

I dunno Sin, I wouldn't have thought you'd bother to watch more than once to do that. I mean, I could watch Joey and laugh at the stupidity of US TV execs in making spinoffs that suck like a vacuum, but somehow I have better things to do. Still, you may be right...

[Serendipity]

I hate to take the sting out, Sin, but Brits tend to be the first to laugh at themselves and each other. FT has been voted as the best Brit comedy (of course, that's just a poll....), and there were only 12 episodes ever made. So much successful Brit comedy is based on mocking people's middle-class aspirations, from FT to Keeping Up Appearances (wasn't that also remade in the US? Not sure). Oddly, I can't stand most of Benny Hill, although his shortsighted newsreader describing events in a "jug of saliva" (for Jugoslavia) tickles me every time I think of it.

[ZenziC]

Sin, that's the exact premise of Little Britain. They make fun of their own countrymen and it ends up really funny to their own countrymen. Politics, chavs, yobs, storeowners, etc face the funny wrath of Wailliams and Lucas.

It's funny when one of their characters is so funny, it boosts the economy of the town their character lives in. Dafydd Thomas of Llanddewi Brefi is an example, and Llanddewi Brefi always ends up replacing their signs (now they sell them in the shops).

Little America would be the same way but some people would fail to see the humour in it.

[sinecure]

I'll take your [collective] word for it....http://www.kurts-smilies.de/hae.gif

...but the "Dead Parrot" Python skit still sends me into respiratory paralysis!

I once proposed to write a book entitled "Teutonic Humor And Other Myths"... my agent said it wouldn't sell... too short. http://pages.prodigy.net/rogerlori1/emoticons/nono2.gif