Disgusting English Comedy Drivel

[Ralph Blunsom]

Lycidas:

> Question: Last night I watched a British Sitcom on the Tube.
> After this program I
> watched another, (my son loves these British sitcoms, "
> 'Absolutely Fabulous' Dad, it's ABFAB!") "Red Dwarf," in
> which a robot defeated another robot by causing him to
> malfunction due to a some "metaphysical dichotomy." It seems
> the robots believe in a silicon heaven, where all the dead
> calculators go when they die and where "the iron lies down
> with the lamp." Funny stuff.

Well, honestly. I've never witnessed such a vitriolic, unprovoked attack in all my
list days. Really, to conclude a discussion of two such execrable English sit-coms
as Goodnight Sweetheat and Red Dwarf with the words "funny stuff" is beyond the
pale. I'm sorry but to give a snapshot of English comedy like that really is
offensive! It could have been worse I suppose, but only if you had mentioned
Pauline Quirke or Noel Edmonds.

Why is it that American taste in English comedy is so bloody awful? Is it merely
because American network buyers have prescribed a diet to you of what they think
Americans like in English comedy? In other words, Monty Python, Benny Hill and Are
You Being Served? All of which may have been funny for five minutes on a wet
Wednesday in 1979, but hardly cut the mustard now.

As far as I know, this doesn't happen in the opposite direction. Unless The
Simpsons, Frasier and Larry Sanders are not cream of your crop. Feel free to put
me straight.

As any English fool know, the only funny man and arch satirist you need to know
about from these isles is Chris Morris. Admittedly, you're unlikely to get The Day
Today or Brass Eye broadcast in the US, but there are plenty bits you can download
from various sources. http://www.koekie.org.uk/funnel/ is as good a place as any
to start. He has inherited Peter Cook's mantle in many ways. You know, I once
heard some silly bint cry that Dudley Moore was the funny one - shocking business!

> There are many incompetent people in the world. But a
> Cornell University
> study has shown that most incompetent people do not know
> that they are
> incompetent.

Hardly news is it. One of the sketches from Morris' Blue Jam radio show begun:

Gregory Corbish (voice over): My name's Gregory Corbish.  I run the Pro-Thick
Agency.  It's a niche business.  It's,
actually we provide thick people for employment in jobs that they can do better
than anyone else.  For example,
they're very good at winning arguments.  They're too thick to realise they've
lost.

--
Sorry to have mithered on so. Lecture over.