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That's Entertainment!

A Survey of American and British Television

Dewhurst / JungWeek 8:

Light Entertainment

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Light Entertainment• stand-up comedy• sketch shows• sitcoms

Stand-Up Comedy

“… often depends on the shocking violation of normative taboos.” (Marc, Comic Visions, 20)

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Stand-Up Comedy• Informal, fast-paced, spontaneous routine• Observational humour, anecdote, biography• Performed live in comedy clubs, bars,

theatres, alternative venues• ‘Comedy circuits’, e.g. London pubs and

clubs, northern seaside towns• Easiest field for new talent to enter• A minority succeed in making transition to

television

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Famous Comics

Frankie Howerd Jasper Carrot Victoria Woods Eddie Izzard

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Jo BrandLenny Henry

Lee Evans Jack Dee

The Edinburgh Festival Fringe

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Billy Connolly

• Born in Glasgow in 1942• Left school at 15 to work in shipyards• Began career as a folk musician, but then

made transition to stand-up comedy• Appeared on ‘Parkinson’ in 1971• Successful tours, television performances• Now also appears in serious dramas and

films (Mrs Brown, 1997)• Biography Billy appeared 2001

Sketch Shows

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Characteristics of Sketch Shows• Series of short comedy scenes between

one and ten minutes long• Performed by group of comedic actors• Often partly improvised• Have their origins in Music Hall tradition• Early stage sketch shows: Cambridge

Footlights, Beyond the Fringe• Early radio sketch shows: The Goon

Show, ITMA

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

The Goon Show, 1951-

60

The ADC Theatre in

Cambridge, home of

Cambridge Footlights

Beyond the Fringe, 1960s

It’s That Man Again, 1939-49

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Monty Python’s Flying Circus• Python members: Graham Chapman, John

Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones and Michael Palin

• First episode aired in 1969• Ran to 45 episodes to 1974• Structured as a sketch show, but with an

innovative stream-of-consciousness approach

• Stage tours, four films, numerous audio recordings, books

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Spitting Image,

1984-92

Satirical Sketch Shows

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Not the Nine O’Clock News (1979-82)

Popular Sketch Shows

Harry Enfield’s Television Show (1990-4)

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Mr Bean (1990-5)• Created by Rowan Atkinson,

Richard Curtis and Robin Driscoll

• Emerged from Atkinson’s stageperformances

• Relies upon physical comedy, with very little dialogue

• Only one significant character• Animated series from 2002

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Comedy Double ActsThe Two Ronnies

Morecambe and Wise

Smith and Jones

Newman and

Baddiel

Sitcoms

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Functions of a Sitcom• To reinforce or challenge the audience’s

prejudices and expectations

Concerns:-• Class conflicts and social structures• Other ideological conflicts

– race (It Ain’t Half Hot Mum)– liberals vs. conservatives (Open All Hours)– gender (Men Behaving Badly)

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Characteristics of British Sitcoms

• Produced by one or two writers• Structured approach to plot and character

development• Character-led rather than plot-led humour• Black comedy, satire, farce or bathos,

bawdiness and innuendo, wordplay• Large variety of styles and settings: realist,

hyperrealist, historical, fantastical

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Realist Sitcoms...

...centred on family structures: • Steptoe and Son• Butterflies• Some Mothers Do ‘Ave ‘Em• Only Fools and Horses• Till Death Us Do Part• One Foot in the Grave

• All unconventional, often dysfunctional family units

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Realist Sitcoms...

...centred on living arrangements:• The Liver Birds• Citizen Smith• Rising Damp• The Young Ones

• Characters are often students or people on the margins of society

• Living conditions are often squalid

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Realist Sitcoms......centred on the workplace:

• Fawlty Towers (hotel)• Yes, Minister (government ministry)• Auf Wiedersehen, Pet (building trade)• Rumpole of the Bailey (law courts)• The New Statesman (parliament)• Drop the Dead Donkey (TV news producers)• The Brittas Empire (leisure centre)

...centred on other institutions or structures• Porridge (prison)• Last of the Summer Wine (group of elderly friends

in a Yorkshire village)

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Historical Sitcoms• Up Pompeii! (ancient Pompeii)• Dad’s Army (WW II)• ‘Allo ‘Allo (WW II)• Blackadder (various periods from

Middle Ages to WW I)

Fantasy Sitcoms• Red Dwarf (spaceship)

Development of the Sitcom

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Early British Sitcom• First true British sitcom:

Pinwright’s Progress (1946-7)• ITV screens I Love Lucy in late 1950s• Hancock’s Half Hour, 1954-61 on radio (from

1956 on television)• Class antagonisms and social commentary• Aspirational frustrations• Cod philosophy• Naturalistic, gloomy setting• Lugubrious, pessimistic central male character

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

1960s

The Likely Lads, 1964-6

Till Death Us Do Part, 1966-8, 1972, 1974-5

Steptoe and Son, 1962-5

Dad’s Army 1968-77

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Dad’s Army• Set in fictional seaside town of Walmington-

on Sea during WWII• Featured local Home Guard (part-time, semi-

retired soldiers) • Captain Mainwearing: authoritarian figure;

opposition from Air Raid Patrol Warden Hodges

• Theme tune ‘Who do you think you are kidding, Mr Hitler’, sung by war-time entertainer Bud Flanagan

• Repeats continue to draw record audiences

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Rising Damp, 1974-8 Porridge, 1974-7

Citizen Smith, 1977-80

1970s

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Fawlty Towers (1975-9)• Created by John Cleese (Monty Python) and

Connie Booth• 12 episodes broadcast• Central characters:

• Basil Fawlty, owner of a southern English seaside hotel • Sybil, his tyrannical wife• Manuel, the Spanish waiter• Polly, the long-suffering waitress

• Class humour, centred on snobbery and narrow-mindedness of Basil

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

1980s

Yes, Minister, 1980-2 Yes, Prime Minister, 1986-8

The Comic Strip

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Only Fools and Horses (1981-91)• Created by John Sullivan• Seven series broadcast, plus

Christmas episodes• Voted ‘Britain’s Best Sitcom’ in 2004

BBC poll• Centred on Del Boy (market trader)

and his younger brother Rodney, who live on a housing estate in Peckham

• Focuses on Del’s ‘dodgy deals’; mixes humour with pathos

Blackadder

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Blackadder (1983-9)

• Created by Richard Curtis and Ben Elton (Rowan Atkinson)

• Set in Middle Ages, court of Elizabeth I, palace of Prince Regent, WWI

• Each series features same cast of actors in different settings, with differences in status and relationship

• Voted second in 2004 poll to find ‘Britain’s Best Sitcom’

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

1990s

One Foot in the Grave, 1990-

Rab C. Nesbitt, 1990-

Absolutely Fabulous, 1992-5

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

Absolutely Fabulous (1992-)

• Written by Jennifer Saunders• Grew from sketch performed in the comedy

show French and Saunders • Humour centres on Edina and Patsy, two

stuck-in-the-sixties, substance-abusing fashion and fad-obsessed Londoners

• Edina’s daughter, Saffron is voice of reason• Good deal of physical humour, often arising

from Edie’s substance abuse

Jung / Dewhurst: WS 2005/06That’s Entertainment! A Survey of American and British Television

The Royle Family, 1998

The Office, 2001-

Drop the Dead Donkey, 1990-

Hyperrealist Sitcom