that's entertainment! - staff.uni-giessen.dega1070/entwk8.pdf · jung / dewhurst: ws 2005/06...

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)


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


Famous Comics

Frankie Howerd Jasper Carrot Victoria Woods Eddie Izzard


Jo BrandLenny Henry

Lee Evans Jack Dee

The Edinburgh Festival Fringe


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


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


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


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


Spitting Image,

1984-92

Satirical Sketch Shows


Not the Nine O’Clock News (1979-82)

Popular Sketch Shows

Harry Enfield’s Television Show (1990-4)


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


Comedy Double ActsThe Two Ronnies

Morecambe and Wise

Smith and Jones

Newman and

Baddiel

Sitcoms


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)


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


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


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


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)


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


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


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


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


Rising Damp, 1974-8 Porridge, 1974-7

Citizen Smith, 1977-80

1970s


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


1980s

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

The Comic Strip


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


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’


1990s

One Foot in the Grave, 1990-

Rab C. Nesbitt, 1990-

Absolutely Fabulous, 1992-5


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


The Royle Family, 1998

The Office, 2001-

Drop the Dead Donkey, 1990-

Hyperrealist Sitcom

that's entertainment! - staff.uni-giessen.dega1070/entwk8.pdf · jung / dewhurst: ws 2005/06...

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