COMEDY SHOWCASE: Girl Friday

The final Comedy Showcase pilot ended the season on a real downer. Girl Friday was a heinous carbuncle of a sketch show, apparently throwing together a mix of rising stars and mildly-recognisable faces who have small roles in bad sitcoms. There was Sara Pascoe (ironically best known for a role in Free Agents, which was a Comedy Showcase success last year), Josie Long (a likeable stand-up comedian now appearing on panel shows every other week), Kerry Howard (sister of comedian Russell, who also played the gormless secretary in this year's Reggie Perrin remake), newcomer Nat Luurtsema, Kathryn Drysdale (the dippy one from Two Pints...), and Lu Corfield (RADA-trained jobbing actress).

The cast wasn't exactly stellar, although there's something very charming about Josie Long and Kerry Howard definitely has some talent, but everyone else was largely forgettable. Of course, the main problem here was that none of the sketches were actually very funny – with the "highlights" only raising a wry smile, at best. I quite liked the roadside mechanic staging a cliché from a slasher film in order to get a car started, but that was literally the only sketch that lodged in my memory. The rest was very weak, but made worse by the fact quite a few bad sketches/ideas (a dire parody of Loose Women called Looser Women, for example) kept recurring with alarming regularity, as if the writers genuinely thought they were comedy gems the audience would lap up.

Hate to say it, but Smack The Pony is still the only all-female sketch show that's ever worked for me (as a man), but maybe something about Girl Friday got lost in translation between the sexes. All I know is that I didn't laugh once and found most of it rather uninspired (a séance uses a Ouija board to talk to text-speaking ghosts) or dull (old folk recalling odd memories of The Blitz). A few half-decent ideas just didn't go anywhere unexpected or interesting (like a woman meeting her two-timing stalker in a bar), and there wasn't enough raw potential for me to consider giving Girl Friday another chance. A disappointing end to what's been a disappointing run of Comedy Showcase this year.


18 December 2009
Channel 4, 10.05pm

written by: Josie Long, Kerry Howard, Sara Pascoe, Nat Luurtsema, Kathryn Drysdale & Lu Corfield directed by: Ben Palmer starring: Josie Long, Kerry Howard, Sara Pascoe, Nat Luurtsema, Kathryn Drysdale & Lu Corfield

Read more...

COMEDY SHOWCASE: Guantanamo Phil

Some of these Comedy Showcase pilots feel like genuine first episodes of a series yet-to-come (Campus), others just have raw potential (PhoneShop, Todd Margaret), while others feel like trivial one-offs (The Amazing Dermot). Guantanamo Phil was definitely one for that latter category...

Created by Mark Bussell and Justin Sbresni, who gave us marital mishap comedy The Worst Week Of My Life, Guantanamo Phil ploughed similar comedic territory in its tale of a meek birdwatcher mistaken by US Marines for a terrorist while crossing the Afghanistan border and summarily detained in Guantanamo Bay for six years. Just released from this living hell, Phil (Steve Edge) returns home to his girlfriend Carly (Rebekah Staton) and tries to adjust to a life of freedom once more.

The jokes came from the fact Phil is a haplessly unlucky man (upon arrival at the airport he's immediately mistaken for a terrorist again by armed police), his friends are all either overprotective (one's convinced he's going to commit suicide so she removes his belt), or insensitive to his ordeal (a man is determined to get the £5 he's been owed six years), and Phil himself has acquired numerous quirks of behaviour as a result of his captivity (he selfishly devours a celebratory cake with his hands, almost pours a cup of urine over his head to "keep cool".)

Guantanamo Phil was pretty weak in terms of storytelling, as numerous things happened but didn't get much follow-through (the talent scout, etc.), and the concept itself was essentially a thin sketch idea stretched to half an hour. It didn't worthy of a full series, and I doubt Bussell and Sbresni even consider it a possibility they'll be asked to write more. No, this felt like they were scratching a creative itch, combining the controversy of Guantanamo Bay and the tale of those British plane-spotters arrested by Greek authorities. Consider the itch scratched, but it all felt eight years behind the curve.

That said, Steve Edge (Star Stories) was pretty good as the gormless Phil, I have a soft spot for Rebekah Staton (Pulling) and her clenched smiles, and the comedy arguably kept you chuckling more regularly than many of this year's Comedy Showcase pieces. It wasn't particularly sharp, clever or insightful, but there were some amusing gags and an endearing sense of silliness. If the story had been stronger and less rambling, I'd have enjoyed it more. But as a daft, extended sketch idea, Guantanamo Phil entertained.


11 December 2009
Channel 4, 10pm

written & directed by: Mark Bussell & Justin Sbresni starring: Steve Edge (Phil Mill), Rebekah Staton (Carly) & Justin Edwards (Government Official)

Read more...

COMEDY SHOWCASE: The Amazing Dermot

[SPOILERS] Kiwki comedian Rhys Darby has gained international cult appeal in recent years, for his role as inept bang manager Murray on HBO's Flight Of The Conchords, so it's a shame he isn't more discriminating about his projects. As the lead in this Comedy Showcase pilot, playing titular conjuror " The Amazing Dermot", Darby's cheeky enthusiasm wasn't enough to keep a sputtering script on the right path...

Improbably representing the UK's most famous magician/hypnotist, goateed Dermot's (Darby) life hits the rocks when his series is cancelled after he made two brothers kiss on live TV, prompting his airhead wife Lucille (Thaila Zucchi) to leave him. Determined to revive his career and bounce back to former greatness, Dermot checks into rehab as a PR stunt with his idiot manager Mickey (Darren Boyd), but discovers just as many obstacles while mixing with mentally ill celebs...

The idea of rehab would appear to lend itself well to comedy, particularly ones frequented by brittle celebrities, but there's mounting evidence to suggest otherwise (remember Russell Brand's rehab-based comedy for BBC3?) However, it wasn't the setup or premise that killed The Amazing Dermot, rather the fact that Dermot himself was both implausible and unlikeable. A-list magicians these days are not end-of-the-pier types like Dermot, so his very goateed existence gave the show a late-'80s sitcom feel. Darby's a talented performer, but Dermot lacked the all-important sympathy that his other screen roles have had.

Faring better were the supporting cast -- particularly the ever-dependable Boyd, who certainly has no problem exuding sympathy himself. Indeed, he managed to make a small subplot about wooing a deaf nurse (Genevieve Barr) more entertaining than everything else we were supposed to be focusing on. And there were some amusing turns from Alex McQueen (Kröd Mändoon & The Flaming Sword Of Fire) as the clinic's manager, and Sinead Keenan (Being Human) as a kid's TV presenter who had checked herself in for treatment.

The actual comedy was thin and obvious fare for the most part, but a few lines and ideas made me giggle: the resident drug-dealer "Edmonds" being revealed as none other than Noel Edmonds (going fictionally crazy again for the first time since that Day Today sketch), sign language being mistaken for bids in an auction, and a coarse dig at "sexaholic" Ulrika Jonsson. The show may have found more success if it had been populated with comedy versions of real celebs, too -- or at least broad approximations we can all identify. A lucid and intelligent Amy Winehouse, perhaps?

Overall, it's clear from this that I'm Alan Partridge did the "faded celebrity" idea with far more skill, panache, insight, and humour over ten years ago. By far the worst pilot of the Comedy Showcase season so far (in that it felt anachronistic and wasted some decent talent), I think this pilot is destined to become a minor curio for diehard Flight Of The Conchords fans – at best. At worst, a forgotten project nearly everyone will scratch their heads over when they find it on Rhys Darby's IMDb page.


4 December 2009
Channel 4, 10.35pm

written by: Jack Williams & Harry Williams directed by: Martin Green starring: Rhys Darby (Dermot Flint/Lesley), Darren Boyd (Mickey), Alex MacQueen (Neil), Sinead Keenan (Wendy), Genevieve Barr (Jessica), Thaila Zucchi (Lucille), Travis Oliver (Frank) & Alan Drake (Dermot/Lesley Double)

Read more...

COMEDY SHOWCASE: The Increasingly Poor Decisions Of Todd Margaret

[SPOILERS] More than anything else, the pedigree of this comedy pilot is by far the most interesting thing about it. Very much an Anglo-American venture, it finds Anglophiles co-writing and directing a one-off pilot that didn't feel at all deserving of a full series...

David Cross (Arrested Development) plays the eponymous Todd Margaret, an American office drone mistaken for a go-getting salesman by his obnoxious boss (Will Arnett), and sent to London to front the company's UK arm with a Korean energy drink called 'Thunder Muscle'. Lured by the six-figure salary, Todd goes along with the folly and arrives in Britain, only for his life to spiral out of control through a combination of culture shock, bad luck, and plain incompetence. His luggage is mistaken for a bomb and blown up, he discovers his sales team consists of one unhelpful Brit called Dave (Russell Tovey), and he has less than a week to shift dozens of drinks crates before his uselessness is exposed.

Less a comedy pilot, more the first act of a low-budget British indie made by calling in favours with American talent, The Increasingly Poor Decisions Of Todd Margaret just wasn't particularly funny or encouraging to go to a full series. The half-hour was packed with famous faces -- Sharon Horgan (Pulling) as Alice the café waitress, Matt King (Peep Show) as a taxi driver, Kayvan Novak (Fonejacker) as a bomb disposal expert, even Kristen Schaal (Flight Of The Conchords) had a blink-and-miss cameo – but the strength of material just wasn't there to justify this star-power.

Cross was actually very good as the bewildered, schlubby Todd Margaret, and his exasperation well captured as he stumbled from one mishap to the next. He was certainly a likeable and sympathetic lead, but there was nothing about this episode that I felt demanded we see more of his British misadventures. The title should perhaps have been "The Increasingly Silly Decisions Of Todd Margaret" as the script, co-written by Cross with Brit Shaun Pye (Monkey Dust), slowly disintegrated into pieces once Todd was ranting to old folk in a café after gulping down too much energy drink. It was also frustrating in how it ended too abruptly with an exhausted Todd pissing his trousers while lying on the floor of a filthy B&B – and I have no idea why his huge salary resulted in him staying there, anyway!

Overall, this felt like a project where Anglophiles just relished the chance to come to the UK, have some fun with a flawed script, work with actors from their favourite British shows, and then jet back home. However, given the fact the teaser featured Todd in court being charged with various crimes (conspirary to cause explosions, funding terrorists, treason, blackmail, possession of biological weapons), and the entire episode was a flashback to "14 Days Earlier", are we to believe the writers are confident a full series will be greenlit? I mean, why else structure your pilot in such a way? Perhaps Channel 4 will give us more of this cringe-comedy, if only to milk its associations with Arrested Development, but I'm not sure it really deserves it.

Sadly, I didn't really laugh or feel compelled by any of the situations being presented; I just played spot-the-celebrity for awhile.


27 November 2009
Channel 4, 10pm

written by: David Cross & Shaun Pye directed by: Anthony Russo & Joe Russo starring: David Cross (Todd Margaret), Sharon Horgan (Alice), Will Arnett (Todd's Boss), Russell Tovey (Dave), Kayvan Novak (Policeman) & Matt King (Taxi Driver)

Read more...

COMEDY SHOWCASE: PhoneShop 1.1 - "New Man"

The second pilot in the Comedy Showcase season used the ubiquitous mobile phone shop as its setting; businesses that have sprung up in high streets up and down the country this past decade. Stereotypically staffed by thirtysomething man-boys who think they're on the cutting edge of retail, PhoneShop gave us a decent enough half-hour of comedy poking fun at this delusion. Indeed, E4 considered this pilot so promising that it's already been picked up for a series next year...

Christopher (Tom Bennett) is a graduate student (resembling a shier Mark from Peep Show, spliced with The Office's David Brent), who is recruited by phone shop manager and chronic masturbator Ashley (Andrew Brooke) to replace an imprisoned colleague. "New man" Christopher becomes the charge of more experienced salesmen, wisecracking duo Lance (Martin Trenaman) and Jerwayne (Javone Prince), on a one-day trial to prove his worth as a salesman. But is the timid academic cut out for this high-pressure world?

PhoneShop certainly has potential, which is the good news. The cast connected together brilliantly and there were some nice lines and occasional insights into phone shop culture (like how attractive women are manipulated into bending over so someone can surreptitiously take a photo of their thong for the staff tea-bar.) It was certainly amusing to see how Lance and Jerwayne believe themselves to be high-flying alpha males, when in fact they're just peddling the latest Nokia's and Sony Ericsson's to largely indifferent customers. Oddly though, neither character came across as particularly likeable through the miasma of laddishness, although I appreciated the moment Lance told Christopher how to cheat his way through his induction by getting a friend to pose as a customer.

With PhoneShop already promoted to series, hopefully writer Phil Bowker will make his characters less caricatured and more rounded as realistic people – a la BBC Three's excellent Pulling, which he produced. The only character with inherent likeability was Christopher, and Bennett did a solid job as the innocent lamb thrown in with the lions. A lot of his mannerisms and the embarrassing situations he faced were reminiscent of other shows, particularly The Office (a coincidence that Ricky Gervais served as script editor?), but hopefully he'll find more unique quirks of his own in future.

The ambitious but thwarted Pay As You Go sales clerk Janine (Emma Fryer) was perhaps played too eccentrically, too. I'd have liked to see more realism in PhoneShop, as most of the characters were very broad, or felt like people you'd grow irritated by fairly quickly. Overall, PhoneShop worked well as a diverting pilot, but they'll have to adjust things if it's going to work as a regular series.


13 November 2009
Channel 4, 10.05pm

written & directed by: Phil Bowker starring: Tom Bennett (Christopher), Martin Trenaman (Lance), Andrew Brooke (Ashley), Javone Prince (Jerwayne), Emma Fryer (Janine), Ellena Stacey (Customer), Paul Pariser (Gruff Customer), Clare Vousden (Customer) & Kobna Holdbrook-Smith (Graham)

Read more...

COMEDY SHOWCASE: Campus

A welcome return for Channel 4's comedy pilot season, kicking off with a university-set retread of Green Wing. It's impossible not to think of that hospital comedy when watching Campus, as the same creative team are behind both, and Campus made no attempt to evolve beyond its progenitor. If you loved Green Wing, chance are you'll have your fingers crossed Campus gets a full series. If you hated Green Wing, you'll hate this...

Me? I didn't like Green Wing, but I wouldn't stretch to hatred. I just found its schitzophrenic camera style and crazed, disjointed writing constantly got in the way of feeling any real empathy towards anyone. Each episode is a pot pourri of loosely-connected sketches and ideas, from a hive mind of a half-dozen writers, and then the performances are half-improvised on top of that. It gives everything quite a wacky, anything-goes feel that's part of the charm for many people, but I just find it annoyingly unfocused and reckless. Anarchic spirit is fine, but I like to see a bit of control at times.

Campus exists in Green Wing's universe (i.e. I like to think the East Hampton Hospital Trust is just up the road from Kirke University), so it shares many of the problems I have with its predecessor. That said, I do prefer the uni locale, as I think more people have first-hand experience of university/college than they do hospitals. For that reason, it was actually amusing to imagine lecturers and tutors behaving like schoolchildren, whereas in Green Wing I just felt a vague horror those characters had life-or-death control over hundreds of people.

Ostensibily, English professor Matt Beer (Joseph Millson) is our hero; a laidback, underachieving womanizer who swans around the campus causing mischief. There's also ferocious Vice Chancellor Jonty De Wolfe (Andy Nyman), a vulgar monster with a haircut like a meteor crater, who cuts quite a tyrannical figure (imagine a sociopathic David Brent and you're not far off); Imogen Moffat (Lisa Jackson), a demure maths lecturer who's just written a bestselling book "The True Story Of Zero"; mechanical engineering lecturer Lydia Tennant (Dolly Wells); vapid accommodations officer Nicole Huggins (Sara Pascoe), who causes an accounting error; and Jason Armitage (Will Adamsdale*) as the accountant who has to fix the fact Nicole's paid everyone their wages twice this month.

That latter subplot was the best of a mixed bag, but Campus primarily felt like a means to deliver 40-minutes of insanity, insults, oddness and quips. It was perhaps too extreme or bizarre for its own good at times, and none of the characters came across as particularly likeable, but it definitely felt like there was potential. If the writing can become more cohesive between scenes and the characters strengthened, Campus could become a satisfying show if it makes it to series. There were some hilarious moments, and the almost supernatural spectre of Jonty De Wolfe was a joy to behold. Nyman's particularly adept at spitting vitriol and chewing on obscenities, and this pilot even made use of his background as an illusionist for one memorable scene when he just vanished mid-speech.

Overall, it feels like a no-brainer that Campus will be picked up by Channel 4, as it's a perfect replacement for the popular Green Wing. I found its style to be quite distancing and too abrasive for my taste, but I'd be lying if I claimed it didn't have a lot of chutzpah and showed enough promise to warrant a full semester.


6 November 2009
Channel 4, 10pm

written by: Robert Harley, James Henry, Oriane Messina, Gary Parker, Victoria Pile, Richard Preddy, Fay Rusling & Christian Sandino-Taylor directed by: Victoria Pile starring: Andy Nyman (Jonty De Wolfe), Joseph Millson (Matt Beer), Sarah Pascoe (Nicole Huggins), Will Adamsdale (Jason Armitage), Dolly Wells (Lydia Tennant), Lisa Jackson (Imogen Moffat) & Alison Lintott (Grace)

* Yes, "Wiiiiiil" from TFI Friday!

Read more...