I saw Partridge on cable there was laughter that wasn't there when it was on BBC.
Have I started hearing voices?
Clone - Series 1 Page 5
There was NO WAY the laughs were from the live show filming. When we left (just after they started the bar scene) The place was half empty and, trust me, no one was laughing much!
Here's something interesting....the scene where they enter the "secure building" and are handed their lab coats was shot in the studio.....the background (making it look like a huge multilevel complex) was CGI. Anyway, that scene needed about 6 takes and took AGES....as did the hand scan machine which didn't work right....so they spent about an hour getting to a point where they could deliver ANY lines! Now, part of me thinks...fair enough, dedication to your art....but then the opening scene has the lines "that was close" "tell me about it"......now hang on! "tell me about it" did Pryce/Ash/Adam not read that and say "let's spend 10 mins thinking of a more fitting line for a genius military professor" (almost as bad as "you're fired from the army" said by a general....was that a "comedy" phrase or did they really mean he was fired from the army?????)
It just felt like they had Chase, the concept, the star actor....and cracked on without reading the script over!
Pryce should have borrowed a few lines from his old mate Pacino when Chase showed him that cack...."You're f**king shit. Where did you learn your trade, you stupid f**king c**t, you idiot? Who ever told you that you could work with men? Oh, I'm gonna have your job, shithead." would have sufficed.
No, but you've fallen into the trap which a number of others also have, in only noticing the laughter on the repeats.
I'd like to point out now that I'm just going by what people have discussed on the board previously. I've still only seen 3 episodes of Partridge.
Quote: Aaron @ November 18 2008, 1:13 PM GMTNo, but you've fallen into the trap which a number of others also have, in only noticing the laughter on the repeats.
Bottom line.....every monster sitcom hit has had a studio laughing along and, as long as you agree the stuff is worthy of a chuckle, it's fine.
I thought this was painfully woeful. I will always give a sitcom a second episode as the first can always be guilty of suffering because it has to introduce the story and characters but I can't remember a worst start to a sitcom series.
As Aaron said the premise is there and the acting talent's very good but the writing for this episode was very bad, IMO. Let's hope for a big improvement next week.
Hello everyone
I saw this last night and was suitably moved (ahem) to write a few words about it.
This seems to be one of those series which combines the worst of British sitcom (bad writing, low budgets etc) with the worst of American sitcoms (gags instead of humour growing out of situations, impossibly artificial set-ups etc). Americans can get away with this sort of stuff since they seem to have witty teams of writers, but I'm not sure how well we do it over here. When it goes wrong it can be painful...
Jonathan Pryce is pretty good as a sort of English version of John Lithgo; ie middle-aged and vainglorious. He's not given anything to play with, alas. Not much else good can be said of it. The plot was wooden and whole lot seemed to be very dated. The central character is so annoying and unloveable that I can see him getting hate mail.
Truly terrible.
Hi Cheesehoven - welcome to the website and thanks for sharing your view. I think you've summed things up very nicely. I particularly agree with this...
Quote: Cheesehoven @ November 19 2008, 7:18 AM GMTThis seems to be one of those series which combines the worst of British sitcom (bad writing, low budgets etc) with the worst of American sitcoms (gags instead of humour growing out of situations, impossibly artificial set-ups etc).
Going back to the subject of the laughter...
Quote: Pete @ November 18 2008, 1:12 PM GMTThere was NO WAY the laughs were from the live show filming. When we left (just after they started the bar scene) The place was half empty and, trust me, no one was laughing much!
You're right Pete. The audience recordings resulted in such a poor / non-existent laugh track (I don't blame you, sounded a long and boring evening from what you say!) that they had to re-record the laugh track at screenings.
One thing to bear in mind when hearing a laugh track - it's much easier to laugh in a crowd, especially after you've been given a few beers and been pumped up by a stand-up... which would explain how they've managed to get people to laugh at this pile of, ahem.
Well, I thought it was alright, to be honest. Hearing what people here said previously, I was expecting it to be awful (really awful) and I didn't think it was.
I understand Pete's experience though as if something irks you in a filming or it goes too long (I had a bad experience with Home Again which meant I never watched it on telly afterwards, not even the one we watched recorded) you're never going to like the show.
As a half-hour sitcom it kept me entertained and I actually want to watch the next one.
Dan
I was desperate for this to be good! I was quite prepared for it to have been saved post production.....but seeing Pryce say "tell me about it" 30 secs in was like a slap in the face!
Finally caught episode one of this. I think its main crime was just....being boring. Hopefully it'll pick up, but I don't know if I can be arsed.
J. Pryce never seems to be good when he's doing comedy. Doesn't seem to be able to play it straight enough. And Mark Gatiss shows his limititions as an actor, I think. Hopeless mugging.
To me, Gaitiss and his character are the best thing in this. The real fault lies with the script.
I'm getting the distinct impression that I should have heard of Jonathan Pryce before this.
*shakes head*
Watch Terry Gilliam's Brazil.
Quote: Nil Putters @ November 24 2008, 3:38 PM GMT*shakes head*
Watch Terry Gilliam's Brazil.
I love Michael Palin in that. So sinister.
Brilliant. *cracks out Brazil avatar*