It starts from the beginning tonight on yesterday. I've seen a lot of clips of it and had it on in the background before but for whatever reason, I've never actually sat down and watched it properly.
I'm going to record all three episodes tonight and give it a proper watch.
Can you let us know then if you find any character conflict, any real sense of what Bren - The Main Sitcom Character is after in life and any other solid sitcom components you notice please. Ta.
I am happy to go back and watch it if someone can convince me there's an actual sitcom in there, as I like sitcom.
It is a very good, very funny traditional sitcom.
Plus, one single episode features Eric Sykes, Dora Bryan and Thora Hird. A joy.
Quote: Alfred J Kipper @ 20th April 2018, 9:11 AMCan you let us know then if you find any character conflict, any real sense of what Bren - The Main Sitcom Character is after in life and any other solid sitcom components you notice please. Ta.
I am happy to go back and watch it if someone can convince me there's an actual sitcom in there, as I like sitcom.
Bren is searching for love and a sandwich maker that isn't always breaking down - aren't we all?
Quote: Aaron @ 21st April 2018, 11:55 AMIt is a very uneventful, mildly funny, untraditional soapcom.
That's exactly what I think too.
Quote: Alfred J Kipper @ 20th April 2018, 9:11 AMCan you let us know then if you find any character conflict, any real sense of what Bren - The Main Sitcom Character is after in life and any other solid sitcom components you notice please. Ta.
I am happy to go back and watch it if someone can convince me there's an actual sitcom in there, as I like sitcom.
Bren is like most of us - trapped in the dullness of the daily grind. She could find love if only she would step outside the comfort of conformity that comes with the safe workspace where everything stays the same. That is the crux of her character - her self worth is such that she refuses to let herself find happiness. That aside, dinnerladies main draw is the absolutely cracking writing, the lines are gold.
Does Kipper think it's a comedy drama? I suppose he has a point.
I loved it and was sorry to see it end. They could have followed Brenda and Tony out to Scotland, but perhaps Victoria Wood had had enough of the character and was ready to see it end. I saw the dinnerladies special on TV, and apparently the scripts were absolutely perfect and needed little, if any, additional work and that it was a blessing to work with them. Still, it always made me laugh and was sweet.
Love dinnerladies it's a classic. Really enjoy the episodes and the wide range of characters. It's excellent and the ending is really sad and you feel sad for them to leave and move on. I don't think it would have worked with the single camera thing, the studio based sitcom worked well here. One episode had Eric Sykes, Thora Hird and Dora Bryan in which was a gem, one of the best in the series on the basis that them 3 appeared imo.
Quote: Alfred J Kipper @ 20th April 2018, 9:11 AMCan you let us know then if you find any character conflict, any real sense of what Bren - The Main Sitcom Character is after in life and any other solid sitcom components you notice please. Ta.
I am happy to go back and watch it if someone can convince me there's an actual sitcom in there, as I like sitcom.
They showed three eps in a row of this the other night on the channel that was on. I sat through the first two, quite happily enough, although in an analytical frame of mind. Two I hadn't seen before, I must have viewed about six now I reckon, maybe bits of others.
Well, it was either me or they were better episodes because I can reverse my decision about it not being a sitcom, it definitely is. Well written by Wood with lots of cues for laughs but still missing vital elements like character conflict. They all seemed to get on well with each other, and that's not really what a model sitcom should do. I do think if an unknown had sent this in to one of these script doctor sites it would be likely to come back with red ink all over it.
Anyway it was funny, to those who like this sort of thing. I didn't laugh at many of the punchlines but I recognized the cues. The humour was there in abundance even if it wasn't my cup of tea. Surprised by the amount of references to sex if not by the amount of references to food. It's a sitcom for women let's be honest, women and Wood fans and it won't be everyone's cuppa.
I can see why some love it, time has served it well, sitcom was going through a horribly trendy phase of having new formats etc. at the time and they made this look unfairly ancient. Now the mockcoms and doccoms look tired and cliched and good trad studio sitcoms hold their ground and posterity has served Dinnerladies well. Not my thing but glad Wood gave some of her talent to sitcom as well as sketch shows as it's a very bold example of the brand of humour she was known for. There you are 
I'm sure Victoria Wood was well aware of the sitcom template.
As was Caroline Aherne. (Although I'll concede there was conflict between Jim and Nana.)
But it's the com part of sitcom that audiences like. Not a template.
Quote: Paul Wimsett @ 21st April 2018, 5:58 PMDoes Kipper think
We've all asked that at some point. As for dinnerladies, it always struck me as a sweet traditional sitcom. As far as I recall Bren was in love with some guy with cancer but never told him (or only told him towards the end of the show). And unrequited love is a big staple of sitcoms. And life.
Yes. And there was oodles of conflict in the show, too. You should watch another few episodes from more of a viewer's point, Alfred.
Yeah, I quite liked that Bren was the (relatively) sane one with the madness all around her. I thought she was quite a relatable character with her own doubts and sometimes low self esteem. Or shall I say, low expectations of how others see her - her reaction to Tony's birthday/Christmas presents to her was fantastic and a great character moment.
In my opinion, of course.
I was surprised to find how very much I enjoyed this show when I found a load of it on YouTube, as I didn't care for it much when my parents were watching the original broadcasts (I expect I was too young).
One thing I slightly dislike (apart from the theme tune) is the repeated 'thing' where Bren struggles to find the correct word to convey a nuanced idea or emotion, such as (I'm making this up) "I don't know why she seems so....oh, I don't mean regretful do I?, um, er what is it? er... oh, er, resentful, that's what I mean....resentful" Presumably the idea is to illustrate that she's intelligent but has had her vocabularly hobbled by a lack of educational opportunities as it's Grim Up North, which seems weirdly condescending, even though it rings true.
I'm not having a pop at VW and have about as much affection for her as one reasonably can towards someone one never met, but I was impressed by the following insight from (I think) the Sitcom Geeks podcast: Victoria wasn't working class. If anything she was middle, or lower-middle class, insofar as people can be categorised thusly ... and here's the truly astute observation: she was widely considered 'lower' class as a result of southeners conflating northeness with workingclassness.
It turns out - and I knew nothing about her pre-fame life - except that she shared a London bedsit with Clive James which they unwittingly shared in shifts thanks to a conniving landlord, that she was the product of an unbelievably dysfunctional family living on a partially abandoned RAF base and essentially spent her teenage years alone in a room with a television and a piano - which explains a lot and turned out to be a very good thing.
That somehow reminded me of a number of other comedians who entertained themselves in childhood and adolescence by making up shows in bedrooms for imaginary audiences - Andy Kaufman and Tracy Ullman, to name a couple. How different to the previous generation of comics who found their way into showbiz through ENSA and the like in the days of wartime and national service.
