Quote: Pingl @ October 1 2012, 12:34 PM BST

Its panto with a post modern twist, can't stand it myself, but seems very popular at the moment.

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It's popular because the audience wants to be part of the show and doesn't care about content or quality. Take these horrible "Idol-Shows", the people don't want to discover a really talented artist as ...let's say David Bowie. No, they want to be part of the show and vote for their favourite candidate. And these candidates are not allowed to be reeeeeeally talented or mysterious. No they have to be average or only a little bit above that. Like the spectators themselves so that makes you think" Oh I could be a star myself If I wanted to". And they want to see these aspiring "stars" cock up on stage or getting nervous breakdowns.
This Brendan O'Carroll guy is clever, he incorporates these elements into his show. Mind you, you can't blame him for that. But I blame the audience.

Call it post modern...I call it lazy writing and thinking and taking the short cut to fame and fortune.

Quote: Gordon Bennett @ October 1 2012, 12:45 PM BST

It's popular because the audience wants to be part of the show and doesn't care about content or quality. Take these horrible "Idol-Shows", the people don't want to discover a really talented artist as ...let's say David Bowie. No, they want to be part of the show and vote for their favourite candidate. And these candidates are not allowed to be reeeeeeally talented or mysterious. No they have to be average or only a little bit above that. Like the spectators themselves so that makes you think" Oh I could be a star myself If I wanted to". And they want to see these aspiring "stars" cock up on stage or getting nervous breakdowns.
This Brendan O'Carroll guy is clever, he incorporates these elements into his show. Mind you, you can't blame him for that. But I blame the audience.

Call it post modern...I call it lazy writing and thinking and taking the short cut to fame and fortune.

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I know but you've got to hand it to him, he's working on a new sitcom and a movie. Someone out there likes it. Not my cup of tea but people have always liked this kind of Dame comedy, Dick Emery, Lilly Savage, Danny La Rue etc. There is always a market for it. Mind you I uesed to like Dick Emery his impressions were so ridiculously masculine that they were funny.

Like I said...I don't blame him for taking the opportunity. Success justifies his actions.
I'd like to conclude my speech with a Perrin catchphrase: I'm not really a "Mrs. Brown's Boys"-person.

(But I must admit, if I had to choose between "MBB" and "In With The Flynns" I'd go for MBB.)

@ Gordon, yes I like Only Fools and Father Ted, I also like Steptoe but I have to say with MBB both me and hubby belly-laugh most of the show, whereby we just laugh at the other sitcoms. I don't think the corpsing is rehearsed either. Last one I watched, MB ended a line with gonorrhea instead of gondolier and the other actor [the gay son] just doubled up laughing and couldn't stop. We couldn't either. That corpsing of the actor was definitely not rehearsed, he was def expecting her to say gondolier as the line was intended. Once he stopped laughing MB's next line was ''Why are you so sad?'' Before corpsing, he'd been devastated because his lover had broken up with him.
I was a professional actor myself and had terrible problems with corpsing. On stage I very often had to nip myself to stop me and came off bruised to b*ggery

Quote: Gordon Bennett @ October 1 2012, 1:00 PM BST

Like I said...I don't blame him for taking the opportunity. Success justifies his actions.
I'd like to conclude my speech with a Perrin catchphrase: I'm not really a "Mrs. Brown's Boys"-person.

(But I must admit, if I had to choose between "MBB" and "In With The Flynns" I'd go for MBB.)

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In with the Flynns is a travesty. Corpsing has always had a part to play in comedy, Peter Cook and Dudley Moore were well known for it. Moore was an arch corpser, but it was a million miles away from what Mrs Brown is doing. Still I agree good luck to him.

Quote: bushbaby @ October 1 2012, 1:02 PM BST

I don't think the corpsing is rehearsed either. Last one I watched, MB ended a line with gonorrhea instead of gondolier and the other actor (the gay son) just doubled up laughing and couldn't stop. We couldn't either. That corpsing of the actor was definitely not rehearsed, he was def expecting her to say gondolier as the line was intended. Once he stopped laughing MB's next line was ''Why are you so sad?''

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Let's say the corpsing is real. But letting it in the recorded show is a completely different thing. It's what I wrote earlier. It's a way to appear more simpatico. It's this "Yes...I'm part of the show" feel that is transfered onto the television audience (excuse me my terrible English...I hope you understand me anyway), not only the studio audience.
I (and I repeat: I) want my sitcom sitcommy, and not like children's birthday party or a clown show in circus where I feel the drops of water out of a bucket that's spilled over the clown. Circus is a good example: You laugh at jokes that aren't really funny...you laugh because you get caught by the whole atmosphere... you laugh because everyione else does....and because the Clown (or Brandon O'Carroll) tells you to. You're having a good time without caring about the quality of the jokes.

But hey there's nothing wrong with having a good time.

Quote: Gordon Bennett @ October 1 2012, 1:15 PM BST

Let's say the corpsing is real. But letting it in the recorded show is a completely different thing. It's what I wrote earlier. It's a way to appear more simpatico. It's this "Yes...I'm part of the show" feel that is transfered onto the television audience (excuse me my terrible English...I hope you understand me anyway), not only the studio audience.
I (and I repeat: I) want my sitcom sitcommy, and not like children's birthday party or a clown show in circus where I feel the drops of water out of a bucket that's spilled over the clown. Circus is a good example: You laugh at jokes that aren't really funny...you laugh because you get caught by the whole atmosphere... you laugh because everyione else does....and because the Clown (or Brandon O'Carroll) tells you to. You're having a good time without caring about the quality of the jokes.

But hey there's nothing wrong with having a good time.

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Some people like the fourth wall to be broken down. Frankie Howerd was brilliant at it in Up Pompeii!, and restoration comedy was built on the concept. However corpsing is an unintentional break and therefore in my mind a cheap one.

@ Gordon, yes I can understand your point of view, but I also like Last of The Summer Wine and that is so unlikely in real life (the things they get up to) and yet the rules of sitcom say the characters/stories have to be real and true to life but one poster on here once said, there are lots of rules to sitcom writing but only for rejected scripts

Quote: bushbaby @ October 1 2012, 1:23 PM BST

@ Gordon, yes I can understand your point of view, but I also like Last of The Summer Wine and that is so unlikely in real life (the things they get up to) and yet the rules of sitcom say the characters/stories have to be real and true to life but one poster on here once said, there are lots of rules to sitcom writing but only for rejected scripts

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Frankly, I don't care about "official" rules, rules limit your creativity right from the start. Although I realise that I explained "my set of rules" with my post before. But every viewer has his own rules and the audience decides what is succesful and what is not. And that is good that way. I don't want to know how many potentially good show were rejected by the BBC because it violated the "official comedy rules". In the end, the audience should decide...and that's what happening at the moment with MBB. MBB reflects the...Zeitgeist. I have to accept that...and like I said: That's better than a humourless TV executives deciding what's good for us and what is not.

Bushbaby, I like The Mighty Boosh. This makes Last Of The Summer Wine look like a documentary.

I was thinking about what you said about the realism of a setting. If a show claims to be realistic and makes "mistakes" then it loses its credibility and most of the audience loses interest. If a show is silly right from the start (or surreal like Mighty Boosh) then there's no problem with that.
So the "rule" has to be: If you want to make a show rooted in realism (like OFAH for instance), then do it properly. If you want to do a silly show, feel free to go overboard.

I've never watched the Mighty Boosh!! So don't know what it is like

Nothing much changes in comedy. There are only so many colours on the pallette so the same ideas in new forms constantly reappear. Mrs Brown is in a long tradition and will go out of fashion and reappear in a new form at some point. Comedy is at the end of the day whatever makes you laugh, and as long as it has some laughs it succeeds. God I'm being reasonable I think this flue has addled my mind

Maybe it's because we live in strange times with nothing really cheerful coming in the news (financial crisis, terrist attacks etc.) that makes us wanting to enjoy the "easier" side of comedy.

Quote: Gordon Bennett @ October 1 2012, 2:43 PM BST

Maybe it's because we live in strange times with nothing really cheerful coming in the news (financial crisis, terrist attacks etc.) that makes us wanting to enjoy the "easier" side of comedy.

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You have a really good point there, the kind of comedy people want in the good times is very different from the kind they want in the bad. Mainstream comedy does tend to get cosier in the bad times, whilst satire and stand up sharper.

Quote: bushbaby @ October 1 2012, 2:36 PM BST

I've never watched the Mighty Boosh!! So don't know what it is like

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If you're into rock music and a psychedelic/dreamlike atmosphere with silly jokes then you'll like it, otherwise stay away.

Quote: Pingl @ October 1 2012, 2:46 PM BST

You have a really good point there, the kind of comedy people want in the good times is very different from the kind they want in the bad. Mainstream comedy does tend to get cosier in the bad times, whilst satire and stand up sharper.

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Maybe, maybe not. Wasn't Britain in a crisis during the 70s? This theory couldn't explain Porridge's success then.

Although Porridge can be categorized as mainstream...but it wasn't really cheerful.

Quote: Gordon Bennett @ October 1 2012, 2:48 PM BST

Maybe, maybe not. Wasn't Britain in a crisis during the 70s? This theory couldn't explain Porridge's success then.

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Yea but what about Terry And June, Rings On Their Fingers etc.? Porridge was a diamond in the shit. Just because most of 70s mainstream was bobbins doesn't mean that there weren't bonafide classics too. Think of how satire boomed, Not The Nine O'Clock News, Spitting Image etc. With stand-up we had a new wave. Mainstream comedy served its purpose which was a comfort blanket. Nothing wrong with that, if people want to feel comforted why not comfort them.