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| TV,
Jeremy Carpenter,
20 January 1999 |
Rating: F3
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‘Edgy and Polemic’ said the shows producer. ‘Weak and Slightly racist’ said the BBC2 review pundits (just now, on the TV!!). ‘Great’ says just about everyone else. What do I say? I say ‘That’s Nice dear, and thank God I don’t have to sit through that smugfest the 11 o’clock show anymore’. I actually allowed myself to be dragged out of the pub on Friday evening for this, so there must be something going on.
I was introduced to Mr G originally through local boys spinning out his catchphrases, and unaware of the source, I thought they were just being nobs. All that batty-boy stuff and finger flicking - like they weren’t behaving that way before. But finally introduced to Mr G’s via MP3 sound clips, I got the joke. He plays a different slant on the hidden agenda TV interview that the God-like Chris Morris had developed to its heights in ‘Brasseye’. Except Mr G’s trick is to lull his interviewees into a weird sense of unease caught in the spotlight ‘yoof-culture’ TV, allowing him to pitch absurd and naively probing questions that often force his targets into making amazing blustering twats of themselves.
Transferring this format into a 30 minute show was always going to stretch things a bit, and sure enough it’s not all broadcast live from Fun-city. The Neil Hamilton interview is obviously short for a reason, and the ‘funny-foreign guy learns London manners’ bit is all far too predictable. But it’s still funnier than the majority of Brit sitcoms, and the mood of the comedy leaves a pleasanter taste in the mouth than the more patronising easy-targeting of other kinds of this genre like Dom Jolly’s ‘Trigger Happy TV’.
As for the accusations of racism, that's no surprise, there’s always folk out there who are going to feel that way, but the points going amiss. Sure, he’s a stereotype, but he’s a stereotype of a gangsta cuture-obsessed home-counties boy, and that’s all there is to it. He’s not Jim Davidson’s infamous Chalkie character. But the obvious worry is that as he becomes too famous, he becomes less effective in duping his targets. The theory is that this is the only series that’ll be made, and I hope that’s the case, because this is a concept with a finite amount of comedy steam in it.
Channel 4 Fri 10.30 BST
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