[HN Gopher] The British sitcom that swept through the Balkans (2...
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The British sitcom that swept through the Balkans (2023)
Author : mellosouls
Score : 57 points
Date : 2025-04-19 07:16 UTC (15 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (blog.samizdata.co)
(TXT) w3m dump (blog.samizdata.co)
| _tariky wrote:
| As someone from Bosnia this is 100% true.
| radicalbyte wrote:
| There is something very similar to 80s Britain and Eastern
| Europe. It's why a lot of us who grew up (or had formative
| years in that decade) have a kinship with people from there.
| pkal wrote:
| I expected this to be about Allo Allo.
| Daviey wrote:
| I heard this was oddly popular in France and Germany. Only
| surprising because I wasn't sure the language inversion, self-
| deprecation and cliche would translate well.
| rsynnott wrote:
| I was expecting it to be Keeping Up Appearances, which is,
| bizarrely, the BBC's best-selling export show, and which is
| particularly popular in parts of Eastern Europe (the show came
| out just as the iron curtain was falling, so that must have
| been, ah, a confusing intro to the West...)
| drno123 wrote:
| Yep. In Croatia it has a cult following. Similar to obscure
| Italian comic "Alan Ford", and Hungarian-Israeli writer Ephraim
| Kishon.
| defrost wrote:
| Anyone still listen to Roddy Radalj and Boris Sujdovic there? (
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZCuCg-UM-U )
| hnlmorg wrote:
| From what I recall from my backpacking days near 20 years ago, Mr
| Bean used to be hugely popular in places like Thailand.
| CarRamrod wrote:
| You might not like it, but this is what peak bri'ish comedy looks
| like.
|
| https://youtu.be/B74_ZoniuPE
| chrislo wrote:
| Or is peak British comedy Stuart Lee satirising that scene as a
| quaint village folk tradition?
| https://youtu.be/7J1J_iHC2Qw?si=kUy3aQvZ4p2PjLG8
|
| Or maybe both?
| dazzawazza wrote:
| Here is peak Bri'ish philosophy
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAh8HryVaeY
| mellosouls wrote:
| First time I saw that I thought it was the cleverest joke I'd
| ever seen - took me a while to realise it's philosophical
| origin.
| AndrewOMartin wrote:
| Your common or garden philosopher will refer to the Ship of
| Theseus, or Theseus paradox, and those with a foot in the
| '90s will call it Trigger's Broom.
|
| Those truly tuned in to popular culture will indeed refer
| to The Sugarbabes, a UK Girl Group who presented a similar
| situation when all their original members were replaced one
| by one. This is the superior reference because eventually
| all the original members returned, elevating the situation
| to new levels of paradox.
| gilleain wrote:
| Peak ... or peep comedy ...
|
| (Peep Show, I would argue is some of the best recent comedy
| from us)
| theshackleford wrote:
| It's easily one of the best comedies I've seen. I've lost
| count of the amount of rewatches I've done. Absolute gold
| standard.
| thebruce87m wrote:
| > bri'ish
|
| I forget the exact quote, but:
|
| _We specifically made something called "Harry Potter" and beat
| it to absolute death to show you we pronounce the letter 'T' in
| the majority of our accents._
| encom wrote:
| Saved you a click: It's "Only Fools and Horses".
| radicalbyte wrote:
| Fools, Dad's Army, 'Allo 'Allo, Red Dwarf, Men Behaving Badly,
| The IT Crowd, Father Ted, The Office, Blackadder, Fawlty Towers,
| Bottom, The Young Ones, The Thick Of It, Alan Partridge, Some
| Mothers Do Have 'em, Mr Bean, Yes Minister, The Inbetweeners...
| British (and Irish) comedy was the best in the world for three
| decades.
| petepete wrote:
| Flebag, Toast, This Country, Detectorists, People Just Do
| Nothing, After Life.
|
| Maybe four.
| walthamstow wrote:
| I'd add Peep Show to that list of 2010s.
|
| Even the funniest American show of the current decade,
| Succession, was written by an Englishman.
| rwmj wrote:
| There's definitely some indefinable quality of Peep Show
| lurking in Succession.
| walthamstow wrote:
| I enjoyed this panel at the BFI with Armstrong, Bain,
| Mitchell and Webb, filmed around the time the Succession
| finale was on TV.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DwO1HP7ZS-c
| switch007 wrote:
| Because Jesse Armstrong co created Peep Show too
| petepete wrote:
| Peep Show started in 2003!
|
| Now I feel old.
| wrboyce wrote:
| Monty Python, A Bit of Fry & Laurie, Jeeves and Wooster, League
| of Gentlemen, Royle Family, Phoenix Nights, Peep Show, Extras,
| Brass Eye, The Smell of Reeves and Mortimer, Bang Bang It's
| Reeves and Mortimer, Shooting Stars, Spaced, Mighty Boosh,
| Garth Marenghi's Darkplace, One Foot in the Grave, Ali G, Whose
| Line is it Anyway, HIGNFY, Idiot Abroad, Life's Too Short, Fast
| Show, Black Books, Porridge...
|
| We could do this forever, I'm sure there's a load still
| missing!
| parkaboy wrote:
| Snuff box, Mitchell and Webb Look, Toast of London, Spaced...
| robin_reala wrote:
| Slowing down, but let's add Friday Night Dinner and Green
| Wing.
| card_zero wrote:
| This Morning With Richard Not Judy, Look Around You,
| Absolutely*, Ghosts, Not Only... But Also.
|
| *The sketch show, not Ab Fab. Alright, Ab Fab too.
| radicalbyte wrote:
| Horrible Histories and Murder So Horrid.
|
| The Tory Party, that was the biggest long running joke
| ever, I never thought that they'd be able to top the
| hilarious Boris Johnson but then Liz Truss came out of
| nowhere and PORK MARKETS'd her way into infamy!
| ndsipa_pomu wrote:
| I've heard that Liz Truss is upset that a lettuce is
| launching a rival social media site to hers
| ndsipa_pomu wrote:
| You sound like a Matt Berry fan, yet you missed Year of the
| Rabbit and Man to Man With Dean Learner
| stevedh wrote:
| A Touch of Cloth. Probably the highest density jokes per
| second in UK comedy.
| bythreads wrote:
| Lol didnt know that one - marvelous!!!
| lovemenot wrote:
| Me neither. Me too. We were surely cut from the same ...
| radicalbyte wrote:
| It's crazy isn't it? American sitcoms/comedy doesn't even
| come close and is almost universally derivative of the
| British greats, despite having 5-6x the population and far
| bigger budgets.
|
| I think that is comes from the fact that Americans take
| themselves too seriously and have a very strong and an even
| stronger censorship model than the British (thanks to well-
| funded religious organisations who make fun illegal).
| tim333 wrote:
| Some American comedy is pretty good especially the cartoons
| like Simpsons and South Park.
| mellosouls wrote:
| (British OP)
|
| I agree that British _sitcoms_ (not comedy generally) were
| superior for a couple of decades, but think we need to give
| modern American comedy much more credit; Seinfeld, Curb
| Your Enthusiasm, Larry Sanders, various animation series,
| etc, etc have established them back at the top. I can 't
| see the UK as that competitive these days.
|
| That's not considering American standup, movies etc which
| leave us in the dust.
| radicalbyte wrote:
| Oh there are certainly some excellent American comedy
| shows..
|
| Seinfeld, Curb, Arrested Development, Modern Family, The
| Office (US), South Park, Parks and Rec, 30 Rock, Frasier,
| Fresh Prince, Friends, How I Met Your Month, Futurama,
| Simpsons (OG) and then there's not a lot more on the
| bench unless you include the lesser remakes of British
| shows.
|
| A lot of them aren't funny or aren't satire.. just look
| at the Shameless remake - they turned that into a
| character drama when it was a sitcom.
|
| America has more of a stand-up culture I feel.
|
| I wonder if it's because the news in America is pretty
| much fiction that they basically don't have political
| satire as a genre outside of the topical news shows
| (Daily Show / John Oliver) which are honestly more like
| real news shows than comedy at this point.
| card_zero wrote:
| What We Do in the Shadows, except it's NZ really.
| timthorn wrote:
| It's notable just how many of the shows called out in this
| thread have links to the Cambridge Footlights. Certainly not
| all, but perhaps a third have cast who came through that
| club.
| ndsipa_pomu wrote:
| I'm shocked that no one has mentioned the Mrs Merton Show
| though you did at least mention The Royle Family. Caroline
| Aherne was amazing at understated comedy.
|
| "So, what first attracted you to the millionaire Paul
| Daniels?" she asked Debbie McGee.
| radicalbyte wrote:
| The Royal Family was amazing. Caroline is dearly missed :(
| CarRamrod wrote:
| >Alan Partridge
|
| Let's not forget that the Alan Partridge character was borne on
| Chris Morris' absolutely genius radio show "On The Hour", and
| made it onto tv on Morris' televised successor "The Day Today".
|
| Which reminds me of the actual high water mark of British
| comedy, which was Chris Morris' third and final series "Brass
| Eye". He rustled too many feathers with that one.
|
| It's a damn shame that those shows have been wiped from
| YouTube. For my money, Chris Morris is the most unappreciated
| creator of the 90s/00s, limey or not.
| radicalbyte wrote:
| That Brass Eye they they had Phil Collins talking "nonce
| sense"... brilliance.
|
| Chris Morris and Armando Iannucci are national treasures.
| ndsipa_pomu wrote:
| Don't forget "Jam" and "Nathan Barley"
| secondcoming wrote:
| Yes Minister is timeless. I still watch it on YouTube
| occasionally
| AsmaraHolding wrote:
| You can't forget Peep Show. One of the longest-running British
| comedies, with 54 episodes.
| seanalltogether wrote:
| I always wondered why so many British shows were never broadcast
| in America. I think the most I ever saw growing up in the 80s and
| 90s was a bit of monty python, mr bean and fawlty towers on PBS,
| but otherwise nothing. Were the licensing fees so high that it
| just wasn't worth it? I suppose you could argue that the style
| wasn't a perfect fit for American audiences, but even then,
| having a large source of already produced tv shows must have been
| worth it to one of the tv stations?
| rwmj wrote:
| Budgets maybe? British shows (especially from the 80s) are
| cheaply made and a bit grubby, especially in comparison to US
| shows with their comparatively enormous budgets, beautiful
| people etc.
| tm-guimaraes wrote:
| > beautiful people
|
| I've watched both the original british "Ghosts" sitcom and
| the still running american one. And to be honest this is the
| american quirk that i found the most odd.
|
| I've actually like the fact they have created different
| characters to make more sense to be stuck in an american
| manor, but the main ones dont hide the beautifull actors
| appeal, which is weird.
|
| Also, the american ghosts chatecters seem to have less depht,
| or at least their deph is rarely shown, ie, deph is there,
| but ignored or forgotten in most eps.
|
| I miss the "cavern ghost" that while he had very primitive
| behaviours, he was actually smart, but more than that, he
| showed the pain, experience and how he grow detatched from
| partimgs and the lime due to the millenia he has been stuck,
| his mirror "thor" also has noce things, but doesn't compare,
| or at least they dont play to them enough.
|
| The english boy scout is a more mature and melancolic as
| well, and acts as a father feature to the female lead
| occasionally, while the american younger seems much more
| steriotipical.
|
| I really like the american finance bro, it is no way similar
| to his british politic counterpart, and they do show his nice
| guy side often, I think the fact that they made them so
| opposite made me enjoy it more.
|
| I guess that the difference in episode count per season might
| also justify why in most eps the americans are just
| steriotypes.
|
| But the "beauty" of the american ghosts is just silly
| american obsession.
| rwmj wrote:
| I watched one episode of _Ghosts (US)_ and that was plenty.
| I watched every episode of every series of _Ghosts (UK)_.
| antxxxx wrote:
| One of the reasons is the number of episodes in a typical UK
| sitcom series. Normally there are only 6 episodes which US
| broadcasters find difficult to schedule
| cjs_ac wrote:
| The American comic hero is the Stand-Up Philosopher, wittily
| demonstrating his superiority with every line. The British
| comic hero is trying his best and failing miserably in a way
| that is relatable to the audience.
|
| Consequently, the only British comedy that is popular in the US
| is satire, like Monty Python and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the
| Galaxy.
| anannymoose wrote:
| I would push back on your generalization, the American family
| sitcoms are as big if not bigger than standup comedy.
| deanishe wrote:
| It's not standup vs sitcom so much as winning vs losing.
|
| British comedy runs on kicking its protagonists in the
| nuts. Ideally, they bring it upon themselves, but cosmic
| irony will do in a pinch.
|
| It's practically unheard of for a British protagonist to
| end an episode in a better place than they started unless
| it's the Christmas special.
| foldr wrote:
| There's plenty of American comedy that doesn't fit this mold
| (Broad City and Search Party are two examples that come to
| mind).
| deanishe wrote:
| Definitely. It's rather that the plucky underdog surviving
| on his wits is practically absent in British comedy.
|
| Brits don't do Bugs Bunny, only Wile E. Coyote.
| foldr wrote:
| I think there are also plenty of counterexamples in that
| direction. Isn't Edmund Blackadder a plucky underdog
| surviving on his wits?
| panick21_ wrote:
| You should watch 'It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia'.
| ykonstant wrote:
| I feel that everyone would benefit from a few runs of Yes
| (Prime) Minister.
| deanishe wrote:
| The former PM's memoirs:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I9NifqJyDMI
| ahazred8ta wrote:
| The US broadcast syndication market is really only set up to
| sell shows that have more than 100 episodes. I think UFO,
| Space:1999, and the 1955 Robin Hood were among the few shows
| seen on regular non-PBS stations. The Disney Show would
| sometimes run UK-filmed material. (Scarecrow, Thomasina) Partly
| it's because Americans can't understand the words when they
| hear many UK dialect accents, so they tune out those shows and
| that tanks the ratings. Even if you give a station a free tv
| show they lose money if no one watches it. We do better at
| remaking shows like All in the Family, Sanford and Son, Skins,
| and Being Human.
| rvba wrote:
| But why?
|
| Why do they need 100 episodes to run something?
| rzzzt wrote:
| These always came with the Thames ident at ${HOME_COUNTRY}, not
| sure why: https://youtu.be/ikH9OLnU3ao
| rvba wrote:
| Wasnt an early 90s show called "Tropical heat" absurdly popular
| in the Balkans?
|
| All I remember is that it had a pony-tailed detective called Nick
| Slaughter, who was solving cases with a red haired woman called
| Sylvia. The show was very 90s...
|
| How about The X-files? The show was popular everywhere, although
| it had very un-even writing. Could have a 10/10 episode followed
| by a 1/10 episode.
| bojan wrote:
| The Tropical Heat was indeed so popular that the Canadian
| actor, Rob Stewart, that played the main character visited
| Serbia back in 2009, talked to people, was signing autographs,
| took pictures with fans, etc. Since then he follows the country
| and has recently supported the ongoing students protests
| against the autocratic regime.
| dvh wrote:
| In Czechoslovakia in 80s and 90s the most popular British TV
| series was Dempsey and Makepeace
| tananan wrote:
| There actually is a "The Nag's Head" in the Balkans - it's in
| Montenegro
| ndsipa_pomu wrote:
| I recall hearing (back in the day) that The Benny Hill Show was
| immensely popular in Germany even after its popularity had
| declined in the UK.
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