Christmas time travel: Back to the 70s with Matt and David
We all love to travel in time on Christmas Day - back to the Morecambe and Wise Christmas special, the Yuletides of yesteryear, when we were wee nippers and we got a Scalextric, and all of that. Nostalgia is as much a part of the whole experience as anything. And BBC1 offered the chance to time travel with comedy twice on Christmas Day - with Ronnie Corbett and Lucas & Walliams. But while Corbett attempted modern jokes (the 'Blackberry' not working for example) in the same old format as his shows with the other Ron, Lucas and Walliams went the other way - straight back to the 70s.
Mm. Look, the r-word isn't coming out. I'm not going to use the r-word. That would be the word of lazy stereotype itself, the kind of thing you'd expect some idiot bleeding-heart liberal to trot out and act all offended. No. I'm not going to use that word. Because Come Fly With Me wasn't that. It wasn't hateful, or nasty, or vindictive, or deliberately unpleasant, or anything like that. Nor do I object to it through offence or shock, because I wasn't particularly offended or shocked - and even if I were, that doesn't mean that I should be disappointed by something. Not that either. And no, I don't want the bloody thing banned, before anyone accuses me of doing so. It's simply this: it was lazy. Feeble, lazy, hackneyed old clapped-out stereotypes that I thought we'd gone past about four decades ago with Spike Milligan's Pakistani Daleks or 'they all sound a bit funny'. Has it come to this? Is this really what we're sitting around the telly watching in 2010?
If you'd like to chip in with the contrarian "Aha, but this is post-ironic use of stereotypes, and who are you to say that people can't black up for comedy, doesn't that make you the real racist?" glibness here, feel free to do so. You might say it's a sign of a mature multicultural society that everyone can make jokes about everyone nowadays - straight people about gay people, white people about black people, and it's no longer the weapon of cultural hegemony, or marginalising minorities by cranking out stereotypes, or whatever. I can see that. And I can understand that, but I'm not really making the point that this sort of thing shouldn't happen because of political correctness having (a) happened in the first place or (b) apparently having gone mad; it's just that I find it such a complete and utter waste. All the talent, all the budget, all the effort that went into that programme, and all we get is a bad impression of Faith Brown doing an impression of Rustie Lee, and "Yingtingtingting" Japanese girls who then go all gruff, you know, like you're doing an impression of a kid in a playground or something.
So, let's leave aside any accusations of political correctness having been breached. Certainly, leave aside the red-flag r-word, because we don't need it. My objection to the Lucas/Walliams vehicle was that it was just so lazy, tired and cliched. A spoof of a programme from the mid-90s - even the source material was going back a bit, let alone the characters. The old lady who pretended to be confused was just like Lou out of Lou and Andy pretending to be disabled; this wasn't doing anything new, anything fresh, anything, well, particularly funny really. And that's the sadness. I like Lucas and Walliams and I think they're capable of a lot better than Come Fly With Me. It's not especially offensive, it's just really disappointing.
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December 27th, 2010 - 11:51
It seems amazing that they made Rock Profile, which was excellent, back in 1999-2000, and have steadily become less and less funny ever since, in inverse proportion to their budgets and creative freedom. And what is coming up later in the week? A documentary following Matt Lucas preparing to appear in Lez fucking Miz???
Oh, for fucks sake.
December 27th, 2010 - 12:34
Lucas is apparently feeling a bit touchy about this though. I tweeted (yes,sorry) saying it would be a nice treat for all the Daily Mail readers who miss The Black and White Minstrel Show. I didn’t @ him in the tweet but he still replied to me saying “Don’t be silly.”
That’s me told then.
December 27th, 2010 - 14:22
I felt dirty for laughing at it. It did entertain me though. What can I say; I’m easily impressed.
December 27th, 2010 - 14:28
Is “post-ironic” a cop out for something that is old hat, wasn’t particularly funny in the first place but is ground breaking and fresh when done by Ricky Gervais or Lucas and Walliams? They just are not funny. It is the same with Reeves and Mortimer, Ricky Gervais, Lucas and Walliams; someone, somewhere gets them promoted as truly great when it is the same old, same old, week in, week out. Not so much truly great as truly grates. And if someone mentions the office episode where Rick Gervais dances then I will have to kill them! In a funny, post-ironic manner.
December 28th, 2010 - 01:40
You don’t like Reeves and Mortimer? Seriously??
December 27th, 2010 - 14:53
“You might say it’s a sign of a mature multicultural society that everyone can make jokes about everyone nowadays – straight people about gay people, white people about black people, and it’s no longer the weapon of cultural hegemony, or marginalising minorities by cranking out stereotypes, or whatever. I can see that.”
Thats a point that is often made, but it doesn’t really work the other way around does it?
I can’t think of any working class black gay comediens who have managed to make a career of telling jokes about middle class straight whites; and if there were I’m sure that the self styled libertarians who complain about political correctness would be the first to demand that they are banned.
December 27th, 2010 - 15:05
I was more concerned about the show not coming anywhere near qualifying for the f-word.
“Funny.”
December 27th, 2010 - 15:16
I’ve never really bought the argument that ironic use of stereotypes is any less bad than the nonironic use. If someone shits on your coffee table ironically, you still have shit on your coffee table.
December 27th, 2010 - 15:35
The old lady who keeps telling us her son is a doctor, whose surname is Wolf, whose grandson’s name is Jonathan, who speaks with a German accent, and who is portrayed as being grasping and mercenary. Really fucking funny.
Also, could you tell whether the production values were actually a brilliant fake of a dirt cheap third tier reality show, or just as shit as it looked?
Others: it’s now several years since Stelios Haji-Ioanniou was the boss at EasyJet (note that they didn’t take the piss out of Michael O’Leary personally, presumably scared he might sue). Ali G is someone else’s material, and as a joke he’s almost old enough to vote. Sasha Baron Cohen should sue.
I fully agree with your main point: it wasn’t that there were racist jokes in it, it was that there weren’t any jokes in it. The word is cheap, but sadly for the BBC I doubt it was particularly cheap. Really, I don’t think the BBC has screened anything as embarrassingly awful in 10 years. Who on earth let this wet fart out of development?
December 27th, 2010 - 19:04
I see your point about the ‘Wolf’ character, there’s a whiff of something about that one too, isn’t there?
December 27th, 2010 - 16:29
Gah, as someone who’s from America I’m told that rock profiles and the first season of little Britain is great but then it’s all downhill. Any truth to that?
December 27th, 2010 - 19:23
can’t say i ever got on with little britain, but i remeber rock profiles as being genuinely funny, perticually regarding the matter of just what lies benieth the edge of u2′s hat.
December 27th, 2010 - 20:31
It’s pretty much true – the second series of Little Britain is OK, but it’s very much downhill after that.
December 27th, 2010 - 22:57
Rock Profiles was good, but Little Britain was at its best when it was still called The Fast Show.
January 1st, 2011 - 19:49
Nope, it’s all pretty shit. Once you’ve seen one sketch you’ve seen them all. The words ‘trite’ and ‘unfunny’ pretty much sum David Walliams and Matt Lucas up.
December 28th, 2010 - 03:18
“The old lady who pretended to be confused was just like Lou out of Lou and Andy pretending to be disabled”
Lou pretends to be disabled? Richard Littlejohn thinks it’s Andy out of Lou and Andy who pretends to be disabled! If Littlejohn spent a bit more time checking his facts and less time comparing people to grotesque Little Britain characters, he might actually get Lou and Andy’s name the right way round.
January 1st, 2011 - 20:15
Oops, think I might’ve got em the wrong way round actually…
December 28th, 2010 - 07:16
I love the bit at the end of the Tom Jones Rock Profile when he’s walking up the street swinging that carrier bag. Comedy gold!
December 28th, 2010 - 08:32
Little Britain was a brilliant radio comedy series precisely because they couldn’t do lazy visual stuff, but had to be verbally funny. It takes more skill. Since then they’ve taken the easy option every time – and lost this fan. And if they’re doing greedy Jew stuff, I’m glad I ditched ‘em.
December 28th, 2010 - 14:19
The depressing thing about Christmas is that they show things like Dad’s Army and Father Ted repeats; Spike Milligan retrospectives and old Peter Sellers films. Then we come to the present day, the pinnacle of our supposed cultural progress, and we get this; this; this lazy, laughless parade of sneers. It’s almost enough to make one commit death by Dr Who fan.
December 28th, 2010 - 15:50
@Jenny
True ‘dat.
@Anton
Some bastard’s only gone and nicked your article and reproduced it in less witty form on CiF. You should kick off about it.
January 1st, 2011 - 20:15
Orly? I’ll go and have a look…
December 29th, 2010 - 10:39
Never seen Rock Profiles, but Little Britain for me came at a time when there was a dearth of good comedy sketch shows at the BBC and therefore may have been rated higher than it merited. What was innovative about it was that they took the occasional mimicking/stereotyping of various population groups the Fast Show e.g. also did and made a whole show out of it, which in the first season at least was also mixed with enough absurdity not to make it all cliches. They still had some sympathy for their characters as well, which helped.
After that first season though that vanished and it became all catch phrases and stereotypes.
December 29th, 2010 - 16:57
Cultural humour can be funny but just blacking up and putting on stupid accents is dumb.
January 4th, 2011 - 10:24
i loved rock profile. bucks fizz was a particularly good one.
but this was pants. rich middle class white men laughing at poor people. yawn!
January 9th, 2011 - 06:22
I remember Dick Emery’s Indian character, and Benny Hill’s Chinese Character (Chow Mein), and neither were as lazily done as the Precious Little character on Come Fly with me (black west indian woman who signs hymns and shouts “lordy lordy” a lot and is so lazy she throws coffee away rather than work on her stall).
If you don’t believe me, look up Benny Hill. He also does a fantastically misunderstood French Director Pierre de Terre (Pied de Terre geddit), a truly great sketch for him and for Henry McGee.
I never bought the whole “That was racism, this is Irony” schtick either.