Homework, 25th November, 2015

This week, you are going to revise for a test on television comedy. Everything you need to know is below:

Television Comedy

Benidorm

·         First aired on February 1^st, 2007 (a Thursday). Repeats go out on ITV 2 and ITV 2+1 at 9pm (right on the Watershed). Must be broadcast after the watershed because of language and sexual references.

·         Aimed at a working class audience and is an alternative to ‘safer’ middle class comedies such as My Family.

·         Set in the Spanish resort town of Benidorm, where thousands of British tourists go every year for cheap holidays in the sun.

·         Actors in the show include Steve Pemberton, who was previously in the comedy show The League of Gentlemen, the stand-up comedian Jonny Vegas and Janine Duvistsky, who was in One Foot in the Grave.

·         Shot almost entirely with hand held cameras on location with no laughter track, so in this sense reflects more modern, edgy comedies like I’m Alan Partridge and The Office, although in terms of the content, has more in common with the ’80s sitcom Hi-de-Hi!, which was set in a fictional Butlins-style holiday camp.

·         Audience pleasure comes from situations which people who take holidays in resorts can relate to, like avoiding paying for things and parents using foul language around their children. 

Have I Got News For You

·         The original panel show, first aired in 1990 on BBC 2. Switched to BBC 1 in 2000 due to its popularity (BBC 2 is generally for programmes with smaller audiences). Now goes out at 9pm on Friday nights and old episodes are repeated on the Dave channel, which specialises in programmes aimed at men (hence the name). The show must be broadcast after the watershed because of language, although because of the style of humour (political satire), does not generally appeal to children anyway.

·         Has a fairly broad appeal, reflected in the range of guests such as Reginald D. Hunter, a black American comedian, Grayson Perry, a male cross-dressing artist, and Germaine Greer, a female writer and broadcaster famous for her feminist politics.

·         The regular team captains, Paul Merton and Ian Hislop, represent contrasting sections of society. Hislop, whose day job is to edit the satirical newspaper Private Eye, was educated in a private boys’ school and always wears a suit, therefore representing the middle and upper classes. Merton, by contrast, is from a working-class background and spent many years on the stand-up comedy circuit before moving into television.

·         Audience pleasure comes from seemingly improvised jokes about topical events, although some are prepared before the show is recorded.