The Directors Commentary

[Simon Price]

Finally caught up with this show (tonight's commentaries: Bonanza and Secret Army). Not laugh-out-loud funny, but not awful either.

A few good moments...

"Michael Landon there, riding a cow." (A visual gag: he was indeed on a weird cow-coloured horse.)

"I like to think of this scene as an hommage. Hommage, a word for the A1s there. To the C2s, a rip-off. Hello, C2s! Just back from the off-license with some booze and a handful of scratchcards."

...and the muffled "Love Changes Everything" from the gagged 'Michael Ball'.

What's the deal, do we know? Is Brydon supposed to have done the whole thing improv-style, in one as-live take? Or was it scripted (or at least re-worked and edited)?

[Darrell]

It was all pre-scripted.

I've given up with it now, and wiped the tape I'd been recording it on.

[Entropy Balsmalch]

It was all pre-scripted.

I've given up with it now, and wiped the tape I'd been recording it on.

It's like any Rob Brydon thing - scripted from long improvisation sessions.

Just watch the stuff on the Human Remains DVD and see how he can spit out perfectly formed gags on the spot.

[benthalo]

Very uneven - show 3 was just insulting I thought, with all of those comments about Michael Barrymore and Carol Vordeman. All rather cheap, and almost as if it was shunted back in the run and was perhaps recorded after the untransmitted pilot. I quite liked the first two, so that was a particular let down. The last couple were so-so.

Why only five? I'm sure Radio Times were billing six shows but it suddenly changes to a run of five. The pilot could only have been a warm up considering the nature of the show.

I'll be keeping the tape, if only to compare the Secret Army against the DVD release which, oddly, turned up in the post yesterday. I'm aware that one actor declined to have his footage used as part of Director's Commentary and have since had it confirmed that this was a member of the SA cast, so I wonder if they edited around the problem in some way. I shall find out even if only I care.

[Darrell]

Five? It was originally publicised as seven!

I wonder what's going on there?

[cairnsi]

as an audio rip I like the show-would work much better as a radio show sort of Cook Life in Pieces-esque

[fbb bastard]

It was all pre-scripted.

I've given up with it now, and wiped the tape I'd been recording it on.

i have done exactly the same....it breaks your heart a bit to hear a person of such obvious talent really trying his best with such a lame duck of a programme

i know it may have been contextually right to do so but last night when he done a joke about going away on holiday with frank bough and (god no) bough being off his tits on drugs....i mean....how old and lazy can you get?

really sad

[Emergency Lalla Ward Ten]

He's not a good enough actor to carry it off really. It really does sound like re-heated improv, which isn't always a bad thing but it doesn't work here. I'm not sure whether it needs to be an all-out gagfest, or be naturalistically slow and messy - it seems to be midway between the two.

It only becomes vaguely funny when he reacts specifically to the footage on screen. 'And as the coach moves, the camera moves...' Reminds me of Alan Partridge commenting on stock-film of sport - it works because Coogan himself knows nothing about sport so just describes everything very literally.

[Goldentony]

absoloute tossforks

[mwude]

Well I've bloody loved it.  Patchy in places I'll admit, but a couple of episodes have had me laughing long & hard throughout.  The same jokes every week did begin to wear a bit thin, but I used to listen to Mark & Lard who did the same jokes every day for about 4 months solid sometimes.

He was at his best when shouting at the actors or the shots - "too busy!" & I always found his comments for the C3s superb.  It's not a character or an idea with any depth to it & maybe it would have been nice to have one or two episodes voiced by a different director.  It was neither ground-breaking nor particularly worthy of repeat viewings but I found the whole series a delight to watch.

I do consider myself a big Rob Brydon fan & was prepared to give it the benefit of any doubts.  I thought it far superior to Human Remains quite simply because it made me laugh more.  Can't think of a programme in the last 6 months which has made me laugh out loud on a more regular basis.

[nixon]

hear hear!   BRILLANT SHOW!

[Jemble Fred]

No, it's not a brilliant show by any standard, surely? But it certainly doesn't deserve a slagging off. It was cheap, cheerful and very very watchable. I see no reason not to do more, in a world where most weekdays are utterly bereft of anything watchable on TV. Let alone ITV!

[TotalNightmare]

i have found it a very odd experience to actually circle shows in the ITV column of my Radio TImes.

What with Directors Commentary, Harry Hill and, fucking hell, even Hardware late night, its perfect viewing for me... but also, with Babycow's ALL STAR COMEDY SHOW thing and such... i am discovering that i am spending more time on the 'light channel'...

Should i get help?

[thatmuch]

He's not a good enough actor to carry it off really.

Huh? I mean did you, I mean *did you* see Human Remains? I mean see it? Really? His acting in that is extraordinary, pitched just right for every different character.

I'm not sure whether it needs to be an all-out gagfest, or be naturalistically slow and messy - it seems to be midway between the two.

Yes, I think it's stuck midway. It never finds its comic pitch. The character Brydon's trying to build up just doesn't gel. I can see how it would have seemed like a good idea at first, but when you hear Brydon going for cheap laughs then you know he knows it's not working out.

[Darrell]

Huh? I mean did you, I mean *did you* see Human Remains? I mean see it? Really? His acting in that is extraordinary, pitched just right for every different character.

I thought his acting in Human Remains was never more than average, all dull variations on the same basic character in a depressingly jokeless series full of 'DARK' nonsense, starring alongside a terrible actress who I've never liked. The only time his acting has really been seen to shine was in Cruise of the Gods, which was written by Tim Firth, and therefore devoid of sloppy sub-Cook Brydonisms. I just find his one-note approach to comedy extremely grating at times.

Every crap project Brydon does further detaches me from my previous adoration of Marion and Geoff, which is a shame. Mind you, his recent bashing of the majority of Peter Cook's career didn't exactly endear me to him further.

[Emergency Lalla Ward Ten]

I think he's decent enough in Human Remains/Marion and Geoff*, but he can't do proper da-da-da-COMEDY acting at all well, which the script of Director's Commentary seems to demand.  He'd have been rubbish in Radio Active. (cf Julia Davis in the Brass Eye Special - she hasn't a clue how to play a Helen Atkinson Wood style part. And she shouldn't be trying to.)

*Some may argue that this kind of acting is quite easy, providing you have the right intonations to start with. But I think being able to do broad sketch-comedy is a skill that very few people can pull off. And it's a different beast altogether.