Cunk on Britain [split topic]

[idunnosomename]

There's not much to get. Cunk is a one-dimensional character, a shallow vessel for some occasionally quite funny gags. I enjoy her in small doses, but the joke wears very thin over half an hour.

I hope Diane Morgan creates some great comedy one day, she's such a naturally funny person. She's better than Cunk.

Absolutely. Did Brooker invent Cunk and Shitpeas? It's sad to me a great comedian is stuck with this persona. Does she like it? Is there something better she has up her sleeve?

[Bobtoo]

I think Diane Morgan had some input. Cunk was supposed to be posher but Morgan wanted to use her own accent.

[Jockice]

Just seen a clip from her show on the BBC website. She calls a tyrannosaurus rex a...wait for it...tyrannical sawdust rex!

As always, fucking hilarious. I'm just off to get a needle and thread for my sides.

[Phil_A]

Morgan's appearance on the Buxton pod was a delight, she really is a treasure.

"What did we have? Kes. Dead bird in a bin."

[Bleeding Kansas]

I enjoyed the little segments from Screenwipe, but I'm not sure about this.

Would this not be better with her performing a different character that captures and satirizes some of the nuance of the presenters of these kinds of documentaries? Or would that be shit?

I guess you have the occasional fun wordplay with this character.

[Ignatius_S]

I think Diane Morgan had some input. Cunk was supposed to be posher but Morgan wanted to use her own accent.

She does. Also, with the one-off Shakespeare episode from a year or two ago, Morgan improvised when interacting with the experts – have a feeling that this is meant to be the case with this series.

[rasta-spouse]

Ep2: big improvement. some nice lines, and some laugh out loud interview moments. are you sure these academics are in on it? their reactions seem genuine. the woman in the first episode with the Doomsday book seemed quietly furious from the offset.

Also, have wardrobe fitted Cunk with a deliberately unflattering outfit, she seems more alien and awkward than before? It's a neat touch.

This still could do with something more, something with comedic heft... to push it beyond just time-filler.

[Bobtoo]

I think they aren't meant to be in on it but some of them must know who she is.

[holyzombiejesus]

I'm pretty sure they're all in on it and that's why, for me, along with the getting words wrong, it's the weakest bit of the show. It just seems a bit pointless, these things should be about the reaction of the interviewee but instead you just have a fairly calm reaction to something they know is from a script. And the getting words wrong thing only really work if the wrong word is similar to the actual one. There were some last night that took quite a leap to have anything to do with what they should have been.

Still, it made me laugh far more than most comedy on television and I thought the bit about Something About Mary was really funny.

I don't think Morgan has any really input in to the character. She's not listed with any of the other contributors, just as the actor playing Philomena.

[gilbertharding]

Snippets by NF 'Wally' Simpson. If you're going to steal, steal from the best (and/or most obscure).

[olliebean]

I don't think Morgan has any really input in to the character. She's not listed with any of the other contributors, just as the actor playing Philomena.

I presume she ad-libs her responses in the interviews, at least.

[Brundle-Fly]

Absolutely. Did Brooker invent Cunk and Shitpeas? It's sad to me a great comedian is stuck with this persona. Does she like it? Is there something better she has up her sleeve?

Why on earth would you see playing Cunk as somehow a burden to her career? It's popular, it's put her on the map, she has her own show on the BBC out of it and all this will lead to other stuff.  Who says she's stuck with this persona anyway?

[rectorofstiffkey]

I'm pretty sure they're all in on it and that's why, for me, along with the getting words wrong, it's the weakest bit of the show. It just seems a bit pointless, these things should be about the reaction of the interviewee but instead you just have a fairly calm reaction to something they know is from a script. And the getting words wrong thing only really work if the wrong word is similar to the actual one. There were some last night that took quite a leap to have anything to do with what they should have been.

they really must be in on it - how thick would you have to be not to Google a presenter when/before you agree to meet them?  However, I actually prefer it when they're in on it - I used to hate Dead Ringers when an impressionist (backed by lines written by a roomful of Oxbridge-educated writers) would ring up someone who worked in a call centre and engage them in 'merry banter'.  Whoever the joke was meant to be on, it was a bit too uncomfortably close to 'taunt-a-pleb' for my liking.

[Sin Agog]

I like it, but enough with the spuddy bloonerisms already. 

[PowerButchi]

I struggle with Cunk as I remember a photo of Diane Morgan as Cunk in the Radio Times for last Christmas and her hands looked massive in it. So it can't see Cunk without thinking "Massive hands". It's not an issue when I watch Morgan as Morgan only when I see Morgan as Cunk. Massive hands.

[rectorofstiffkey]

I like it, but enough with the spuddy bloonerisms already.

Yes, or the missed-mark malapropisms.  It's only funny if it's similar to the incorrect word; 'Napoleon Cumberbatch' is not funny and I'm not sure how anyone thought it was.

[idunnosomename]

Why on earth would you see playing Cunk as somehow a burden to her career? It's popular, it's put her on the map, she has her own show on the BBC out of it and all this will lead to other stuff.  Who says she's stuck with this persona anyway?

because it's shit

Yeah, she's making good money. But I think she's funnier than this character. Though on Twitter I see some history fans like it. "Norman Architecture" etc. But I'm a miserable cunt and don't think the character (or rather persona, since there is no discernable backstory or development) is any good. Sry.

[Panbaams]

For anyone interested, the latest episode of the Remainiacs podcast features Cunk writers Jason Hazeley and Joel Morris, and they go into their writing for the character in this series and on the Wipe shows.

[East of Eden]

Can't get enough of this.

[DrGreggles]

I like this.
It's not highbrow, but it doesn't try to be.
Plenty of good lines and silly jokes, and Diane Morgan's deadpan delivery is great.

[Brundle-Fly]

But I'm a miserable cunt

Is this a sort of more damp cystitis?

[kidsick5000]

I really enjoy this.
Happily daft

[Ghughesarch]

I enjoyed the little segments from Screenwipe, but I'm not sure about this.

Would this not be better with her performing a different character that captures and satirizes some of the nuance of the presenters of these kinds of documentaries? Or would that be shit?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xdic-nhLUOM
or
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzOD0fEoD4I
or even
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rSPWlNL3VLU

[MojoJojo]

Anyone catch what the Charlie Brooker article was in the Halley's comet-great events bit was in the first episode, just watched it, but too lazy to go back.

[oopett]

I really like Diane Morgan and Cunk always has loads of funny mishearings, but yeah, it does get a bit old.  And I get ridiculously uncomfortable watching all these academics trying to be polite in the face of her put on cringey idiocy.   They're all polite and pretty skillful at navigating around it but the whole "ha ha look at the funny things the person with a learning disability says" genuinely makes me feel uneasy after a while, personally.  I'm probably being overly negative though -- usually am!

I mean, IMO, Alan Partridge is largely about a man's Aspergers syndrome and the constant terror and confusion and the tragi-comedy that comes with it, but it's still a lot less 2 dimensional & really well-observed.  Also I think there is some compassion and understanding there.

Totally agree that knowing a bit more about the character would improve it.

[mjwilson]

I quite liked "what is the most political thing that ever happened in Britain?" as a question, it has a different kind of stupidity to some of the other stuff.

[biggytitbo]

I thought it was terrible, in fact struggled to finish the episode. Cunk works in very small doses, making this roughly 28 minutes too long. Had a kind of relentless, monotonous quality to it that made it feel like it was trying to beat you into submission.

[olliebean]

I quite liked "what is the most political thing that ever happened in Britain?" as a question, it has a different kind of stupidity to some of the other stuff.

The brilliant thing about that was that rather than tactfully rewording or reframing the question to make more sense, as the experts usually do, Peston accepted it as a valid and good question and seemed to be genuinely tying himself in knots trying to think of an answer.

[Artemis]

It's not highbrow, but it doesn't try to be.

I've never really understood this kind of argument. It sort of lets anything off the hook because it's knowingly shit.

[RoadMaintenanceTycoon]

I've never really understood this kind of argument. It sort of lets anything off the hook because it's knowingly shit.

Are you saying that shows should aim to be highbrow? there's so much good comedy that mixes the high and lowbrow in a lovely nonjudgmental soup, like Curb or The Thick of It. I'd count this show among them