Nathan Barley new trailer

[Slackboy]

It would be interesting to have a read of those actually; I've never really understood where the Ayoade bashing came from. It always worried me slightly because it seemed that a lot of you had taken a disliking to someone for no apparent reason, or just based on the characters that he'd played or something like that.

[TJ]

It would be interesting to have a read of those actually; I've never really understood where the Ayoade bashing came from. It always worried me slightly because it seemed that a lot of you had taken a disliking to someone for no apparent reason, or just based on the characters that he'd played or something like that.

Take it you've never seen that BBC documentary about him then?

[Munday's Chylde]

You can probably search for them - I might be wrong, a wiser verbwhore than I should be able to confirm it, but im sure he used to be here under a name like Aod or something?

[Slackboy]

Nope. Any chance of a brief synopsis? Preferably a little more than "he seemed like a complete cunt"?

Luvvie-ish? Arrogant? Conceited? That kind of thing then?

[Ambient Sheep]

You can probably search for them - I might be wrong, a wiser verbwhore than I should be able to confirm it, but im sure he used to be here under a name like Aod or something?

It was A0d, I think, but was all on the old database, which we can no longer get to.

[Slackboy]

It's not this guy you're thinking of is it?

http://chilled.cream.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=107946&highlight=a0d#107946

[alan strang]

Take it you've never seen that BBC documentary about him then?

The Footlights one? That was Anglia.

[Munday's Chylde]

It's not this guy you're thinking of is it?

http://chilled.cream.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=107946&highlight=a0d#107946

Well thats him mentioned there yes, A0d - but as sheep has confirmed his posts appeared on the old board so i guess they're lost. From what I remember he used to post a lot of strange random daftness.

[TJ]

Take it you've never seen that BBC documentary about him then?

The Footlights one? That was Anglia.

Ah, so it was.

Bet I know more about "Haggard" than you do, though. Nyer!

[Darrell]

Take it you've never seen that BBC documentary about him then?

The Footlights one? That was Anglia.

A Strang-brand DivX of which I have and keep meaning to upload/get someone to torrent.

[neveragain]

Well then, for those of us that don't know, why is he such a cunt?

Apart from being not terribly funny. My mother could never tell a joke but I wouldn't call her a one of those things.

[Sexton Brackets Drugbust]

Apart from being not terribly funny. My mother could never tell a joke but I wouldn't call her a one of those things.

In which case, try to steer her away from the portrayal of comedy characters.

[neveragain]

Well, I admit to thinking he's a crap actor as well - and basically an all round humour-vacuum whenever he's put into a programme - but still is that justification enough for so much abuse? It's not like he's single-handedly destroying British television comedy as we type. Or is he?

[Bellscab]

Doesn't seem to have been mentioned anywhere else...

There's a Morris and Brooker interview by Stephen Armstrong in today's Sunday Times Culture supplement! I don't have a scanner to hand, but it's page 20 for those who do...

It's interesting to hear from the man himself  and it's interesting that he chose to do so now, after transmission (and there's EVEN a new pic!) but I just don't feel Armstrong asked the right questions...

Haven't got time to write anymore as need to go out... just a quick heads-up, really.

[butnut]

Here's the url

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/newspaper/0,,176-1538174,00.html

March 27, 2005

Interview: It's hard to be an idiot
Well dense? Chris Morris and his co-writer explain the sitcom Nathan Barley to Stephen Morris

The first series of Nathan Barley clattered to a close on Channel 4 last weekend, and a quick perusal of the cuttings suggests that the series, written by Chris Morris and Charlie Brooker, has to date garnered more column inches than the return of Doctor Who. From wild adulation to astonishingly bad-tempered invective, Nathan Barley's depiction of the excesses of wigged-out nu-media types more than made up for disappointing ratings with its disproportionate social impact.

Online teen chat rooms spotting self-obsessed idiots refer to them instantly as "a bit of a Nathan Barley", suggesting the phrase will join "Up to a point, Lord Copper" and "It goes up to eleven" in the rich pantheon of catch phrases that American college professors (and Barleys) like to call memes: sampled and sampled until those who use them aren't entirely sure why. Others have sought to defend Barleyism, among them the anonymous correspondent who angrily found the truth a little close to home: "I am constantly quoting Robin from vintage Batman cartoons, which is a bit Barleyish," he huffed in a BBC chat room, "but it can be funny (trust me on this one)."

If the series has made it impossible to claim ironic ownership of kitsch, it will have performed an immeasurable service. From the early 1990s, the possibility of mutilating anything of value, then facing criticism with a sneered "whatever", has become the dominant cultural discourse. At the same time, the series introduced two actors of startling skill: the stand-up comedian Julian Barratt, whose portrayal of the collapsing style writer Dan Ashcroft was understated and powerful; and a newcomer, Nick Burns, as Nathan, who brought an unexpected depth to a character originally conceived as the archetypal prat.

Amid all the debate on the series, the voices of its creators have been hard to hear. Chris Morris and Charlie Brooker created the show out of a character on Brooker's website, TvGoHome, but have said little about either their intentions or their response to the criticism. In a brief e-mail chat last week, however, they outlined their views with considerable aplomb. It was well bum.

ST: "Some reviewers have said they were surprised they didn't hate Barley as much as they were meant to."

Chris Morris: "Well, if they found they didn't completely hate Barley, why conclude that they were meant to? Alan Partridge was an arsehole, but how many times do you hear people say, 'I'm worried I don't hate him enough'? No matter how heinous someone's behaviour, if you make them a comic character, you can't expect people to hate them. Jack T Ripper effectively blew up the planet — do you hate him? "When people say 'love to hate', they actually mean 'love to be appalled by' — if they truly hated them, they'd never repeat a catch phrase.

"Nathan is not al-Zarqawi. He's a cocky tool who tries too hard. If you really expect that to summon the full force of your hatred, I'd say you were mentally ill. In a sitcom, you travel with the monster — you don't just see them from the outside. Even on Charlie's original TvGoHome website, which has a much more exterior viewpoint than a sitcom, the sheer level of psychotic rage spewed at Barley is part of the joke — it's implicitly unreasonable."

Charlie Brooker: "The fury vented in the TVGH listings was so patently over the top, only a bastard couldn't have felt slightly sorry for Nathan even then. Nathans in general don't strike me as nasty or scheming — they simply display a rather irritating enthusiasm for life, or rather a version of life that's essentially an imaginary movie starring themselves in the lead role."

ST: "Some people seem unable to watch the programme without going into neurotic convulsions over whether it is a sitcom or a satire ..."

CM: "A sitcom isn't usually the right tool for satire... When you watched I'm Alan Partridge, did you really go, 'Thank God they're exploding the hideous world of the local-radio DJ in temporary accommodation'? Or The Office, 'At last someone's rodding the paper merchants!'? You can have incidentals that are satirical — background jokes, peripheral characters — but mainly you're concerned with the psychological flaws of your lead."

ST: "Great sitcoms always have tragedy somewhere at their heart. Do you see tragedy in the characters in Nathan Barley? Is there hope of redemption?"

CM: "Hmm. Not sure how much tragedy there is in Porridge, Yes, Minister or Seinfeld, but both Dan and Nathan have access to desperation. Nathan is certainly headed for a massive crisis — possibly as soon as his next birthday (he is 26), when a party photo reveals a receding hairline, he finds his string vest riding up on his belly and he is struck by his first true insight into his own uselessness. Twenty-seven is the most common age for men to commit suicide.

"For Dan, with his greater self-knowledge, redemption hovers just out of arm's reach, and I suspect he will make increasingly desperate lunges for it. One reason we couldn't hate Nathan is because, beneath the honking idiocy, he is desperate. He cares too much what people think, so he can't be effortlessly cool — he can only try to appear so. And that's very hard work: studied nonchalance is driven by a turbocharged insecurity. That's enough empathy to understand his motives, but not enough to excuse him. The pursuit of approval usually ends in disaster."

CB: "I think Nathan will end up going crazy, simply because he's got so many inconsequential choices to make, all of which involve the way he's perceived. Look at the way mobile phones are marketed — apparently, when you buy one, you're buying something that will "express who you are", something others will judge you by. If that's true, society might as well drown itself in a bucket and have done with it. You should only judge someone by their mobile phone if they've hand-painted a swastika on it. But even though you know the whole notion of that is ridiculous, the terror's going to be bubbling away somewhere in your head next time you're in Carphone Warehouse looking for a new handset.

"Extrapolate from that one example to cover virtually everything you can think of, from the type of trousers you wear to your views on globalisation, and you've got a world full of things for Nathan to take sides on, but never personally analyse. His brain'll revolt in the end."

Nice to see Morris dismiss the 'tragedy' element in there.

[Bellscab]

Ah... nice one, Butnut. Didn't really the supplement text was online as well.

[butnut]

Do you want to stick in the database - seeing as you 'found' it?

[neveragain]

'Online teen chat rooms spotting self-obsessed idiots refer to them instantly as "a bit of a Nathan Barley", suggesting the phrase will join "Up to a point, Lord Copper" and "It goes up to eleven" in the rich pantheon of catch phrases that American college professors (and Barleys) like to call memes: sampled and sampled until those who use them aren't entirely sure why.'

what the fuck? -
(Alright, perhaps not worthy of a wtf but still not very well written or accurate or even relevant... the sentence doesn't even seem to go anywhere... and what is 'Up to a point, Lord Copper' anyway?)

[slim]

CM: "Hmm. Not sure how much tragedy there is in [...] Seinfeld."

I wonder how he defines tragedy? George is the perfect expression of a tragic individual for me.

[neveragain]

Yes, to me as well, and there is a sense of tragedy in Porridge and - to a lesser extent - Yes, Minister which he also mentions. But remember we're talking about the man who made Jam here.

[butnut]

That's all true - but the darkess and tragedy aren't pushed in your face in those shows. I mean, when you think of Seinfeld, you don't think "what a DARK show it is" (and some of things they cover are pretty dark), you just think "what a bloody funny show".

I just liked the fact that he dismissed the whole darkness thing rather than saying how tragic all these shows are.

[Robot DeNiro]

and what is 'Up to a point, Lord Copper' anyway?

It's from Evelyn Waugh's novel 'Scoop'.  I don't think it's a particularly well know catchphrase though - I only recognised the quote because I'm reading the book at the moment.

I may as well take this opportunity to recommend 'Scoop' - it's made me laugh out loud more times than Nathan Barley, and I'm only half way through it.

[Morrisfan82]

Others have sought to defend Barleyism, among them the anonymous correspondent who angrily found the truth a little close to home: "I am constantly quoting Robin from vintage Batman cartoons, which is a bit Barleyish," he huffed in a BBC chat room, ...

Er, yeah, that's exactly like Barley isn't it.

... "but it can be funny (trust me on this one)."

Sorry, I take that back!

[gazzyk1ns]

CM: "A sitcom isn't usually the right tool for satire... When you watched I'm Alan Partridge, did you really go, 'Thank God they're exploding the hideous world of the local-radio DJ in temporary accommodation'? Or The Office, 'At last someone's rodding the paper merchants!'?

That's just deliberately missing the point, isn't it... if those shows were "exploding" anything (and I don't really think IAP was), it was a certain type of person. Alan's job is only semi-relevant, in that he's sort-of-famous, and the nature of Wernham-Hogg's business is almost completely irrelevant. You would assume Morris knows that, too, he's talking a load of shit in that interview.

[jutl]

I don't think it's a particularly well know catchphrase though - I only recognised the quote because I'm reading the book at the moment.

It was very widely used peviously though - my parents still say it. It's supposed to indicate cautious disagreement with a superior (rather like the Punch Curate's Egg cartoon).

[Gypsum Fantastic]

Jack T Ripper effectively blew up the planet — do you hate him?

I know I'm being terribly picky, but it's Jack D Ripper, isn't it?

[Hoogstraten'sSmilingUlcer]

That interview's a load of shit. Morris is talking through his arse for most of the time.

CM: "A sitcom isn't usually the right tool for satire

But why not? If it was just pure satire with no emotional depth et cetera, then I agree it would be unwatchable, but surely if you had great characters, stories, and you constructed an involving world around the satire, then that would make a sitcom the perfect vehicle (this is sounding like the Gospel of St. John). I think sitcom is as a good a tool for satire as sketch shows and spoof news programmes. It sounds like another 'its not satire, it's just comedy' excuse from Morris.

You can have incidentals that are satirical — background jokes, peripheral characters — but mainly you're concerned with the psychological flaws of your lead."

Fair enough, but you didn't really tackle the 'psychological flaws' of Dan or Nathan, did you? They were shallow, poorly drawn characters, with no emotional depth, and no no alternative to (in Nathan's case) arrogance and prentension and (for Dan) self-loathing and despair.

Morris is turning into a damp parody of himself. In other interviews, he's a funny and imaginative man, who takes a fresh and interesting view on things, as you would imagine the co-creator of The Day Todayand Brass Eye would be. But now he just seems like a tedious little pundit, with Brooker tagging behind agreeing with everything he says like an irritating nephew. Even Morris' use of 'cocky tool' and 'honking idiocy' seem like desperate attempts for a laugh. [/quote]

[Slackboy]

Many thanks to whomever wants to take the credit for the article.

Reading between the lines I'd say that CM and CB are really wanting to do a second series. Has there been anymore word on if that's going to happen yet?

I thought that the article was interesting if a little lacking on the information side. Was anything 'banned' from being shown? Did it turn out the way that they hoped? Was it a comment on modern media or just all done for a laff? Is it me or does no-one seem to actually know what the word 'satire' actually means when they talk about it?

http://www.answers.com/satire&r=67

Am I being satirical now by exposing the human folly of people who use the word 'satire' incorrectly? I mean definition 2 on that page is exactly what NB is doing isn't it?

[The Mumbler]

I like the idea that they have to "explain" Nathan Barley.  An "essentially what we were trying to do" for 2005.  Bit late chaps - and if you've had to explain it, you failed.  

By thunder, Morris talks some bollocks these days.

[Jon_Norton]

and what is 'Up to a point, Lord Copper' anyway?)

It's in Evelyn Waugh's 1938 comic novel Scoop, about Fleet Street *(as it then was) - Lord Copper is a fearsome newspaper owner who doesn't take "No" for an answer, so "Up to a point, Lord Copper" is what his subordinates say when they can't answer "Yes" to one of his demands.

It tells us more about Stephen Armstrong that he imagines this has any wide circulation in 2005. I've read all of Waugh's books and I've hardly ever felt the urge to use it. I've only seen it used about 3 times in the Telegraph papers in the past 20 years. It's not exactly used on a Fast Show scale in the original novel.