Here’s a couple of news stories that have caught our attention over the last few days.
Enterprice gets a second series
BBC Three has ordered a second series of Enterprice, its comedy about two South London brothers trying to get a delivery business off the ground.
In the second series of the Wheeler-Dealers comedy n the second series, Kazim has been kicked out of his mum’s house and Jeremiah’s savings are vanishing, so the duo try to use their street smarts to get ahead, making deals with dangerous market stall holders, unpredictable music producers and over-friendly chief executives.
The new series will run for five episodes but no firm dates for transmission have been announced.
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Fawlty Towers Knocks Only Fools Off The Top Spot!
For many a year Only Fools And Horses has been rated as Britain’s best sitcom, but Fawlty Towers has claimed the crown for a second time by a panel of experts compiled by the Radio Times.
It was interesting to see that Father Ted and I’m Alan Partridge came in second and third place respectively.
Richard Curtis and Ben Elton’s historical sitcom, Blackadder, starring Rowan Atkinson, was fourth on the list, with Jimmy Perry and David Croft’s 80-episode, half-century-old Dad’s Army in fifth.
Only Fools and Horses, featuring Peckham wheeler-dealers the Trotter family, was named sixth best sitcom of all time, ahead of Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais’s prison-based comedy drama, Porridge, in seventh.
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Fawlty Towers was also named the best British sitcom of all time in a survey of comedians, comedy writers and actors in 2017.
BBC Want To Develop New Comedy Talent
Opening the doors to new voices and furthering the impact of British comedy, Allen plans to cultivate a comedy community backed advocacy group with three main purposes:
- to engage and enable and enrich the under-represented and under-privileged
- to be a catalytic body for industry opportunities, challenges and partnerships
- to celebrate heritage and promote British comedy’s vital role in our cultural life
The BBC comedy chief seems to have a real passion for this project as he explains “We need a body to give dedicated focus and nurture to this crucial part of British cultural life which captures, defines and reflects our national character, identity and soul. Our strength and weakness, all our oddity and individuality. And we are brilliant at it. We’re famous for it all over the world. From Chaplin to Python, The Office to Fleabag, our comedy travels everywhere and brings us back love and respect, friends and influence. It’s one of our greatest cultural triumphs.”
“So the question I find myself asking, time and again, is: if comedy is loved and adored by audiences, why isn’t it afforded its dues to the same extent as other areas of culture?
“I want things to change. I think it’s time for the comedy industry to feel its value and exert its influence and potential throughout society. I want us to explore what a comedy foundation might look like, who it could unearth, what it could achieve and who’d get behind it. I want it to be valued as an art form and for arts body funding to be opened up to benefit comedy.”
The foundation, supported by BBC Director-General Tony Hall and Charlotte Moore, Director of BBC Content, will initially be developed by Allen over three months, from mid-April onwards.
source and full article beyondthejoke
During the foundation launch the BBC Comedy chief also hit out at social media. Shane Allen has said he feels British Comedy is being ruined by social media users with a “Victorian moral code” He feels a possible solution is the creation of a comedy charter that would help to deal with viewer’s who complain about jokes without appreciating their context, particularly around political offence.
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It looks like things could be looking up for British sitcoms.