http://www.boston.com/dailynews/236/world/John_Cleese_speaks_the_unspeak:.shtml

John Cleese speaks the unspeakable: American comedies are funnier than British

By Jill Lawless, Associated Press, 8/24/2001 01:53

LONDON (AP) It's the ultimate heresy from a British comic legend: John Cleese thinks Americans make funnier television than the British.

The former ''Monty Python'' comedian, who now splits his time between England and California, told the British Broadcasting Corp. this week that ''for the first time in a long time the comedy on American television is rather better than we are producing.''

Cleese didn't name any specific programs, but the comments have nonetheless piqued Britons, who have long felt certain of their comic supremacy over their trans-Atlantic cousins.

Britain gave the world the Goons and ''Beyond the Fringe,'' ''Monty Python's Flying Circus'' and ''Fawlty Towers.'' Many of America's best-loved sitcoms from ''All in the Family'' to ''Three's Company'' were based on British shows.

But Cleese says standards have fallen.

''When I had my hip replacement operation, I was a bit dopey and I started watching much more television and reading less and I suddenly became aware that television seemed to me to be as bad as it is everywhere else,'' he told the BBC.

His comments drew a predictably incredulous response. The United States may be bigger, Americans might be richer but funnier? Never.

''There are few sights in life more nauseating than that of a pampered British celebrity scuttling off to America, slagging off their homeland as they go,'' sniffed the Daily Mail.

But American television is gaining respect in Britain, where critics routinely praise the tight writing of shows like ''Frasier'' what writer Mark Lawson called its ''machine-tooled one-liners'' over the latest British comedy.

''Thirty years ago, British TV was regarded as the best in the world, and U.S. TV was a byword for what is bad. That is no longer the case,'' said Jon Cook, dean of the school of English and American studies at the University of East Anglia.

''Through shows like 'ER,' 'Friends' and 'Frasier,' American television in Britain is now associated with both quality and popularity.''

Across the Atlantic, however, ''Britcoms'' retain millions of dedicated American fans, and U.S. critics regularly praise British imports for their subtlety and experimentation. ''The Royle Family,'' the BBC's closely observed, all-but plotless comedy about a working-class family of couch potatoes, won rave reviews when it was screened this year on the cable channel BBC America.

British comedies are not afraid to explore uncomfortable territory. Two of the BBC's most praised recent series were ''Happiness'' about a man approaching 40 and bereaved by the sudden death of his wife and ''The Office,'' a painfully accurate depiction of white-collar hell.

Like most British comedies, they are craft products, the result of one or two writers honing two or three hours of television.

Cleese's ''Fawlty Towers'' last year rated the greatest British television show of all time by the British Film Institute ran for only 12 episodes between 1975 and 1979. Britons look in wonder at the hundreds of episodes chalked up by shows like ''Frasier'' and ''Cheers.''

''British sitcoms are a different animal to American ones,'' said Boyd Hilton, television editor of entertainment magazine Heat. ''American sitcoms deliver a laugh every few minutes. A lot of British sitcoms are written by one man in his room. It's more about character development, and it only lasts for six or eight episodes.''

Despite criticism at home, the British television formula remains a hot property in America. Game shows like ''The Weakest Link'' and ''Who Wants to be a Millionaire?'' have been successful transplants, and American producers continue to mine British comedies. ''Men Behaving Badly,'' one of the most popular British sitcoms of the '90s, was remade less successfully for NBC. CBS has commissioned a pilot for ''The Kennedys,'' an American ''Royle Family'' set in Boston.

British viewers, meanwhile, seem loyal to homegrown shows. American sitcoms like ''Friends'' and ''Will and Grace,'' shown on the alternative Channel 4, draw between 2.5 million and 3.5 million viewers an episode. The most popular British sitcoms on the BBC's main channel often get more than 10 million. Six million tuned in to watch a rerun of 25-year-old ''Fawlty Towers'' last year.

''There's always a tendency to trash the present in relation to some golden age,'' said Cook. ''I don't think there has been a waning of comic inventiveness. 'The Royle Family' is an extraordinary reinvention of the sitcom.''

The criticisms, he says, ''partly reflect the fact that there is a great deal of uncertainty about the future of British television. I think there's an anxiety in Britain now about the extent to which British productions will be able to compete in a global media market.''

Cleese, 61, concedes he may be the one who has changed.

''I think almost everything I've done since I was about 35 has been a disaster, hasn't it?'' he said.

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2001

Answers

Um, er, ahem

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2001

If you click on the link in OG's message it says it is deleted. Do you think OG is going to delete us if we irritate her ?????

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2001

Yeah, that message says couldn't find it, probably deleted. What it really means is the URL was screwed up in some way. I think it works now. If not: http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=0068QB

-- Anonymous, August 25, 2001

Ah, I see, Brooks thought she had something new, but in reality Git is showing Brooks that it is a duplicate post of sorts...

LOL

-- Anonymous, August 25, 2001

:)

Mind you, I have to say that any nation that elects someone like Tony Blair more than once must have some sense of humor.

-- Anonymous, August 25, 2001

Well, we beat you guys there too. We elected Clinton twice. LOL

-- Anonymous, August 25, 2001

And now there's Condit! Man, that beats any British male MP found hanged in black lace bra and panties.

-- Anonymous, August 25, 2001