TV Review : Coupling
For once the critics got it right. The sexy new (to BBC America) sitcom Coupling came to these shores with rave reviews but then again so did the massively disappointing In a Land of Plenty which so it's with great relief that I report that Coupling is every bit as good as it's best notices. It's not going to be for everyone though,this has got to be one of the most explicit shows to air on basic cable. Men Behaving Badly would blush at some of the things we've seen in the first two episodes but as randy as it is it's also pants wettingly funny.Easily the best new comedy of the year so far.
If Coupling has a minor fault it's in it's cast, through two episodes the two lead characters have yet to fully live up to the material they've been given. Jack Davenport (This Life, The Talented Mr. Ripley) seems to be striving to be the British Jim Carrey and the (massively) lovely to look at Sarah Alexander (Smack the Pony) seems to be coasting on pure sex appeal. Even so they're quite good but the best performances so far belong to Richard Coyle (Topsy Turvy, Lorna Doon) as the sex obsessed Jeff - who's been gifted some of the series best lines ad delivers them with aplomb - and Ben Miles (Cold Feet) as Susan's (Ms. Alexander) "gifted" Conservative ex is terrific.
Unless there is an extraordinary drop off in quality from here it seems safe to group Coupling among the very best of recent British comedies and full marks to BBC America for importing a series without obvious known star appeal or a previously existing cult audience.
TV News : British Men Behaving Badly - New, Old, Related
Hosannah! BBC America are bringing new episodes of British Men Behaving Badly to our screens beginning this week. In celebration I got out some old tapes of MBB's very first season and was surprised to find that not only do they hold up pretty well but there's reason to believe that the show could have been even better then it became without the cast change that occurred after the inaugural series.
In the beginning Martin Clune's character Gary had a different roommate - no not Rob Schnieder, you're having an unpleasant flashback to the American version - in Dermot, as played by English national treasure Harry Enfield. Dermot was less the free living pretty boy Neil Morrissey's Tony would become but he had an equally obsessive crush on upstairs neigbor Deborah (Leslie Ash). In many ways Enfield's Dermot was a more comedically satisfying character that the cartoonish
For once the critics got it right. The sexy new (to BBC America) sitcom Coupling came to these shores with rave reviews but then again so did the massively disappointing In a Land of Plenty which so it's with great relief that I report that Coupling is every bit as good as it's best notices. It's not going to be for everyone though,this has got to be one of the most explicit shows to air on basic cable. Men Behaving Badly would blush at some of the things we've seen in the first two episodes but as randy as it is it's also pants wettingly funny.Easily the best new comedy of the year so far.
If Coupling has a minor fault it's in it's cast, through two episodes the two lead characters have yet to fully live up to the material they've been given. Jack Davenport (This Life, The Talented Mr. Ripley) seems to be striving to be the British Jim Carrey and the (massively) lovely to look at Sarah Alexander (Smack the Pony) seems to be coasting on pure sex appeal. Even so they're quite good but the best performances so far belong to Richard Coyle (Topsy Turvy, Lorna Doon) as the sex obsessed Jeff - who's been gifted some of the series best lines ad delivers them with aplomb - and Ben Miles (Cold Feet) as Susan's (Ms. Alexander) "gifted" Conservative ex is terrific.
Unless there is an extraordinary drop off in quality from here it seems safe to group Coupling among the very best of recent British comedies and full marks to BBC America for importing a series without obvious known star appeal or a previously existing cult audience.
TV News : British Men Behaving Badly - New, Old, Related
Hosannah! BBC America are bringing new episodes of British Men Behaving Badly to our screens beginning this week. In celebration I got out some old tapes of MBB's very first season and was surprised to find that not only do they hold up pretty well but there's reason to believe that the show could have been even better then it became without the cast change that occurred after the inaugural series.
In the beginning Martin Clune's character Gary had a different roommate - no not Rob Schnieder, you're having an unpleasant flashback to the American version - in Dermot, as played by English national treasure Harry Enfield. Dermot was less the free living pretty boy Neil Morrissey's Tony would become but he had an equally obsessive crush on upstairs neigbor Deborah (Leslie Ash). In many ways Enfield's Dermot was a more comedically satisfying character that the cartoonish
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