No Place Like Home now being repeated on Forces TV

 

If you have read Robert Webb's memoir How Not to Be a Boy you may remember that the youthful Webb mentions an unlikely source of comedic inspiration: the mainstream sitcom No Place Like Home, which ran for five series on BBC1 in the 1980s.

It's about a middle-aged man, chagrined to find his grown-up children have taken up residence in the family home once again - a bit like Eric Chappell's Home to Roost, on around the same time - only more so, as this put-upon dad is lumbered with four kids and a wife. Not the most obvious sitcom, perhaps, to stir the blood of one who went on to star in a gloriously dark example of the genre but that's what seems to have set the seal on Webb's decision to become a performer.

Not that he offers an unqualified tribute to the ability of its writer, Jon Watkins.

New book about cult 90s UK sitcom Nightingales

I don't often review books on this blog but this was placed into my hands by its author and it's an astonishing piece of work ... well, maybe not that, precisely, but it's certainly rather surprising, to say the least.

Fiddler's Green and other adventures in sitcom

The discussion in the previous post of a sitcom which didn't make it to pilot stage has reminded me of one which did pass that hurdle at least, even though it was never broadcast.

Sid and Rich: the sitcom that never was

According to a new biography, when Sid James died in April 1976 he had been just about to finalise plans to record a sitcom pilot for Thames Television in which he had been slated to appear with ex-Beatle Ringo Starr. It's a sad tale of what might have been - and, author David Hamm suggests, so very nearly was.

So take THAT, Galton and Simpson ...

 

Joyce Carol Oates in an interview published in the Guardian today:

Is there an art form you don't relate to?

Situation comedy on TV or stage. It distorts the complexity of the human soul.

Tripper's Day (Leonard Rossiter sitcom)

A DVD has recently been issued of Leonard Rossiter's last sitcom, Triipper's Day, written by Brian Cooke. It will, I imagine, sell on the strength of Rossiter's name - and it is indeed worth acquiring for his performance if you are already a fan.

The casual purchaser needs to be warned, however, that this is not another Rising Damp or Reggie Perrin: but a broad and knockabout sitcom of the sort which might have been more common when it aired in 1984.

Ode to Nightingales (Paul Makin)

 I mentioned the sitcom Nightingales in a recent post about BBC 4's new series The Night Shift. Originally broadcast on Channel 4 in the early 90s, it is now available on DVD and deserves the very highest praise.

Bigging Up PhoneShop

Still in new (or newish) sitcom mode  - I can't pontificate about doo wop all the time - I'd like to put in a word for PhoneShop, already broadcast on E4, but which has just started a run on Channel 4 last night.

In the Friday night slot, too - which would suggest a certain amount of faith in its potential, even if it's been securely sandwiched between very old Peter Kay material and Ricky Gervais.

Why new Icelandic sitcom is straight from the fridge (The Night Shift, BBC 4)

As a further contribution to this blog's intermittent series of non-musical posts, allow me to draw youir attention to The Night Shift, a sitcom set in an all-night garage in Reykjavik which promises to be, on the basis of the first two episodes broadcast last night on BBC 4,  pretty good.

Danny Dyer's Chocolate Homunculus

This clip from last night's episode of the UK sitcom Peep Show demands a wider audience. And it's music-related (after a fashion), thus qualifying for this blog. In later reviews of sitcoms over the decades the phrase "Danny Dyer's Chocolate Homunculus" will, I am sure, rank alongside Alan Partridge's "Monkey Tennis."