Gone Out
BBC1, 9.30
That's it. I am no longer able to objectively view this programme. It went out, after Anne Robinson's Outtake TV, at the same time as Galapagos on BBC2, Taggart on ITV1, The Best Of The Worst on C4 and The All-Star Talent Show on Five. Presumably viewership will have been down in households that take the Observer. In the same slot last week, one-off Lenny Henry comedy drama vehicle Berry's Way scored 3.2 million viewers, matched by Galapagos with 3.2, and beaten by Rebus (your Taggart equivalent) with 5.3. Ratings shouldn't matter. On BBC1 on Friday night, they matter.
Hey, hey. I laughed at the jokes I didn't write (I wish I could claim the "self-harms/sell farms" line, but I cannot), and I thought the cast were very good. I wish the bloody credits didn't whizz past so fast and illegibly though, not just for me, but for all the people who worked on it.
posted by Andrew Collins @ 5:57 PM
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19 Comments:
I didn't think the titles went by too fast, I saw your name anyway. I liked it, the clown jokes particularly amused me. Will be watching next week :-)
I enjoyed it too - some excellent jokes in there, and a couple of groaners too, but on the whole it's just about perfect for a Friday night in front of the telly with a glass of beer. I'll be watching next week too ... :-)
Just posted this review on my own blog. Really great stuff Andrew...
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Not Going Out, the new BBC One sitcom scripted by Lee Mack and Andrew Collins has had some bizarrely mixed (pre)reviews from a couple of raves to notices which seem to have been written by people who don't like television period. I went in with an open mind and fingers crossed. And you know, given all that, I loved it. The premise is refreshingly simple. Lee and Kate share a flat, he's a bit of a bloke, she's a bit of an American and they both know this other bloke Tim, because he's Lee's friend and Kate's ex-boyfriend (he dumped her). And err... that's it. In an industry which increasingly relies on high-concepts, it's lovely to see a British sitcom that strips everything away to the important essentials -- the characters.
The script was a riot. Presumably because I've been watching Gilmore Girls again lately, it reminds me of Gilmore Girls, that clever utilisation of flippancy and pop culture and rapid fire one liners which eventually and subliminally cut to the core of the subject. Of course my favourite line was 'As my mum used to say, "Just because Thora Hurd couldn't get up stairs doesn't make her a Dalek!" but there were so many others that I'll have to rewatch to catch them all -- this burned through more good lines in half an hour than most have in a series. Note also the surprising re-introduction of the malapropism, last seen in Restoration comedy -- in one scene Mack says that his latest date 'sells farms'. Vine asks what's so wrong with that then realises at the same time we do that it was actually 'self harms'.
The performances were very fine too. Lee Mack and Tim Vine previously worked together in ITV's late night sketch comedy experiment The Sketch Show and presented real chemistry in the scenes in which their characters propped up the bar and reflected on their differing relationship with Kate. In the middle, majestic Megan Dodds in her first sitcom proves that her scene stealing turn in Spooks wasn't a blip. Her timing was excellent particularly in the aftermath of a water spillage. Sometimes sitcom acting can detour too far away from anything like realism, but here the work was perfectly measured and in places touchingly dramatic.
If there is a tiny criticism it's that often the laughter track was loud enough to lessen the impact of the script and the performances, with lines being drowned out and in places actually intruding on the comic timing, filling in important silences and not allowing moments of real wit time to breath. In this case, there is a danger that the viewer won't be able to bond with the characters (which is just as important in sitcom as in drama) because they simply can't hear what they have to say or be able to tune into their rhythms. Here any vaguely humourous word or line was greeted with a guffaw deadening the effect of the whole. Compare to Friends, in which the laughter builds across the scene which means the big punchline is all the sweeter -- they'd often agonise over the sound mix of a scene for just this reason -- guide the audience to the humour rather than hit them over the head with it.
I'm pleased to say that for the first time in some time, there is a British sitcom worth watching on a main channel that isn't by Ricky Gervais. Not Going Out somehow manages to straddle the mainstream and not so mainstream and I'm sure that the harsher reviews were too quick to dismiss it because of the supposedly unfashionable elements of a studio and multi-camera setup instead of taking pleasure in the script and performances. The measure of any sitcom is whether it makes you laugh and I did, all the way through.
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Andrew, it was ok. Some laugh out loud funny stuff, a few laboured or corny gags but on the whole not a bad half hour. Actually, i'm sure at one of the dodgy gags I heard the audience half laugh/half groan. I could have been hallucinating it though, hangovers do that to me. A decent trad sitcom. I'll keep watching.
I actually enjoyed it more than I thought I might - you've been lowering expectations a bit this week, Andrew.
I know that Lee is the stupid funny one but the other characters are less clear, which is probably a good thing after one episode. At least they weren't the stupid tall one and the stupid short one. Hopefully they'll fill out a bit though. I did think the possible chemistry between Lee and Kate was being flagged up slightly too often.
The quality of the jokes was a bit uneven - the Milton Keynes gag didn't belong in a show happy to make a passing reference to Charles Manson. There were plenty of good jokes in it though. (And you didn't do the "that wiped the smile off your face" joke that I was expecting, which has to be a good thing.) Lee was surprisingly good at the physical comedy stuff - Jerry Seinfeld barely walked and talked for the first three series.
It looks very good too. It's a sitcom set flat, but that's OK. Nice door.
The studio audience does sound like canned laughter - but they do, don't they? It certainly didn't sound worse than in most sitcoms and the laughter was generally commensurate with the jokes (i.e. I could tell why they were laughing).
Anything that ensures the credits stay full screen and aren't talked over is a good thing in my book. (It worked for Green Wing, which must have really pissed off Mister "we're pretty funny guys too you know" Channel Four Continuity Announcer Bloke.) The credits were just about readable - only a little bit too fast.
Overall I thought that at the very least it was likeable enough that no one would turn over to avoid it. That sounds like faint praise but there are plenty of sitcoms that try to achieve that and fail. At its best it was funny and mainstream, which I think is what you were going for.
I hope you've got some jokes left over for the rest of the series. Whereas most sitcoms these days have a few jokes in them, this seemed to be in keeping with a US approach with a high gag rate. And yes some were better than others, I seem to be alone in enjoying the "clown with a stroke " line more than is healthy. But then, I do hate clowns.
I liked it. Obviously the Observer reviewer was watching something else.
We enjoyed it too. Even my hubby, who doesn't usually watch Friday night telly.
We'll be watching next week too. Well done to you and everybody else who worked on it.
Now have it on autoview with series link, no chance of forgetting it's on (my oh so busy life...).
Enjoyed the mix of belly-laughs and groaners, particularly the 'Looking for a job init.' That's still making me laugh. Am I sad?
The most promising first episode of a sitcom I can remember for some time (since Peep Show, maybe).
Only minor quibble was that Lee Mack and Tim Vine's stand-up past was quite obvious in some of their delivery, but that was the case with Seinfeld too.
I laughed, my girlfriend laughed, we'll be tuning in again.
You and Mr Mack didn't make it easy for yourselves did you (although I think you said it was Lee who insisted on coming up with the vast number of gags). As others have said an amazing joke-rate - I've always admired fast-paced comedy and spiel much more than (what I consider to be) the laziness of the likes of the Office, but actually I thought NGO was at its best when it slowed down a bit. Not sure but it might have benefited from a few longer lulls between jokes. Must be mildly frustrating to see some of your favourite jokes thrown away so quick - the self-harms one for example could have filled loads more airtime. I guess more light and shade will come naturally as the series develops and if it doesn't its insanity could catch on.
A good hours worth of comedy,
Not Going Out and then QI on BBC2.
When I heard the reviews I was dreading it was going to turn into a "When The Whistle Blows" (from Extras) type sitcom.
But my good lady and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Yes, there may have been a few "groan" gags but I don't see what's wrong with that - Tim Vine has made a career out of it.
Some of the reviews that I read, particularly the one in the Metro, were extremely harsh, considering it was the first episode. I remember disliking Frasier when I saw the first episode.
We're already looking forward to next week's episode.
Paul (and Kirsty)
Dunfermline
I was expecting car crash TV, but i was quite impressed actually, didn't know it was you Andrew, I would have watched it rather than catching it by accident if I did! :-)
Gari - the "clown with a stroke" gag had me laughing out loud for an unreasonable amount of time, as did the reactions of the other clowns in the background when Kate drenches the clown school teacher.
All in all, not bad for what was essentially the pilot episode - it sets things up nicely for the rest of the series and didn't overelaborate the characterisation. Unless you catch the Friends pilot on E4's mega-heavy rotation, its easy to forget that series started out with 3 locations (coffee shop, 2 flats) and a reasonably contrived opening set up - Ross' wife's left him, he says "where am I going to find another wife?" and Rachel stumbles into the coffee shop in full bridal regalia, and 10 years elapse before it reaches the pay off. I thought NGO was a lot less contrived than that, and started out as if it had been on screen for a while and we were all comfortable with its premise.
So, worth checking out, worth coming back for a second go next week.
Loved the show - good plot, liked the characters and want to know what happens to them, and some great gags.
Hope the ratings and reviews were good - haven't seen any myself yet.
Andrew, you said to be honest -
I didn't enjoy Not Going Out. I don't think it matches my taste in comedy. I usually find Lee Mack funny and I ALWAYS enjoy your work - Grass, Banter, All The Way From Memphis, Lloyd Cole Knew My Father, your books etc, etc, etc.
Although Lee Mack is far far better than some other actors I have seen doing sitcoms, I wondered whether the comedy would have come across better if it had been delivered better. I just felt that Lee was making it too obvious that a punchline was coming and there wasn't much variation in his delivery of his lines.
I don't generally watch sitcoms that are on BBC1 during the evening as I generally don't find them funny, so perhaps I am not your target audience and that explains my comments.
Having said that I did laugh out loud a bit on 2 occasions.
I wouldn't write this if I didn't think you would take it the right way. Hopefully I haven't offended anyone, but have given an honest and constructive critism. It's just not my cup of tea.
And yes, the credits were too fast.
Thank you Clare H - I was beginning to wonder if I was the only reader here not to have enjoyed NGO. As a big admirer of Andrew's written and broadcast work I too really wanted to like it, but I just found the jokes a little bit obvious (init) - and as they were coming thick and fast, viewing degenerated into a "spot the punchline" competition between me and my girlfriend. All a matter of personal taste, of course, but this just wasn't to mine.
Still, two disgruntled viewers aren't going to wreck the figures and I admire anyone with the guts to try something new, so genuinely good luck Andrew - I don't like Little Britain either but it doesn't seem to have done Matt Lucas and David Walliams any harm!
I'm certainly not offended by the negative comments, Clare and Steve. I appreciate your honesty. I was talking to the actress and comedian Lynn Ferguson after a Banter recording recently and I mentioned how much I'd disliked Ben Elton's sitcom Blessed, forgetting in that split second that Lynn had been in it. She didn't write it, so it's not quite the same, but she's still connected with it, and yet she was circumspect, and we had a sensible conversation about Ben Elton after my faux pas. It's silly to pretend to like things. Better to be constructive about why. I'm glad my 14-year-old nephew liked Not Going Out.
I enjoyed it mostly, it certainly improved as it went along. After the first few minutes I - sorry - really thought it was terrible and nearly turned off after the Isle of Man joke. Pleased I didn't though, the second half of it was very enjoyable.
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