I love the British sense of humour, and as a result I love British television. Some of my favourite shows are Red Dwarf, Absolutely Fabulous, The Office, Being Human and Shameless. Now, us Aussies know all about how badly these TV versions can go after seeing the US rendition of Kath and Kim, which was APPALLING! In 1992 the US felt the need to do their own version of Red Dwarf. The only original cast member was Robert Llewellyn as Kryten. Even through all his layers of make up you can see him thinking 'what the hell am I doing here?'. It was a complete violation of all that we love about Red Dwarf. Craig Bierko played Lister!!! Since when was Dave Lister tall dark and handsome?
Moving on from the Red Dwarf tragedy we have Absolutely Fabulous, and really I don't think I need to say anything on this. Some things should never be touched, and Ab Fab is one of those things.
The Office....now this one is a contentious one. I like Steve Carrell, and maybe if they had given this show another title I may have given it a good go, but they didn't. I am a devout Office fan. There is only one David Brent and there is only one Office for me. It's just not the same. What about our dearly hideous Gareth and his annoying behaviour? There is only one Gareth and that is Mackenzie Crook. The cast of the English show are genius! Each person bought something special to the show and made it a cult classic.
The most recent to tragically be butchered are Being Human and Shameless. Being Human really took my breath away. It was funny and yet dramatic with the whole supernatural theme of three housemates, one a vampire, one a werewolf and one a ghost. The casting of this show is amazing. It runs in the classic style of Doctor Who with low budget special effects that make it such a cult show and give it that cool edge. The US version is full of high tech special effects and it appears that the characters have all been renamed. It has lost it's sparkle.
Now possibly one of the worst offenders here is Shameless. Those of you who know this show know just how brilliant it is. Set on a housing estate in Manchester there are two distinct families, the Gallagher's and the Maguire's. Frank Gallagher is the town drunk who spurts off nonsense while wobbling through the streets to and from the pub.He has about 8 kids and his wife ran off with a woman. The Maguire's are the town drug dealers, who doesn't love the volatile relationship between Mimi and Paddy?! And then of course one of their boys Shane has a prostitute for a girlfriend. It is a hysterical watch. Sometimes it takes a turn for the serious with story lines about heroin addiction or family members being murdered, but it always does a full circle and comes back the quirky and funny. The cast is brilliantly chosen and all are wonderful in their own rights. Now the US version of Shameless appears to be nothing more than a white trash family in the ghetto drama. There was nothing funny about it. Yes they have some stellar cast members, the likes of William H Macy as Frank Gallagher and Emmy Rossum as his daughter Fiona Gallagher, but that is about it. It was a shoddy attempt at doing a British TV show. It never...EVER translates properly.
So, why is it that the US feel the need to redo British and Australian TV shows? Why can't they just watch the original shows? It's not like we speak foreign languages. I just don't understand it....and to be honest, it kind of makes my blood boil to see so many of my favourite shows get butchered by American producers. It truly saddens me to think that our US counterparts cannot "get" the Australian and British sense of humour, so much so that they must remake and interpret the scripts. What has happened to the world?! Is nothing sacred anymore?
Too true. I think it's just laziness - they see something that works and think that simply shoving a different cast in the pot and turning that gas on will convert instantly into cash, all too often they don't really understand the attraction of the original. Hands off I say!
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