The Ugly American (tourists in Italy)

[Lannis]

Lannis , I do watch a bit of TV , mostly animated stuff , a couple of silly sitcoms , some of the Brilliant British  
sitcoms , PBS Docs , and of course Dr Who . I just never know the names of the actors , except for the ones that populate Last of the summer wine  ;D Peter Sallis is my hero  ;) :D

  Dusty

I have a raft of British Comedy DVDS, and it constitutes most of my tube-watching (maybe 3-4 hours a month at most).

"Last of the Summer Wine" is unique - nothing like it would ever have survived in the USA.    That's true for most Britcoms; their actors are not "beautiful", they don't all have perfect teeth and skin, but they are by gosh comedic actors and actresses and their work never gets old.   I tend to like the more obscure ones sometimes, like Open All Hours and Is It Legal and Brittas Empire.

And the Brits are funny in other ways - most of them drive French cars but their TV comedy shows give the French hell every time.   And they will actually show people eating - American shows almost never show anyone actually eating - they'll press a burger against their mouth but never take a bite and chew it.    It's little, realistic things like that that make the difference to me.

And if I were an ancient Sultan and someone offered me every Jen and J-lo and Kim on American TV for my harem - OR just Felicity Kendal - it'd be Felicity every time!

Lannis

[oldbike54]

 Lannis ,

 Yeah , one of the things I found fascinating about LOTSW , was that in the early seasons the main characters smoked AND drank beer . Not advising to smoke , just found it interesting . The humor was just so different . Of course there was some truly crude BBC stuff , The Young Ones comes to mind  :D

  Dusty

[Lannis]

Lannis ,

 Yeah , one of the things I found fascinating about LOTSW , was that in the early seasons the main characters smoked AND drank beer . Not advising to smoke , just found it interesting . The humor was just so different . Of course there was some truly crude BBC stuff , The Young Ones comes to mind  :D

  Dusty

Never found any of the "crude" ones, maybe because I got into it via PBS 20 years ago when I used to walk to my brother-in-law's house and watch Britcoms on his TV, which picked up PBS stations.

EVERYONE on TV used to smoke and drink beer, back when half of Americans smoked.   Andy Griffith always had a cigarette in his mouth; so did Dick van Dyke on his show.   You could hardly see Edward R. Murrow or Chet Huntley for the smoke from their on-camera ashtrays, and even Fred Flintstone and Barney Rubble were flogging Winstons in prime time.

The house I grew up in was always full of smoke, my Dad smoked 3 packs a day.   Dying of his second heart attack at age 39 stopped that, though, and I never took it up.   Reason I'm alive today.....

Lannis

[Ad B]

Hi,

to go back to the nerds who carves names and tags in historic sculptures.  :wife:
I take pictures to remember those sculptures. The sculptures don't have to remember me...
Nor my lovely wife or I has to be on such beautiful picture from somekind of historic thing or happening.
Pictures of us are on a terras with a good beer or at the pool...  :BEER:
Only once I wrote my name and from my lovely wife; from Phang and from Guzzitech (sorry, I didn't know thís place yet...),
on a wall, a plastic white sheet wall at  the Guzzi factory in 2011 at its 90th birthday.  ;-T ;-T
The white wall was supposed to be written, permanent markers where given for it, behind that wall was the new part of the factory build.
Let those nerds pay for the damage they made and thank them with a huge fine, so they never come back. P:)

Ad B

[radan2]

 Reason I'm alive today.....

Lannis

Then the rumors are false!  :)

[Lannis]

Then the rumors are false!  :)

Busted.   This "Lannis" persona is part of a "Turing Test", in which people try to determine if the entity with whom they are communicating is a human or an AI.   Looks like the program needs a little work .....

[dibble]

And the Brits are funny in other ways - most of them drive French cars but their TV comedy shows give the French hell every time.  

Lannis

Yeah just like you lot all drive trucks, own guns and wear red Braces...........

[Lannis]

Yeah just like you lot all drive trucks, own guns and wear red Braces...........

It's true, though, all of it ....

[oldbike54]

Yeah just like you lot all drive trucks, own guns and wear red Braces...........

 Hmm , I must be English , well , except for the French car thing , Simca anyone ? ;D

  Dusty

[Bill Hagan]

 
Apropos BBC comedy, etc. -- which I think this thread has addressed along its winding way from the real Forum  ;) -- I think that my Hell (or, at least, Purgatory) will include endless reruns of "Keeping Up Appearances."

My mother LOVES that show.  Even before her descent into dementia, we watched (and watched and watched) those.  I've seen them all.  Multiple times.  Mom has the dvd's for days PBS doesn't torture us with its scheduled repeats.

Now, with evil Alzheimer's, it's worse ... well, for us.  For Mom, it's the first time through. 

Yes, as if I were in a perverted version of "Groundhog Day" ... but sans Andie MacDowell.  Every imbecilic line Hyacinth or the rest of the cast utters is fresh for her ... and torture for me.

Oh, well.  She's happy while watching, so we'll just enjoy her pleasure.  But, one day ... I'll melt those dvd's in the fireplace and pray that my penance for sins of all sorts isn't condemnation to watching eternal episodes of the Bouquets.

Bill

[oldbike54]

 Yeah , K U A is not the best of British comedy , and neither is A Y B S . Kind of pap for the masses . However , Summer Wine remained engaging for most of its run , maybe because it wasn't set in London or close by , and the characters were , er , well , late middle aged . Silly old men one might say . Sound familiar ? ;D

  Dusty

[56Pan]

Apropos BBC comedy, etc. -- which I think this thread has addressed along its winding way from the real Forum  ;) -- I think that my Hell (or, at least, Purgatory) will include endless reruns of "Keeping Up Appearances."

My mother LOVES that show.  Even before her descent into dementia, we watched (and watched and watched) those.  I've seen them all.  Multiple times.  Mom has the dvd's for days PBS doesn't torture us with its scheduled repeats.

Now, with evil Alzheimer's, it's worse ... well, for us.  For Mom, it's the first time through. 

Yes, as if I were in a perverted version of "Groundhog Day" ... but sans Andie MacDowell.  Every imbecilic line Hyacinth or the rest of the cast utters is fresh for her ... and torture for me.

Oh, well.  She's happy while watching, so we'll just enjoy her pleasure.  But, one day ... I'll melt those dvd's in the fireplace and pray that my penance for sins of all sorts isn't condemnation to watching eternal episodes of the Bouquets.

Bill

Yeah.  Show sucked.  Big Time.

[Bill Hagan]

Yeah , K U A is not the best of British comedy , and neither is A Y B S . Kind of pap for the masses ****

  Dusty

Well, my mother -- and, thus, I -- come from a long line of Swabian peasant stock; my Irish side tilled dirt here from 1662 for eight generations, so I cannot distance myself from the "masses" without rejecting my roots.  The only reason Kathi and I can tell a Margaux from a Mateus today is because of the sweat of our simpler people who paved the way with their sweat for centuries.

That said, I still retch at "Keeping;" don't know the others you mention.  Kathi is wonderfully fond of British romantic comedies, to wit, one in which some walking stick sprouts branches at the end of some love-wins-all movie. I have to drink heavily before watching such things.  ;)

OTOH, I remain a sucker for subtitled Italian stuff, with my present favorite the adventures of Commissario Montalbano.  Probably for the Italian "masses," but I love 'em.  Have seen through episode 15 on dvd; getting more soon.  Katharina Böhm helps get me through the slower spots.   ;)

A snippet, you ask?  Why, sure: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bhdf6PFZZs8   ;D

Bill