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This page badly needs a rewrite out of a US-POV. -- Tarquin 23:41 Mar 19, 2003 (UTC)
Father Ted was removed (because it was Irish). But it was a British Channel 4 production (by Geoffrey Perkins amongst otheres), so I'm reinstating it RTE thought it was too controversial. Mintguy (T)
I have a theory about British sitcoms. I think that all the best British sitcoms are about inadequate men who consistently fail to acheive their intended goal , e.g. Harold in Steptoe and Son (goal: Escape from his father's working class roots, (and his father)); Basil in Fawlty Towers (goal: improve the quality of his clientelle); David Brent in The Office (goal:Make everybody laugh at his jokes and think he's a "fun" boss); Del Boy in Only Fools and Horses (goal: become a millionaire); etc.. add to the list, The Britas Empire; Til Death Us Do Part; Ever Decreasing Circles; Hancock's Half Hour; One Foot in the Grave; Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em; Rising Damp; Father Ted; Citizen Smith and Blackadder. Mintguy (T) 01:10, 5 Aug 2004 (UTC)
The discussion of the article British_comedy wonders whether that page and this page should be merged. While that's a good question, in the meantime, I'm wondering about a different issue. There are numerous references to "Britcom" scattered throughout Wikipedia, but the term isn't defined, nor are the terms linked to the Brit-com page. That page itself currently redirects to British_comedy, which contains no mention of the term "Britcom" (or "Brit-com"). Should uses of the term "Britcom" link to a descriptive page of its own, or should they redirect to this page? It doesn't seem to make sense to leave things as they are, since this page at least gives a minimal definition of the term, whereas that page doesn't even mention it. (User:0dimensional 08:42, 2 May 2009 (UTC)) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 0dimensional (talk • contribs)
The overview history only mentions one of the top 10 British sitcoms (as voted last year). That needs to be sorted! (ricjl 23:52, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC))
Would it be possible to rewrite this so it didn't come off sounding so superior and brainy? We're not talking facts here, it sounds like a bulletin board bigot explaining why he thinks Americans are stupid. I'm talking about stuff like this:
Unlike American sitcoms, which employ teams of writers and attempt to cram as many jokes into half an hour as possible, the traditional British situation comedy is produced by just one or two writers. Although it may be argued that a sitcom's raison d'être is to pack as many gags as possible into a half hour, the more measured approach engendered by a single writer or a close writing partnership permits greater control over the programme's direction and a more structured approach to character and plot development. A need for rapid-fire jokes can make the establishment of multi-dimensional characters much harder. The British approach therefore gives greater freedom to individual writers and more opportunities for character development.
Let's be a little less gushing, eh? SavMan 08:30, 9 November 2005 (UTC)
Actually that sounds fine, a need for rapid fire jokes DOSE make detailed charachters harder and having one or two people DOSE give them more control. Tortanick
It is the tradition of British sitcoms that the comedy arises out of the drama, it is an adjunct to Shakespeare and that crowd. There is an American tradition of cramming in as many gags as possible, the Dick van Dyke show, which was actually set in a scriptwriters' office, is a good example of that. Sweetalkinguy
As it is, the article contains no references to sources whatsoever to support any of its claims. It is FULL of US bias and comparisons which are unnecessary. Much of its information is trivia or personal opinion. It is, basically, a massive mess which is so heavily buried under POV it is difficult to understand why it has not been fully rewritten before. Rather than moving to have it merged with a page on British comedy in general, where it might be better looked after and more thoroughly sourced, I have attempted to tackle these issues. I have not found sources for the claims made (since they are not my claims) but would STRONGLY encourage you to if you wish to include any of this information. If it is not verifiable, it is not welcome. Feel free to work to build a better article, but remember to stick to the facts and keeep your opinions to yourself. Best of luck with the article. --86.153.57.126 (talk) 15:10, 26 September 2009 (UTC)
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I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of British sitcom's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.
Reference named "Gaughan":
I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT⚡ 04:16, 31 December 2021 (UTC)
Looking up something about a Christmas special I watched in December 2021, I realised that this article seriously needed updating. That update has involved three days and evenings of full time work over the holiday and I throughly enjoyed doing it, but the dilemma is knowing which sitcoms to include and how large the entries should be. Missing entries on important programmes have been added and others expanded from their parent articles and further research and fact checking. I think there is now a fair selection of entries and other types of content without the article getting too long and unwieldy.
The article is not intended to become an anthology of Britsitcom, but it's hard to define what makes it so successful without resorting to PoV and/or websites that are blocked by our filters as unsuitable for sources. That kind of information just does not seem to be available. No one seems to speak of the magic casting and distillation of the highly experienced comedy actors, for example, that made laugh-out-loud Keeping Up Appearances and Dinnerladies, and 'cozy' comedy such as The Good Life, To the Manor Born, and Doc Martin such roaring successes, while it is also well known OTOH, that the casts of some of the other well know sitcoms couldn't stand the sight of each other - but try sourcing that! Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 06:58, 2 January 2022 (UTC)
Escape_Orbit, thank you for your edits. I have reverted one edit which contravened its stipulated use. Some f the errors were imported from the parent articles, please do not attribute all of them to me and in negative ES. If you feel so strongly about them, perhaps you could take a moment to edit them yourself proactively rather than simply removing sections of text. Wikipedia is a collaborative work, care should be taken to keep it so.
Thank you for your time. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 01:52, 14 January 2022 (UTC)
'I picked an entry at random'is precisely the problem in these and your other criticisms. Each entry has its own parent Wikipedia article, while this article is supposed to be read as a whole and by doing so the issues you mention are more than adequately evidenced. I think it's therefore fair to assume that most readers who are genuinely interested in the topic will have no difficulty in seeing the remarkable cohesion and similarity throughout the first 70 years of British sitcom. With the development of digital TV and the eruption in the number of channels as well as the many on-demand streaming options for which some of today's shows are exclusively produced, viewer levels are now much diluted. The impact of newer sitcoms will probably be far less influential than the days when one had to be at home to see what was being broadcast on the handfull of traditional free-to-air providers and watched on the family TV set in the living room, and while the pioneering actors, writers, producers, and directors were still alive. Be happy that Wikipedia has this article at all - which took a lot of work and further research and is a vast improvement on what it was 15 years ago even though you don't like it. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 01:35, 11 July 2022 (UTC)
After "British sitcoms reflect changes in public opinion and culture through the times" in the lede, I was trying to find a better description than "They began at a time in which, for example, 'class and ethnic prejudices were challenged and mocked'. The racial and religious slurs were appreciated for their pure laugh-out-loud and slapstick humour and exploitation of stereotypes that were often the essence of a sitcom series and the butt of the joke line, rather than as offensive issues that are nowadays discredited by modern tastes.'"
It seems to touch on two contradictory devices used:
Any thoughts on a more cogent description? signed, Willondon (talk) 16:41, 4 February 2022 (UTC)