Remember Kinvig, Clone, Not With A Bang? These are the UK sci-fi sitcoms you’re unlikely to see on comedy best-of lists…
With E4 sci-fi comedy commissions, Tripped and Aliens, and in-development Channel 4 projects, Space Ark and Graham Linehan/Adam Buxton collaboration The Cloud, in the works, a new crop of sci-fi sitcom could be making its way to UK TV.
Making funny sci-fi on a small-screen budget is tough enough without the additional pressure of having to attract viewers more traditionally down-to-earth in their sitcom tastes. Sci-fi sets and effects can be seen as prohibitively expensive by comedy commissioners (which is perhaps why the best UK sci-fi sitcoms of recent years has been on BBC Radio), and the genre’s niche status doesn’t scream mainstream hit. Over the years, one or two stand-outs have managed to straddle the sci-fi and comedy TV worlds, but plenty more have stumbled in the attempt.
With E4 sci-fi comedy commissions, Tripped and Aliens, and in-development Channel 4 projects, Space Ark and Graham Linehan/Adam Buxton collaboration The Cloud, in the works, a new crop of sci-fi sitcom could be making its way to UK TV.
Making funny sci-fi on a small-screen budget is tough enough without the additional pressure of having to attract viewers more traditionally down-to-earth in their sitcom tastes. Sci-fi sets and effects can be seen as prohibitively expensive by comedy commissioners (which is perhaps why the best UK sci-fi sitcoms of recent years has been on BBC Radio), and the genre’s niche status doesn’t scream mainstream hit. Over the years, one or two stand-outs have managed to straddle the sci-fi and comedy TV worlds, but plenty more have stumbled in the attempt.
- 7/23/2015
- by louisamellor
- Den of Geek
'If I hadn't been able to make people laugh, I'd have ended up hitting someone with a brick'
When did you first discover you could make people laugh?
When I was 13. I got into lots of fights at school: I'd get racially abused, then lash out. One day, this kid said something and instead of putting my fists up, I said something back: people laughed, and he walked away. It saved my life – if I'd carried on the way I was going, I'd have ended up hitting someone with a brick.
What was your big breakthrough?
Winning a TV talent competition called New Faces. That was when I started to think of showbusiness as a job. The audition was at a dodgy nightclub in Birmingham; it smelled of chips and old beer, but there were people putting on glittery costumes, practising fire-breathing and doing Frank Spencer impressions in the toilet.
When did you first discover you could make people laugh?
When I was 13. I got into lots of fights at school: I'd get racially abused, then lash out. One day, this kid said something and instead of putting my fists up, I said something back: people laughed, and he walked away. It saved my life – if I'd carried on the way I was going, I'd have ended up hitting someone with a brick.
What was your big breakthrough?
Winning a TV talent competition called New Faces. That was when I started to think of showbusiness as a job. The audition was at a dodgy nightclub in Birmingham; it smelled of chips and old beer, but there were people putting on glittery costumes, practising fire-breathing and doing Frank Spencer impressions in the toilet.
- 6/4/2013
- by Laura Barnett
- The Guardian - Film News
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