Showing posts with label The Office. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Office. Show all posts

Friday, 22 August 2008

The Cup

It's easy to feel sympathy for Rick Gervaise and Stephen Merchant: everything they do in future will inevitably be compared to The Office; equally inevitably, everything will fall short of that high standard. At least though, they have the kudos of having created the show. Spare a thought for the creators of pretty much any other sitcom likely to emerge in the next few years: they will struggle to compete, without any of the glory of having done something great.

I enjoyed the first episode of BBC2's new comedy The Cup. It is a mockumentary portrayal of a kids' football team. Slightly predictably, the parents are far more competitive than the kids. The strongest moments by far featured cringemaking father, Terry McConnell's, attempts to make a name for his son. His misplaced ambition, and lack of self-awareness when addressing the camera, were both clever and funny; nevertheless, I couldn't help thinking that I've seen it all somewhere before.

I'll watch it all the way through, and no doubt enjoy it, but I am still waiting for the next groundbreaking sitcom.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00d51ll