Jazz:
>an entertainment mecca like Hollywood over there, do you?<
guess you don't read the credits-- other wise you might have noticed "Pinewood Studios" Located just outside london, it is an international center for film production. (check out an some english, or international films, with parts done in England.) I think you'll find pinewood studios comming up a lot more often than you realize!
i think british sit coms are often funnier since they are simpler. there are fewer effects--no of the morphing or cartoon effects like in "alley mcbeal" . and they have more comedy based on class and language. and yes, most of the US is still too puritanical for international comedy.
--on an other note, the "our Violet" is fairly common among the irish, but it is a class thing. my mother didn't permit it, she thought it too low class. but she did laspe into refering to my father as himself. But she did make a point of calling my dad, Pat and never Paddy, even though every one else in the family use the irish diminutive. she refused to name my brother Michael, even though he was born on the Michaelmas day, since it was bad enough to be married to Paddy Reilly, but she wasn't going to have Micky Reilly as a son!
as i grew i learned to differeniate between irish culture and irish american culture-- they are very different! but that is another thread.....
