>I guess you don't have an entertainment mecca like Hollywood over there, do you?
That's fine Jazz, if we can be rude about your President you can be rude about our TV. Actually, we're pretty rude about our own Prime Minister and our own TV most of the time. The short answer is that the British comedy shown on American television is self-selected - we keep the best to ourselves.
Regarding Britcoms, I think that the stuff that gets filtered through to an American audience tends to be the rather safe mid-evening slot stuff with a touch of nostalgia aimed at an older audience. Programmes like "Are you Being Served?", "Benny Hill", "On the Buses" and "Dad's Army" are early seventies shows which were pulled from the schedules years ago (around the same time that the USA stopped making "I Love Lucy") Sadly, some have recently crept back in the early evening slots to cope with digital TV's insatiable desire for content over quality.
Some programming like "Porridge, "Open All Hours", "Only Fools and Horses", "Fawlty Towers" and "Monty Python" have survived the test of time slightly better. "Keeping Up Appearances" ran until 1995, "The Thin Blue Line", "Waiting for God" and "One Foot in the Grave" (last programme tonight) are more recent examples of early evening sit-com.
There is a lot of good comedy which is not exported as much. One of our top programmes is "Have I Got News for You" which is a very irreverant look at the week's news. It deals with British politics and it would be unlikely to interest a significant section of the American audience. Other programmes like "Men Behaving Badly", "Red Dwarf", "Goodness Gracious Me", "The Young Ones", "Blackadder" and "Ab Fab" are/were mid-evening programmes for a younger adult audience. Some, like "Red Dwarf", have a cult following and the low production values are part of the joke. In fact you may have noticed that British comedy programmes tend to go for people who look funny as well as being funny, we're less inclined to go for glamour, it would be hard to imagine a succesful UK version of "Dynasty". If you ever get to see "The Royle Family", you'll know what I mean.
Some of our programmes like "Who Wants To Be a Millionaire" or get "translated" so you never get to see the British versions. A gound-breaking programme like "Cracker" (very edgy, urban, threatening with the wonderful Robbie Coltrane) was re-made as "Fitz" with an American cast and writing team and was much the worse for it. Think of what the "Sopranos" would be like if it were re-made by Disney! Conversely, "ER" is streaks ahead of our own, early evening medical show "Casualty" in my opinion.
Our later evening comedy tends not to get exported quite so readily to America, it tends to have too much "language" and sex (and not enough violence) combined with regional accents and British humour. Think of something with the edge of "The Full Monty" or "Trainspotting", more Lenny Bruce than Lucille Ball.
As an aside Jazz, have you ever been outside America? - you might enjoy a trip to Europe one day. (Just don't watch the television!)
