Extras, de nieuwe tv-serie van Ricky Gervais! (The Office)

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Op donderdag 21 juli 2005 22:36 schreef Wunsel het volgende:
Ik zag een aantal keren David Brent doorschijnen, maar voor de rest zet hij toch wel redelijk een ander personage neer.

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Moet er nog even aan wennen denk ik, een aantal grappige stukjes, maar nog niet die constant hoge kwaliteit van The Office

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Op vrijdag 22 juli 2005 02:59 schreef rubbereend het volgende:
video vergeten te zetten

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Op vrijdag 22 juli 2005 07:19 schreef Mark het volgende:

[..]

Typisch Nijmeegs kwaaltje?

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TV review: Extras

BBC sitcom Extras, from Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, began on Thursday.

In the space of just a few years, Ricky Gervais has become one of our most popular comic performers.

Thanks to his BBC sitcom The Office, self-deluded pen-pusher David Brent is an iconic creation on a par with Alf Garnett and Basil Fawlty.

And Gervais' stand-up shows Animals and Politics have sold out up and down the country.

All of this has stoked anticipation for Extras.

Based around two struggling bit-part actors - Andy Millman, played by Gervais, and Maggie Jacobs (Ashley Jensen) - each episode takes place on a different film set and features a new celebrity playing a version of themselves.

Kate Winslet, for example, appears as an Oscar-craving actress, while EastEnders star Ross Kemp mocks his hard-man image.

In the first episode, Starsky and Hutch star Ben Stiller spoofs himself by playing an arrogant director making a serious drama about the Bosnian conflict.

The presence of such high-profile names has made Extras much more of an event than the usual BBC comedy.

Hilarious in some places, oddly flat in others, Extras has the makings of another hit.

But on the basis of the first episode, it is not there yet.

It will take time to warm to its unfamiliar characters, while the central gimmick is not as instantly accessible as The Office's mock-doc format.

While Gervais can take pride in enlisting so many big stars to his cause, the show treads a fine line between poking fun and pandering to their no doubt sizeable egos.

There is also a problem of tone. Stiller, for example, offers a gross parody of a Hollywood brat, forever quoting his own box-office statistics and treating crew members like dirt.

But his flamboyant scenes jar with quieter ones that echo The Office's exquisite moments of humiliation, embarrassment and social faux pas.

Lovelorn Maggie has a crush on the assistant director - until she learns he has one leg shorter than the other and wears a surgical boot.

"He's like Herman Munster," she wails in despair.

Andy, meanwhile, is so desperate to augment his part that he allies himself with the film's inspiration - a Balkan refugee who has lost his wife in the conflict.

Peripheral

But the latter's raw grief does not prevent our hero trying to bribe him with Top Shop vouchers.

There are many such flashes of cringe-inducing hilarity. What is missing is a sense of place, pace and forward momentum.

In The Office we had Dawn and Tim's halting romance to mark the progress of the series.

But Extras' stand-alone structure does not encourage that kind of empathy with its protagonists, who by their very nature seem peripheral to the action.

Clueless at some points, quick-witted at others, Andy Millman does not feel consistent.

Indeed, where Brent was a fully fleshed-out monster, Andy is closer to the slobbish, sneering persona Gervais projects in his numerous chat-show appearances.

Gervais says Extras will develop throughout series one and that he and Merchant have already mapped out the trajectory of series two.

It might be heresy to suggest it, but judging by the first episode the latter is hardly a foregone conclusion.

BBC

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Op vrijdag 22 juli 2005 20:15 schreef DonStefano het volgende:
haha... ja, dat vond ik ook wel t meest grappige stukje

Verder allemaal nog ff wennen, maar in potentie kan t zeker nog wel wat worden. Weet overigens niet of t aan de brakke geluidskwaliteit lag, of aan mn eigen brakheid, maar de helft van alle conversaties ging langs me heen....

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Extras viewing figures

Early ratings show nearly 5 million viewers tuned in to watch the first episode - an average of 4.62m equating to an audience share of nearly 24% - making it the most watched show in its time-slot.