I do not know if you have been watching television lately, but in the past decade the British released a sitcom that even those of us whose childhood memories are filled with sad recollections of one’s parents skipping one’s music recital because a new episode of Roseanne was on that night* could enjoy. This show was, as you might have guessed from the title, called The Office. Like so many successful things produced by other cultures (for three examples: jazz, Italian food, and the practice of wearing white hats with the flap in the back a la the French Foreign Legion that was the “thing” in the 1980s), mainstream America soon adopted it as its own and took complete credit for everything it did well, while at the same time adding a touch of the good old saccharine that the flyover states seem to prefer. This year, a show has come out that is a sort of a copy of the American Office, which of course is in turn a copy of the British Office. This show is called… Parks and Recreation. They had a great opportunity to call it The Rural Office or perhaps The Office With The Female In Charge LOL Women Are Soooo Crazy, but as you can see they utterly failed.
In this post, my aim is to explore which of these do what they do the best. Although I plan on using too many words, I also plan on including pictures; additionally, my results may surprise you. Humility would normally lead me to claim that the criteria presented forthwith are not exhaustive and that you, dear reader, ought to be left to make your own conclusions on the matter. However, given the fact that for some reason I seem to be writing this post like Anthony Trollope would write if Anthony Trollope shoved a huge stick up his ass, I have to admit that yes, I do think that this list shall be exhaustive and no, you should not be left to your own machinations in this or any other subject. Frankly I am surprised that you were able to spell popbunker. Probably you misspelled poopbunker. Pervert. Or else you were searching for capybara pornography, to which all I can say is sorry, that is my other blog.
What I shall give you the opportunity to do is come up with your own scoring system. Perhaps 1st place will be worth 5 points, second 3 and 3rd 1. Or you could give 1st 1, 2nd 2, and 3rd 3 and score them in reverse order. You could even give them all 2s, except then you wouldn’t know which show “wins”. Come to think of it, that’s a pretty stupid idea.
The Really Crappy Boss. This is what these shows are built around, really. The whole point of the British Office (from here on out called TBO) is that Ricky Gervais as David Brent is this icky, embarrassing supervisor whose insecurities are so out in the open that you can’t help but feel sorry and a bit revolted by him at the same time. Michael Scott (played by Steven Carrell), the American version, started out that way but has slowly morphed into a rather likeable weirdo a la Cliff from Cheers. Finally, you have Amy Poehler as Leslie Knope on Parks doing her own thing.
So who’s the best/worst boss? Clearly David Brent wins out here. I can’t think of a character on a sitcom quite like him. There have been scoundrels in the past, many of them lovable (John Cleese from Fawlty Towers springs to mind), but nobody had that ability to make you cringe quite so much. This is not a lot of peoples’ cup of tea, I will grant you, but if you like it, Brent’s got to be the most extreme case. On the other hand, I actually think Michael Scott’s become too likeable. If a standard sitcom character drives their car into a pond you just yell “BLOOOOOPER”** and wait for the Chef Boy-Ar-Dee commercials. If, on the other hand, a guy you really don’t like loses a trivia contest and tries to demonstrate his true intelligence by throwing your shoes over a bar, but does it in a way that makes you feel sorry for him, that’s television magic.
This is where I have to give some kudos for the creators of Parks in deviating from the formula a bit. I think they’ve erred on the side of making the Leslie character more believable. At the same time, there are some hints (like in the episode where she invited everyone to her house and it turned out she’s a hoarder) that she’s not just sitcom-crazy but actually certifiable. It’s still early enough in the show’s lifetime that they could mess this up, but I am hopeful.
TBO 5/1/2, TAO 1/3/2, Parks 3/2/2.
Recycling. Obviously, TBO couldn’t really recycle much since they were first and all but I do have to give them some sort of negative credit for aggressively marketing the franchise. American, French, German, French-Canadian (can’t they just watch the French version?), and Chilean versions have been made of this show according to wikipedia. Granted, wikipedia refuses to acknowledge that Bellevue, Washington is the largest exporter of yak butter in the world and deletes this fact every time I add it, but I think they’re probably right on this measure. That’s an awful lot of Office.
Parks features two cast-members from TAO and doesn’t just feature them but puts them in roughly the same situation they were in in the original (by which I mean the copied) sitcom. Rashida Jones is cute and funny, but did she have to get caught up in the love triangle? There have to be more roles for attractive females on this sort of show than “romantic foil”. And the copier guy who was part of the original American Office love triangle but who worked off of the main set returns in Parks as… part of the original love triangle but works off the main set.
TAO’s recycling crimes are I think much, much worse, though. The first season was funny enough but two of the episodes used scripts from TBO. I mean, I can sort of see doing that for the French version, but come on now… it’s not like those of us who sought out the British version didn’t get the jokes the first time. Like Gus van Zant’s shot by shot remake of Psycho, it just feels wrong.
TBO 10/2/4, TAO 2/6/4, P&R 6/4/4
The Love Triangley Thing. I think I’m starting to sound like I really dislike TAO, which isn’t entirely fair. I think it’s a lot better than Everybody Loves Raymond, for example. It’s just… well, in this case Jim and Pam were an interesting story the first season, a bit less so the second, annoying the third, and since then I am glad that I tape the show because it allows me to fast-forward through all of their interactions. I think I’ve finally figured out why Who’s The Boss spent 10 years keeping Tony and Angela apart: people who are together and happy are boooooooooooooooooring.
The other two shows benefit, in a sense, from not being on (so far) long enough to make the sexual tension seem stupid or strained. I do have to give the edge to TBO in that the resolution between Tim and Dawn seemed so much more realistic. On the other hand, Ann in Parks seems to be much more of her own person and much less a poor frail woman who needs to be saved from a less than optimal relationship.
TBO 13/4/6, TAO 3/9/6, Parks 11/5/6
The Autistic, Sycophantic Dude. Well, I guess Parks has to get the automatic last place on this one because the closest they have to this guy is Tom Haverford (Aziz Ansari), who is just inept. Maybe he has that kind of Asperger’s Syndrome that everybody who is socially awkward has (that is, the one that doesn’t exist except in the minds of people who want to categorize everything). He might be my favorite character on Parks but he just doesn’t fit into this category well enough.
Dwight Shrute (Rainn Wilson) and Gareth (Mackenzie Cook), though… yeah. One of the things I really like about each character is that although they’re both management suck-ups who have some, ah, strange ideas about, ah, things, they’re still very different in ways that allow the viewer to see the cultural differences of just plain weird between England and the USA. Both seem to have some sort of military background but Dwight seems to have about him more of a “reformed country bumpkin” thing about him, whereas Gareth is just plain oblivious to any form of social cues.
In the end, I am going to give the edge here to Dwight, not so much because of the character itself but because the American writers, I think, got a lot more creative with the things Jim/Pam do to him (and how he finds a way to emerge from their jokes relatively unscathed) than Tim/Dawn did with Gareth. There were an awful lot of gay jokes with the latter…
TBO 16/6/8, TAO 8/10/8, 12/8/8
The Scapegoat. Correct me if I’m wrong, but TBO didn’t really have this character, or to be more specific it was part of David Brent. I won’t spend too much time on this but I think the way Michael dumps on Toby every chance he can get is about the funniest part of TAO. There’s a similar dynamic being formed between Jerry on Parks and the rest of the cast but it’s definitely in its infancy.
TBO 17/9/10, TAO 13/11/10, 15/10/10
Coffee mugs sayings like this are why the term BLOOOOOPER was invented.
Wearing Out Its Welcome. Originally I was going to put the fact that each of these three is a “mockumentary” as its own criterion. On further review, I think that my thoughts on the format fits in well with this idea. When TBO came out, the whole concept of taking the characters aside and talking to them separately was very, very The Real World and Survivor. In other words, it was kind of the staple of very hip shows, popular with the younger crowd, and when TBO did something similar, that in and of itself was pretty funny in an ironic sense. TAO was less so with this and frankly it’s a little bit off-putting in Parks. I for one hope they start to move away from it. It’s a neat little gimmick to get inside of peoples’ heads, but I’m not sure I need or want to know what’s going on in Leslie Knopes’ mind.
Otherwise, though, the biggest advantage I see that TBO and Parks have over TAO is that they haven’t been on for six seasons. TBO died the normal, quiet death of the Britcom, having gone to pasture after just 2 6-episode seasons and a 2-part Christmas special. There are times when I think that format really hurts British television in the sense that their shows never get a chance to grow and adapt over time, but in this case TAO is increasingly reminding me of Dilbert, a comic strip that some may not remember at this point as being very, very funny when it initially came out because at this point the only difference between it and Garfield is the artwork and lack of lasagna. Whereas TBO is Calvin and Hobbes, a strip whose creator knew the wisdom behind the idea that it’s better to get out a little too early than a little too late.
Parks gets a pass on this… for now. Don’t think I won’t be looking you all up in 5 years, writing staff!
TBO 22/10/12, TAO 14/14/12, Parks 18/12/12
“Intangibles”. This is where I am putting everything else, so the presence of Creed and Kevin faces off against the pioneering aspects of TBO and, um… Amy Poehler. Sorry, Parks and TBO, but… Creed.
TBO 25/12/14, TAO 19/15/14, Parks 19/15/14
So there you have it. Depending on your choice of weighting, you have to come to the conclusion… that, okay, the British Office wins hands down. Parks and Recreation may prove to be awesome in 3 years or it could get really, really bad; it’s too early to tell. I feel like there should be a moral at the end of this but we live in immoral times. Suck it up and find your own.
*Yes, this is a true story. In fairness, I was 16 at the time.
**Actually I think only I do that.
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John Craven is Bugs Bunny, Millionaire. He owns a mansion and a yacht. 
Great article, but I simply *must* disagree on a few of these points about TBO. Full disclosure: I have never seen the American ‘Office’, or “Parks and Recreation”. Also, I promise I’m not being snarky or cheeky. Just setting the record straight. =) (see? I done a smiley! I is teh hapee.)
Like so many successful things produced by other cultures mainstream America soon adopted it as its own and took complete credit for everything it did well
Certainly, one could cite a good chunk of the work of Norman Lear as being derivative (“All In The Family”=”Til Death Do Us Part” – “Sanford and Son”=”Steptoe And Son”) inasmuch as one could point to a million other examples (“Three’s Company”=”Man About The House” – “Not Necessarily The News”=”Not The 9 O’Clock News”) I don’t think it’s fair to imply that the originals are shining beacons of win and that America takes scraps. “The Office” in particular. Plus, there have been plenty of American shows that Britain in particular has failed to remake well. They tried a remake of “Married With Children” that was ghastly and sank without trace, the UK try at “The Golden Girls” was embarrassing, and there’s been at least one attempt to remake “The Daily Show”, with not-so-hilarious consequences.
What it’s essential to understand is that although “The Office” was popular at the time, it was hardly an original concept. Not by a long shot. In fact, a news-parodying show called “The Day Today” had a segment – actually called “The Office” – that adopted the fly-on-the-wall approach to inept office management styles. It was made in 1994, predating Gervaise’s attempt by almost seven years. Also, what is often termed the ‘docu-soap’ approach (a weekly documentary, but revolving around specific people as regular characters) had been a staple of lazy British comedy for almost as long as the format had been a staple of lazy British scheduling. (The first example I can find was BBC’s “The Family”, filmed in 1975 and based, interestingly, on an American series called “An American Family”.)
I can’t think of a character on a sitcom quite like him. There have been scoundrels in the past, many of them lovable but nobody had that ability to make you cringe quite so much.
Alan Partridge; a failed sports reporter, chat show host and night-time radio DJ. Played by Steve Coogan and written with so much pathos that it practically drips off the screen and onto the living room carpet. Pathetic, downtrodden, can’t win or succeed at anything, but thinks he’s a genius… and he has no idea how ridiculous and pathetic he is, nor that the people around him think he’s a tool. Sounds familiar, doesn’t it? Also interesting to note that the character debuted in the early 1990s on Radio 4′s “On The Hour” which morphed into TV’s… “The Day Today” (see above).
When TBO came out, the whole concept of taking the characters aside and talking to them separately was very, very The Real World and Survivor. In other words, it was kind of the staple of very hip shows, popular with the younger crowd, and when TBO did something similar, that in and of itself was pretty funny in an ironic sense.
I touched on this above, but it’s worth expanding on. Britain’s love affair with so-called reality shows like “Big Brother” is very much a recent thing, but the ‘docu-soap’ was far from being the staple of hipsters. In fact, stuffy, populous, no-risk channel BBC1 used to schedule them in weekday primetime. 1997′s “Driving School” being a notable recent example, as is 1996′s “Airport” (which became A&E’s “Airline” – they’re at it AGAIN!).
TBO died the normal, quiet death of the Britcom, having gone to pasture after just 2 6-episode seasons and a 2-part Christmas special. There are times when I think that format really hurts British television in the sense that their shows never get a chance to grow and adapt over time
There’s no time limit on the British sit-com, but because they tend to be written by only one or two people rather than a team of staff writers, they have a short life. For example, the brilliant “Father Ted” (two writers) ran for three series and 24 episodes, “Fawlty Towers” (two writers) ran for two with 12. But there are examples of longevity, too. “One Foot In The Grave” (one writer) ran for six seasons – 42 individual episodes and two specials, “Only Fools And Horses” (one writer) has run since the early 1980s with 64 episodes and seven specials. Writers often say that they shut up shop after two or three series because they feel that they’ve done all they can do with characters and have developed the show enough to maintain its integrity. By the end of the second series of The Office, the British public were starting to turn against the wave of appreciation and, I would imagine, Gervaise and Merchant saw the writing on the wall and pulled the plug whilst it was still a hot commodity. It could have easily run for another series, but Britain has a talent for building up and knocking down public figures, and “The Office” was very close to that edge. As a result, Gervaise, once the darling of comedy, is now an extremely polarising figure in the zeitgeist.
In conclusion, is it fair to say that David Brent was a blantant rip-off of Alan Partridge? No, there are certainly differences in the character, not least the settings they are in. Brent is in a position of authority at a paper company, Partridge is clawing at fame and respect in the media. It is, however, fair to suggest that both characters are steeped in pathos and are totally oblivious to their faults and limitations, hold outdated frames of cultural references and have little to no people skills, and that both were written within five years of each other.
Is it also fair to say that what Britain produces is gold, but that America’s output is pish? Not at all, there are plenty of Americoms that shine – Cheers, Taxi, Who’s The Boss? …OK, maybe not Who’s The Boss, nor its unsuccessful British knockoff “The Upper Hand”.
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oops, html fail. sorry about that.
.-= Spike Nesmith´s last blog ..204: Film Geek / Embarrassing Movies =-.
How ’bout – I can’t stand The Office in either incarnation, and Parks & Rec made me want to chew my own arm off and flee (not because I was chained to the chair, but because that’d simply have been a more fun activity).
@Spike: You raise some excellent points. My rebuttal – and please feel free to be offended by my cultural imperialism because frankly I’m a little offended by it myself – is that I’m writing from the perspective of TBO’s impact on American television. I am vaguely aware of the character of Alan Partridge, but haven’t actually ever seen “This Day Today”, and I imagine that most Americans would tell you that’s the name of the character Danny Bonaduce played if you asked them.
What set TBO apart from the other shows you mention isn’t so much that it was wholly original – you may well be right about that – but that a small but significant portion of Americans glommed onto it and that ended up pushing its memes across the ocean.
The mockumentary format is very indicative of this. Of course, Americans had been familiar with Christopher Guest movies, which use the same device. However, for us anyway that combination of dark humor (disclaimer: TAO is significantly less dark than TBO), the single-camera format, and the way that occasionally characters sit down and talk about their actions was really ground-breaking. So much so, in fact, that other shows that do the same thing feel very, very derivative (and, in the case of P&R, are).
WRT Britcoms vs Americoms in general: It’s not so much that I think English television is gold while US TV is crap, it’s that 98% of everything we both create is crap. No offense, but I never really got “Are You Being Served” or “Good Neighbors”. Perhaps there was some brilliant humor you have to be English to understand, but both of those shows struck me as little more than run of the mill sitcoms. I’m guessing you folks put out a lot more of that sort of thing that we never even see due to the fact that we tend to only see the best of what you put out and then only on public television (due to the lack of commercial breaks). You, on the other hand, probably see pretty much all the semi-popular dross that we put out, and to make matters worse we have a tendency to allow a show like “Friends” to be on for more than a decade while an “Arrested Development” or “Sports Night” gets canceled after two seasons.
@Heather: WHY DO YOU HATE FREEDOM
Great point, I had forgotten about the Christopher Guest movies!
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I’m with Heather. I like both Offices well enough, but I’ve not watched more than 8 eps of all three of those shows combined. To me they’re funny in that way that is pleasing to know is around, but not enough to go out of my way to watch.
Some Britcoms suck – and I mean most of the “classics” that were shown in the US on PBS. I never have and never will *get* those shows.
I’ve seen all of the episodes of the three of ‘em, and I enjoy what they do greatly.
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