Gigglebox Weekly #29 – My comedy awards…

Gigglebox Weekly With Ian Wolf

This week the main topic of discussion is the British Comedy Awards, and as ever, there’s a lot to talk about.

For starters, two programmes that the BBC decided to axe, Shooting Stars and Psychoville, both picked up awards. Let’s hope this makes the BBC see sense and bring them back.

I’m glad to see Sarah Millican is the new Queen of Comedy, and I’m pleased to see both Stewart Lee and Armando Iannucci honoured. However, I’m frustrated that Friday Night Dinner didn’t win any of the four categories it was nominated for, especially for “Best Sitcom”, as in my opinion it’s far superior to Twenty Twelve.

Interesting to see Have I Got News for You win the lifetime achievement award as well. I didn’t know you could win an award simply for making jokes about politicians being fat for over 20 years.

Of course, we all have our own opinions on who should have won. Luckily we all have that chance in January when the British Comedy Guide launches their annual Comedy.co.uk Awards, the only comedy awards voted by the fans, and the only one in which we get to say which programmes you also hated.

However, there are still some things not covered. That’s why I’m using this chance to name those I think should also be given an honour, including creating some more interesting and unusual categories that you won’t see with the BCAs.

Best Radio Comedy (Narrative): It’s a shame there isn’t a radio award; presumably Channel 4 doesn’t fancy giving the BBC any more awards than necessary. However, I think we should honour radio comedy as well as TV and film. In terms of narrative comedy, for me the best show was Warhorses of Letters, the previously untold gay love story about Napoleon and the Duke of Wellington’s horses. Such a bizarre idea, wonderfully written and carried out. A book covering the series is coming out soon.

Best Radio Comedy (Non-Narrative): I felt that John Finnemore’s Souvenir Programme had some of the best writing of any comedy this year. When I listened to this show just about every episode featured a sketch or two which made me think: “Now why didn’t I think of that?” Finnemore’s work made me so envious, which is why I liked it.

Best TV Comedy Broadcast not in English: Sadly this a very short list, because as far as I know only two comedy series have been shown this year which weren’t in English: Næturvaktin (The Night Shift) from Iceland on BBC4, and the French Vous Les Femmes (Women!) on late-night BBC2. There would have been more nominations, but I don’t know how to get S4C in Teesside. For me the best of the two I came across was Næturvaktin, for its storyline and characters. Hopefully the BBC will show the sequels to the series. Vous Les Femmes was entertaining, but there were things that kept coming up which were deeply annoying (e.g. idents after every sketch).

Best Comedy Anime: As someone who is not just a comedy fan but also an anime fan (or otaku to use the self-deprecating technical term), I thought it would be nice to highlight a comedy from the Far East which I think should be given more of a profile. My favourite this year was Nichijou, which means Regular Life, which is the one thing the series isn’t about. The show is a surrealist comedy following a group of schoolgirls. Regular characters included a six-year-old professor, a schoolgirl who can seemingly make weapons and heavily artillery appear out of nowhere, and a robot that looks just like an ordinary girl – except for the gigantic clockwork key sticking out of her back.

Best Stand-Up: The best stand-up show I saw this year was Tim FitzHigham’s “Gambler” show at this year’s Fringe, which was huge fun and surprisingly brave, given the amount of injuries he’s endured during the making of it. The show was made all the memorable for way that FitzHigham dealt with some incredibly annoying members who won’t stop talking throughout the show. FitzHigham’s got guts, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s hurt them as well.

Best Musical Comedy: Again, another show I saw at the Fringe, and this one was free to boot: Jollyboat were the best musical comedians I saw this year. Brothers Tom and Ed Croft’s numbers such as the computer keyboard love song and the disturbing “What the Hell Happened on Wednesday?” were just some of the delightful tunes I heard. Shame they’ve never released an album.

Stand-Up Comedian I Most Want to See Next Year: Bethany Black. I follow her on Twitter, I’ve seen her stuff on YouTube, but I’ve never had the chance to see her perform live. I know she is writing material for the Glasgow Comedy Festival called “Insecurity Guard”. Hopefully she’ll bring it to the 2012 Fringe and I’ll be able to see her then…

Most Infuriating TV Network: Sadly it has to be the BBC for several reasons. They’ve axed Shooting Stars, Psychoville and most of BBC3’s comedy output. While they did eventually show comedies from BBC Scotland nationally they were all in annoying late-night slots. Also, what with rescheduling certain programmes out of the blue (a recent episode of QI featuring Jeremy Clarkson, for example) I believe the BBC TV has been somewhat cowardly. They really need to buck up their ideas.

Most Important Thing I’ve Learnt: If you’re writing a bad review of someone and decide to post that review on Twitter, don’t link the person you’ve reviewed in that tweet. I thought I was helping by pointing where people were going wrong. Turns out I just came across as an annoying prat (and that’s putting it mildly).