British: "Only Fools and horses" for me, although it lost a lot in the translation to "American" it's one of the few that made my sides hurt from laughing. (Black Adder a close second)
American: "Soap" A bloody fantstic show. Dead surreal. I so gelled with the humour.
I am obviously biased considering my roots but i reckon Brit tv humour is far superior than our cousins. It's wit and slapstic combined with innovation (Faulty Towers), dedpan, subtle (The Office)....i could go on.
where as American is so formulistic. (name any)
Of course you may disagree with me!!!!
FC
PS.........Don't mention the frigging election!!!!
I know I love watching Keeping up Appearances on PBS. That, along with Monty Python and the Hitchhiker's Guide series, is pretty much my only exposure to British comedy .
I gotta go with Roid on "Keeping Up Appearances". Watching that status hag and her spineless husband is just tedious to me. Run her over with a bus already. "Absolutely Fabulous" can be pretty funny. Monty Python (the t.v. show) was okay. It's mighty dated now though, and some of it upon re-viewing is just b-grade. Their movies were good, but without Graham Chapman MP was nothing. I'm just not big on dry humor, but when the brits get silly they're pretty hilarious. Someone like Eddie Izzard cracks me up.
American comedy has both crap and quality. Shows like MASH, WKRP, Soap, Cheers, Friends, Seinfeld, etc. had good writing (at least at their height). Then there's garbage like "Who's the Boss" and "Full House".
"Blackadder Goes Forth", huh? Wasn't that the War one? (There's a Blackadder spot on BBC America, but they mix episodes from each of the series, so it's hard to keep them straight.)
I'd seen most, though not all, of the shows they listed. "Fawlty Towers" is definitely one of the good ones, as is "Keeping Up Appearances" (poor Richard, I still want to know what Hyacinth was like before they got married, maybe she was okay in those days, before she bought "How to Win at Housework" ). I like "The Office", though my wife hates it, since it's a bit too low-key. British humor is sometimes an acquired taste, and sometimes American humor isn't humor at all, just people being stupid.
When I was very young I watched "Hancocks Half Hour" and "The Hattie Jaques Show", "On the Buses" "David Allen" and "The Frost Report". All on Canadian television. Must have warped my sense of humour totally because now I have to fully agree with FC. Britcoms, as we call them here, are head and shoulders above U.S. products. They are not afraid to be rude, politically incorrect and are not filled with performers chosen only for their good looks. The closest U.S. television has come to them are the various Bob Newhart shows.
Unfortunately Britain must also accept responsiblity for Bennie Hill. No peaks without a few valleys I guess.
I think the fact that I have a Monty Python shirt for every day of the week gives a hint at my preference. Faulty Towers and Waiting for God are a couple series that I try to catch an episode of every now and then as well.
From this side of the pond, I watch....erm....not much. I used to watch SNL fairly regularly, but that's been spiralling down the crapper over the last several years (since the mid to late 90's, IMO). I do like The Daily Show, especially the Back in Black segments. Occasionally, Comedy Central will strike gold with someone they put on 'Comedy Central Presents' (half hour standup specials), so I'll sometimes plop down for a couple hours of Friday Night Standup.
I never really liked the Seinfeld series too much. Sure, I'd get an occasional chuckle out of it, but it was one of those shows where, if you saw one episode, you had seen them all. The characters got tiring and the material seemed to be rehashed over and over again, with rare exception. Even the standup miniroutines at the start of the episodes got old because even the greatest comedians can't come up with enough new material fast enough for a typical sitcom.
Friends, I thought was god-awful. With a cast that large, I can understand having a (note the singluar) recurring character whose funny point is that he/she is stupid. The problem was, to me anyway, that every character was stupid, and that was supposed to be the joke. Tossing in soap opera 'drama' (read: 'antics') in the later seasons didn't help matters either.
I suppose I just appreciate sarcasm and original material more than anything else in comedy. Sure, I can laugh at...oh, say...a fart joke, but when your show just takes the same fart joke and tells it different ways every week, I'm going to be sick of it well, WELL before your sorry excuse for a show gets cancelled, despite the fake laugh track you play in the background. I think someone else already mentioned it, but most American comedy has become formulaic, and I can't stand it.
Ford Prefect wrote:When I was very young I watched "Hancocks Half Hour" and "The Hattie Jaques Show", "On the Buses" "David Allen" and "The Frost Report".
All classics Ford, i agree. Hancock was a genius. For those that are into Monty Python, there was a group of guys that years before did a radio show in the fifties called the Goon Show which was totally mental. It featured Peter Sellers among it's group. A bit later there was peter cook and Dudley More...ooh my youth. You can get some streams of these guys at http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbc7/
So why do you think there are differences is in the humour? The Americans i've met (bit of a generalistion i know) love it. I get the feeling that American TV is so scared to take risks because of the enormous amounts of money involved it limits experimentation so you basiclly get the same crap all the time. You can definatly say this about the utter dross that is forced down our throats within the music biz.
What is the difference between U.S and U.K. humour?
Hmmm.... A sense of the absurd seems to be important in U.K. humour. They seem to know how to present a situation that is completely implausible in a way that shows up the ordinary as equally absurd.
U.K. humour is also very biting in it's satire. Not sanititzed to avoid offending some sponsor (possibly since much of English television is non-commercial). If something is deemed worth mocking it is open season, no fear of legal or monitary reprisal. A show like "Spitting Image" would have lasted about as long as it took to run the opening credits on U.S. television before it was slapped with a dozen law suits and it certainly could not have been sponsored by any U.S. company.
"South Park" is perhaps the closest the U.S. has come to the U.K. type of satire. And is one of the funniest shows out there these days.
i really agree with what you guys say about american tv being formulistic, and Plebian saying it's often nothing more than people being stupid. that is SO true, i've never thought of it like that before.
yeah sorry FC i fergot about the goons, they really were the yardstick that monty python was based on.
thx for the site , i've been meaning to listen to as much goons as i can. thx thx thx thx!
Brit comedy is hilarious. We watch lots of BBCUSA. (BBC World News kicks CNN's @$$. There's no real "news" on US tv's anymore, it's all crap and fluff!) I have every episode of Monty Python's Flying Circus series, and all of their movies. I know it's a little older of a comedy, but I liked "Are you being served?" as well. Brit comedy has it's ups and downs, just like US sitcoms, some shows in the UK are unimaginitive and formulaic just like the US, but nowhere near as bad. Ghram Norton, Coupling, and The Office are a few shows we like a lot.
I have every episode of Monty Python's Flying Circus series,
Do you have the "Bicycle Trip" episode!?
I saw it once on TV and laughed until I cried, but have never been able to find it again. I read the script on a web site and it was just as funny as I remember. Perhaps the portrayal of the Chinese attempting to infiltrate British bingo parlours was a bit over the top race-wise for North America but the tomatoes that ejected from sandwiches just before an accident has got to be one of the funniest things I have ever seen.
i cant laugh at english humor other than monty python. mostly because that language they speak is barely english and i can barely understand anything they say.
There is definitly a language barrier in the strong accent and the coloquial expressions used in many British shows (E.G.-You're off your chump mate=You're nuts buddy). My American wife has that problem but,since I was raised in Canada amoung a lot of ex-brits and watched a lot of British TV shows I can follow most of it. If you cannot follow what is being said you lose most of the humour, it is the kind of thing you need to pay attention to not just run in the background and laugh with the laugh track.
They are on DVD, a local store was selling the set of 50+ episodes together. It wasn't cheap, but I absolutely had to have them. As far as the bycicle trip episode, is that the name of the skit? I'll have to check, but if it aired on TV, it oughtta be in there.
It is called "Bicycle Trip" in the catalog. It is the only full 1/2 hour show instead of the normal collection of skits. I believe the title is actually "Mr. Pither's bicycle trip through the South Counties"
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, some of my friends like it though, i'm not quite sure why.
). I like "The Office", though my wife hates it, since it's a bit too low-key. British humor is sometimes an acquired taste, and sometimes American humor isn't humor at all, just people being stupid. 
No peaks without a few valleys I guess.
Watch a few bits...