The USA have made all my favourite TV dramas, but when it comes to humor, no one beats the UK. Every year I must watch one or two shows that make me think, "Wow, this is the greatest comedy show I've ever seen!" A couple of years ago it was The League of Gentlemen, then The Mighty Boosh, then The IT Crowd. Last year it was The Thick of It, and indeed it's very, very hard to top Malcolm Tucker's foul-mouthed tirades and the government's screw ups he has to solve. But for now I'll go with Coupling as the best comedy show ever.
Coupling is a deceptively simple show about relationships - between sexes, between friends, between husband and wife, between rivals - but it's made with quirkiness, a great cast and some of the most intelligent dialogue ever to grace TV. Steven Moffat, the writer, loads the dialogues with insightful and original observations about language, human behaviour, the different way men and women think about certain topics like sex, faithfulness, marriage, etc., that makes this show one of the sharpest modern treatises on human relationships of our times. I think male and female viewers, watching this show, will frequently nod, "He's absolutely right!," even when he's saying something very insolent about men and women.
He's also helped by an excellent cast - Jack Davenport, Richard Coyle (the real star of the show, who sadly left after season 3), Ben Miles, Kate Isitt, Gina Bellman, Sarah Alexander, and the under-appreciated Richard Mylan (who has the unenviable task of replacing Coyle as the crazy, wacky character); they worked well together and their friendship and occasional spats were convincing and emotional. Richard Coyle stole the show as the socially awkward, sex-crazy Jeff - any scene with him is unforgettable, as are the weird situations he gets himself into. He sadly left the show after three seasons. Although I missed him, I disagree with some who think the show took a nosedive in the last series - Mylan was quite good as the comic book store owner Oliver, an insecure but lovable geek.
In fact the last season has many of my favourite episodes. One of the things that made Coupling so good was that it also played with timelines and parallel stories, and sometimes told stories out of order. In episode 4.1 we have the same story told from three perspectives, and 4.2 has one of the highlights of the show, a phone conversation that starts with two people and ends with the five characters all getting in it. Moffat's scripts are brilliant at a sense of crescendo - they start small and turn into epic situations that completely distort the everyday world. And what of 4.5, when Jane visits Oliver's porn-filled apartment? As far as hilariously embarrassing moments, only Jeff stripping naked in front of his co-workers tops it.
Coupling is one of the few TV shows I'd call perfect. The writing, the acting, the jokes, the timing, everything is just right about it. It's a pity it didn't go on for more seasons, but then probably it wouldn't have been so good. Excellence can only be sustained for so long. So thanks to Moffat and the cast for four amazing seasons!
Coupling is a deceptively simple show about relationships - between sexes, between friends, between husband and wife, between rivals - but it's made with quirkiness, a great cast and some of the most intelligent dialogue ever to grace TV. Steven Moffat, the writer, loads the dialogues with insightful and original observations about language, human behaviour, the different way men and women think about certain topics like sex, faithfulness, marriage, etc., that makes this show one of the sharpest modern treatises on human relationships of our times. I think male and female viewers, watching this show, will frequently nod, "He's absolutely right!," even when he's saying something very insolent about men and women.
He's also helped by an excellent cast - Jack Davenport, Richard Coyle (the real star of the show, who sadly left after season 3), Ben Miles, Kate Isitt, Gina Bellman, Sarah Alexander, and the under-appreciated Richard Mylan (who has the unenviable task of replacing Coyle as the crazy, wacky character); they worked well together and their friendship and occasional spats were convincing and emotional. Richard Coyle stole the show as the socially awkward, sex-crazy Jeff - any scene with him is unforgettable, as are the weird situations he gets himself into. He sadly left the show after three seasons. Although I missed him, I disagree with some who think the show took a nosedive in the last series - Mylan was quite good as the comic book store owner Oliver, an insecure but lovable geek.
In fact the last season has many of my favourite episodes. One of the things that made Coupling so good was that it also played with timelines and parallel stories, and sometimes told stories out of order. In episode 4.1 we have the same story told from three perspectives, and 4.2 has one of the highlights of the show, a phone conversation that starts with two people and ends with the five characters all getting in it. Moffat's scripts are brilliant at a sense of crescendo - they start small and turn into epic situations that completely distort the everyday world. And what of 4.5, when Jane visits Oliver's porn-filled apartment? As far as hilariously embarrassing moments, only Jeff stripping naked in front of his co-workers tops it.
Coupling is one of the few TV shows I'd call perfect. The writing, the acting, the jokes, the timing, everything is just right about it. It's a pity it didn't go on for more seasons, but then probably it wouldn't have been so good. Excellence can only be sustained for so long. So thanks to Moffat and the cast for four amazing seasons!