A radio producer is someone who checks microphone levels, screens callers, and edits tape. Unlike in television, the producer is not the brains behind the show.
In regards to that quote, yes. Like Karl’s character, that may not warrant a straight reading. I’m not as intimate with his character as some of the others here are; I’m just going on what my impression is, and his similarity to actual characters I know in my life, who do this sort of schtick. I would say that it’s more possible that it’s y’all that are being whooshed, but it seems to be difficult to prove either way. I’d be curious to hear his radio work pre-Gervais (apparently, he had a brief talk show in Manchester.)
Hey, he had to come in on the weekend sometimes!
From the little bit that I have watched, this is my bet as well.
I think it’s quite obvious that Karl Pilkington is just a character, like SuperDave Osbourne or the dreadful Jake Byrd (Jimmy Kimmel Live)
I don’t think he’s anything like an obvious character like Super Dave. In any case, I don’t think a “little bit” is enough to really get the full effect of Pilkington. If you still think he’s just a character after listening to the XFM shows, I’ll give that more weight.
He had to come in every weekend! Because Ricky and Steve were doing a Saturday afternoon show. He whinged about it until they gave him Mondays off.
And he still had to keep going on his terrible vacations to Mediterranean rocks.
Possibly. I wouldn’t be too surprised to find out it was a put-on. But the character was developed so organically, that it would be on of the best whooshes I’ve run across.
I don’t really enjoy the Merchant-Gervais-Pilkington dynamic, because Gervais sounds like a braying jackass laughing. I think Gervais and Merchant have brilliant comedic skills, but I am not a real fan of the podcasts (though of course there are funny bits).
I was pretty underwhelmed with the show (I saw the Egypt and India episodes). Egypt was more amusing, because it did show an aspect of the tourist experience (commercialization of the pyramids, street vendors) that gets glossed over. Like someone said upthread, though, it was like 15 minutes of comedy stretched out over an hour.
If it’s on I might watch it but it’s not appointment viewing for me.
I believe it was Ricky who gave one of the best defenses against the show being scripted when he pointed out how many months it took him and Steve just to write an episode of The Office. And it’s clear Ricky wasn’t the quickest improviser on air, based on his inability to finish sentences, and his penchant for spending the entire show lying down.
Yeah, if the shows were scripted, I bet Ricky would have given himself funnier lines than Stephen.
Exactly.
It is more than likely that Karl plays up his personality to annoy Ricky and Steve.
Does he says things just to get a rise out of them? does he exaggerate some of his thoughts just to get a laugh and provoke argument?
I would say absolutely yes. But we all do that with our friends and I confidently predict that those three interract in much the same way whether they are down the pub or in the studio.
In fact, based on listening to the podcasts it is clear that a lot of what they talk about probably started off as a conversation elsewhere and is brought back up within the shows.
I would say though that that is a million miles away from being scripted and “Karl” is not a character. (although he most certainly is a “character” if you know what I mean )
I don’t necessarily disagree with the above, even though I am on the “donning a persona” side. I think he is greatly exaggerating aspects of himself and purposely throwing out stupid thoughts in a unique and brilliant manner for the comedic value. And I certainly don’t think the show is scripted. There may be some sketched out “landmarks” but I have no reason to believe it’s not off the cuff.
This might be a British thing. My husband is a Brit & when he first moved to the USA he got incredibly frustrated when appliance shopping. More often than not we’d leave the store with him complaining “too much choice.” Say for TV or stereo shopping, for example, he was used to ONE cheap, low-quality option, ONE expensive, high-quality option, and *maybe *one in the middle. He gets here and there are dozens of choices with the differences between them not so obvious.
Unless he moved there in the 1960’s that’s a little bit of an exaggeration there. We aren’t East Germany.
But it is true to say that in the USA there is far more choice in some areas (say, breakfast cereal) and far less in others (whole chickens). And I personally find that frustrating.
Yeah, I don’t think it’s the case of an Englishman frustrated with a foreign level of choice. He’s shopping in London after all. One of their well-known stories is that he dislikes grocery shopping so much that he forced his fever-ridden girlfriend to get out of bed and get him something for dinner (He doesn’t keep much food in the house, because he never knows what he might want for “tea”). He reasoned that her standing in front of the open freezers would make her feel better.
New season of Karl ticking off items off a bucket list starting. Desert Island… next week it’s “Travelling the trans-siberian railway”
Technically speaking, if you removed every life form on the planet but humans and the things we eat, it’s unclear that our lives would be diminished in any way. Removing part of the animal kingdom would have an effect on the rest of the animal kingdom, but that is only of relevance to people who think that really matters.
(Frantic Googling finished…) *Oh…okay, Season 2 is just starting on Sky on the UK. Can’t find anything on when we might see this legally in America…anybody know anything?
I watched the China episode tonight to get a better idea about this show. It had funny moments, but overall I didn’t think Karl was an idiot so much as he is a really good straight man and plays up the rest. It was ok, but not nearly as funny as Gervais seems to think.
It’s perfectly clear to me. I don’t eat plankton, for example, but I eat lots of animals that eat plankton (or animals that eat animals that eat plankton, or animals that eat animals that eat animals that eat plankton, and so on).