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Gimme Gimme Gimme3 / 5
Series: Three
Aired: 1999 - 2001
Channel: BBC One and BBC Two
Writer: Jonathan Harvey
Cast: Kathy Burke, James Dreyfus, Brian Bovell, Beth Goddard and Rosalind Knight et al
My prevailing memory of this late-90s comedy is that I used to absolutely love it. I don't recall whether that pertains to any kind of genuine love for the humour or just my childish infatuation with the obscenely ginger hair of Kathy Burke's character, Linda.
Gimme Gimme Gimme is a flat share comedy, focusing on two people who are polar opposites but compliment each other perfectly, living together for what can only be described as "the company". Tom is a struggling gay and a struggling actor and Linda is who-knows-what, both of whom are fairly vile, surrounded by other vile people: their landlady, ex-prostitute Beryl and their nice-on-the-surface-but-just-as-vile-underneath neighbours Suze and Jez, one of whom Linda severely tries to mount in every episode.
Innuendos, double entendres, insults and venom are pretty much standard, but the basis of the comedy is the reliance that Linda has on Tom and that Tom has on Linda. Most flat-share comedy or odd-couple comedy relies heavily on this format and Gimme Gimme Gimme is no different, but it still seems like sometimes they'd be exactly the same to whoever it was they lived with.
On Twitter, Kathy Burke (Linda) made the rather obvious yet sneakily obscure comment that "Kids love shouty fat twats shouting at shouty skinny twats who shout back." I couldn't agree more: I was trying to wrack my brains, working out why I loved this show so much when I was younger and I really don't think there's anything to it more than it was just fun. It's lost its appeal slightly, mostly because the references are very out-dated and the arguments get repetitive and the acting by support cast was at best dire most of the time, but I will say that the ending to the series as a whole is one of the greatest endings I think I've ever seen in a comedy, or any television programme for that matter. There's no huge happy ending like most comedies get away with, and there's not much closure: it feels like a end-of-series closing instead of The End but it was supremely perfect.
Innuendos, double entendres, insults and venom are pretty much standard, but the basis of the comedy is the reliance that Linda has on Tom and that Tom has on Linda. Most flat-share comedy or odd-couple comedy relies heavily on this format and Gimme Gimme Gimme is no different, but it still seems like sometimes they'd be exactly the same to whoever it was they lived with.
On Twitter, Kathy Burke (Linda) made the rather obvious yet sneakily obscure comment that "Kids love shouty fat twats shouting at shouty skinny twats who shout back." I couldn't agree more: I was trying to wrack my brains, working out why I loved this show so much when I was younger and I really don't think there's anything to it more than it was just fun. It's lost its appeal slightly, mostly because the references are very out-dated and the arguments get repetitive and the acting by support cast was at best dire most of the time, but I will say that the ending to the series as a whole is one of the greatest endings I think I've ever seen in a comedy, or any television programme for that matter. There's no huge happy ending like most comedies get away with, and there's not much closure: it feels like a end-of-series closing instead of The End but it was supremely perfect.
There are cameos galore (hello Mel and Sue) and Kathy Burke's brand of acting is second-to-none, but it seemed to lack a depth that goes beyond simply shouting at each other. There was little visual comedy in truth, though a particular walking scene does stick in mind quite vividly, and I think more visual comedy was needed for this comedy that often had a weak or recurring plot. Having said that, I cannot deny the joy it gave me in my youth and it was in fact pleasant to re-watch.
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