Tuesday, November 15, 2005

Second Time Around…

Woody Allen once said that if reincarnation was real he wanted to come back as legendary Hollywood lothario Warren Beatty’s fingertips and, while I can see the plus points of this argument, there were always other contenders for me.

There was the pre-cancer Alex Higgins (breath-taking talent and real beauty while in his twenties), the pre-Aids John Holmes (lots of women and a cock THAT big – and paid to shag. Brilliant!) and Ross Kemp (but only so I could put on a tutu, pay somebody to tie me up and ram oranges in my mouth and up my arse then help me top myself and then give the pictures to every newspaper in town).

The newest contenders for this list, though, are Jesse Armstrong and Sam Bain, the writers behind Peep Show, and I would quite happily come back as both or either of them as they have created the funniest and most consistent comedy on TV at present.

The third series started on Friday and it remains a work of utter joy – from Jeremy trying to finish with his girlfriend only to end up having a threesome with her and a woman with a gammy foot, to mugging victim Mark explaining to his now girlfriend Sophie why carrying a large knife is actually a time-saving device and not a concealed weapon.

Peep Show inhabits the world of grating social faux pax and devastating social and personal embarrassment and its past triumphs are plenty. My favourite is probably the episode where Mark befriended a colleague at work and found himself going on a weekend dressed as a member of the Third Reich but there are countless others too.

I’m pleased to report that series three hit the ground running and it looks like there’s been no let-up in the quality of the scripts – or the acute pain experienced by its two central protagonists. Cue anguished internal monologue from Jeremy after he’s been shagged by his girlfriend wearing a strap-on ‘I suppose these are the indignities we accept to avoid being lonely…’

It’s worth spending Friday night at home for. And that’s pretty bloody good indeed…

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