In response to the buttoned-down, conservatism dominant in British culture in the ‘80s, Channel 4 released The Word (1990-1995) – a magazine-format comedy show. It included interviews, live music, and game shows, as well as an infamous segment called ‘The Hopefuls’, in which ordinary members of the public would commit ludicrous acts to earn their time in the spotlight. The Word had many remarkable moments, including Nirvana’s first TV appearance, but it also became known as a controversial and subversive show. The ‘outrageous’ late night programme was unflinching in its content and was often regarded as an anarchical manifestation of frustration as felt by the younger generations – particularly as everyone who worked on the show was a part of their target age demographic – 16–24-year-olds.
“The Word flourished, and went on to both encapsulate the 1990s, and help define them: a sonorous ball of music, mess, madness, mayhem, complaints and controversy that rolled its way through the bedrooms of millions of bored teenagers and post-pub drinkers, all the way to the Houses of Parliament, with a few detours through the pages of The Daily Mail along the way.” – Jamie Andrew
Another Channel 4 classic, Eurotrash,was one of the UK’s longest running late-night entertainment shows, lasting for 16 series. It had a large budget (approximately £400,000/hour) yet despite this, the programme deliberately maintained a ‘low budget feel’ with pop-art studio backgrounds being used to contribute to the comical nature of the show.
‘90s comedy television relied heavily on performance, with the humour largely, if not entirely, derived from masterful comedic timing and an array of truly bizarre circumstances. Edgar Wright recalls how there was a conventional wisdom of the time that a camera was merely a vessel by which to record comedy and could not contribute to the comedy itself.
Wright, however, became increasingly fascinated by ways to make these run-of-the-mill sitcoms ‘visually exciting’. In his films, notably Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz, and The World’s End, he takes a very purposeful and stylised approach, placing lots of emphasis on camerawork and editing as comedic tools. Wright also developed a formula for his shows, which involved making the mundane and ordinary seem melodramatic, and often consisted of pop-culture references, movie parodies, surreal fantasy interludes, and cameos from his favourite comedy actors (often personal friends). In doing this, the world he creates adheres not only to its own hilariously flawed logic, but also to the logic of his target audience via popular culture references.
Having established themselves as pioneers of comedy through their work on sitcoms like Spaced and Big Train, Wright and Pegg released their classic Shaun of the Dead in 2004. The film has been described as ‘a collision between the quotidian and the outlandish’, – a statement which perfectly encapsulates their ability to blur the line between real and surreal.
The first half of the film focuses largely on the heightened normalcy of the protagonist’s situation as a man with an unremarkable job who has just experienced a break-up. During this portion, the camerawork is melodramatic, and features montages riddled with quick cuts and the like. However, as the film progresses, and the subject becomes increasingly fantastical, Wright opts for a more naturalistic style. As with much of his work – the humour is in the contrast.
David Cox described Wright and Pegg’s sense of comedy as ‘fabulously elastic’ in his 2004 article for Film Comment magazine. He says that their jokes ‘either snap in a split second or stretch the length of the film’, again, the humour is in the contrast of two extremes.
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