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Lead Balloon
''Lead Balloon'' is a British television series produced by Open Mike Productions for BBC Four. The series was created and is co-written by comedian Jack Dee and Pete Sinclair. It stars Dee as Rick Spleen, a cynical and misanthropic comedian whose life is plagued by petty annoyances, disappointments and embarrassments. Raquel Cassidy, Sean Power and Tony Gardner also star. The first series of six episodes was broadcast on BBC Four in 2006, with the first episode achieving the highest ratings for a comedy on the channel. Repeats of the series were run on BBC Two and BBC HD, bringing it to a larger audience. The second series of eight episodes aired on BBC Two from November 2007; the third series aired from November 2008; and the final series aired from 31 May 2011 until 5 July. Comparisons were made by critics to the successful American comedy '' Curb Your Enthusiasm'', and positive comments were made about ''Lead Balloon'''s characters, particularly Anna Crilly's Magda, the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Situation Comedy
A sitcom, a portmanteau of situation comedy, or situational comedy, is a genre of comedy centered on a fixed set of characters who mostly carry over from episode to episode. Sitcoms can be contrasted with sketch comedy, where a troupe may use new characters in each sketch, and stand-up comedy, where a comedian tells jokes and stories to an audience. Sitcoms originated in radio, but today are found mostly on television as one of its dominant narrative forms. A situation comedy television program may be recorded in front of a studio audience, depending on the program's production format. The effect of a live studio audience can be imitated or enhanced by the use of a laugh track. Critics disagree over the utility of the term "sitcom" in classifying shows that have come into existence since the turn of the century. Many contemporary American sitcoms use the single-camera setup and do not feature a laugh track, thus often resembling the dramedy shows of the 1980s and 1990s rather t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rick Spleen
Rick Spleen (born Richard Shaw) is a character in the BBC situation comedy ''Lead Balloon'', played by comedian Jack Dee. Spleen is a world-weary comedian who is forced to make ends meet by hosting corporate events. Character profile Rick is a short-tempered, impatient comedian who struggles to find worthwhile gigs or appearances. He spends a lot of his time writing jokes for corporate events with his friend and writer, Marty who always does far more work than Rick. He lives in a typical London suburb house with partner Mel and daughter Sam. He is a stubborn, incompetent liar, who often attempts to avoid paying professionals by performing a task himself. He also passes off many of Marty's jokes as his own, and always aims to take credit for other people's work. In episode 2 of Season 3, "Panda", it is revealed that Spleen's real name is Richard Shaw, which caused him much grief at school due to it being shortened to 'rickshaw,' after the Chinese/Japanese transport Rickshaw. Dee ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Willesden
Willesden () is an area of northwest London, situated 5 miles (8 km) northwest of Charing Cross. It is historically a parish in the county of Middlesex that was incorporated as the Municipal Borough of Willesden in 1933, and has formed part of the London Borough of Brent in Greater London since 1965. Dollis Hill is also sometimes referred to as being part of Willesden. With its close proximity to affluent neighbourhoods Brondesbury Park, Queen's Park and Kensal Rise, the area surrounding Willesden Green station has seen increased gentrification in the past several years, with rapidly rising property prices. ''The Daily Telegraph'' called Willesden Green one of London's "new middle class" areas. The area has a population of 44,295 as of 2011 including the Willesden Green, Dollis Hill and Dudden Hill wards. Willesden Green has one of the city's highest Irish populations, and is also strongly associated with Afro-Caribbeans and Latin Americans. Willesden is mostly in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Omid Djalili
Omid Djalili ( fa, امید جلیلی; born 30 September 1965) is a British actor, comedian and writer. Early life and education Djalili was born on 30 September 1965 in Chelsea, London, to Iranian Baháʼí parents. He attended Holland Park School and then Ulster University in Coleraine, Northern Ireland, studying English and theatre studies. Comedy career The first significant success of his stand-up comedy career was at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 1995 with "Short, Fat Kebab Shop Owner's Son", followed by "The Arab and the Jew" with Jewish comedian Ivor Dembina in 1996. Djalili has performed in numerous countries, including Australia, Ireland, Sweden, Belgium, Canada and the United States, where he had his own HBO Special. Djalili took part in a show for Comic Relief after the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami and also in 2005 he appeared on the British TV show ''Top Gear'' as a celebrity driver. The same year he broke Edinburgh Festival box office records wit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Seinfeld
''Seinfeld'' ( ) is an American television sitcom created by Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld. It aired on NBC from July 5, 1989, to May 14, 1998, over nine seasons and List of Seinfeld episodes, 180 episodes. It stars Seinfeld as Jerry Seinfeld (character), a fictionalized version of himself and focuses on his personal life with three of his friends: best friend George Costanza (Jason Alexander), former girlfriend Elaine Benes (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) and his neighbor from across the hall, Cosmo Kramer (Michael Richards). It is set mostly in an apartment building in Manhattan's Upper West Side in New York City. It has been described as "a show about nothing", often focusing on the slice of life, minutiae of daily life. Interspersed in earlier episodes are moments of stand-up comedy from the fictional Jerry Seinfeld, frequently using the episode's events for material. As a rising comedian in the late 1980s, Jerry Seinfeld was presented with an opportunity to create a show with NBC. He ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Woody Allen
Heywood "Woody" Allen (born Allan Stewart Konigsberg; November 30, 1935) is an American film director, writer, actor, and comedian whose career spans more than six decades and multiple Academy Award-winning films. He began his career writing material for television in the 1950s, mainly ''Your Show of Shows'' (1950–1954) working alongside Mel Brooks, Carl Reiner, Larry Gelbart, and Neil Simon. He also published several books featuring short stories and wrote humor pieces for ''The New Yorker''. In the early 1960s, he performed as a stand-up comedian in Greenwich Village alongside Lenny Bruce, Elaine May, Mike Nichols, and Joan Rivers. There he developed a monologue style (rather than traditional jokes) and the persona of an insecure, intellectual, fretful nebbish. He released three comedy albums during the mid to late 1960s, earning a Grammy Award for Best Comedy Album nomination for his 1964 comedy album entitled simply '' Woody Allen''. In 2004, Comedy Central ranked A ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Office (UK TV Series)
''The Office'' is a British television mockumentary sitcom first broadcast in the UK on BBC Two on 9 July 2001. Created, written and directed by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, the programme follows the day-to-day lives of office employees in the Slough branch of the fictional Wernham Hogg paper company. Gervais also starred in the series, playing the central character David Brent. Two six-episode series were made, followed by a two-part Christmas special. When it was first shown on BBC Two, ratings were relatively low, but it has since become one of the most successful of all British comedy exports. As well as being shown internationally on BBC Worldwide, channels such as BBC Prime, BBC America, and BBC Canada, the series has been sold to broadcasters in over 80 countries, including ABC1 in Australia, The Comedy Network in Canada, TVNZ in New Zealand, and the pan-Asian satellite channel Star World, based in Hong Kong. The show was shown in the United States on BBC America ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Guardian
''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Guardian Media Group, owned by the Scott Trust. The trust was created in 1936 to "secure the financial and editorial independence of ''The Guardian'' in perpetuity and to safeguard the journalistic freedom and liberal values of ''The Guardian'' free from commercial or political interference". The trust was converted into a limited company in 2008, with a constitution written so as to maintain for ''The Guardian'' the same protections as were built into the structure of the Scott Trust by its creators. Profits are reinvested in journalism rather than distributed to owners or shareholders. It is considered a newspaper of record in the UK. The editor-in-chief Katharine Viner succeeded Alan Rusbridger in 2015. Since 2018, the paper's main news ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Times
''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (founded in 1821) are published by Times Newspapers, since 1981 a subsidiary of News UK, in turn wholly owned by News Corp. ''The Times'' and ''The Sunday Times'', which do not share editorial staff, were founded independently and have only had common ownership since 1966. In general, the political position of ''The Times'' is considered to be centre-right. ''The Times'' is the first newspaper to have borne that name, lending it to numerous other papers around the world, such as ''The Times of India'', ''The New York Times'', and more recently, digital-first publications such as TheTimesBlog.com (Since 2017). In countries where these other titles are popular, the newspaper is often referred to as , or as , although the newspaper is of nationa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Talent Agent
A talent agent, or booking agent, is a person who finds jobs for actors, authors, broadcast journalists, film directors, musicians, models, professional athletes, screenwriters, writers, and other professionals in various entertainment or sports businesses. In addition, an agent defends, supports and promotes the interest of their clients. Talent agencies specialize, either by creating departments within the agency or developing entire agencies that primarily or wholly represent one specialty. For example, there are modeling agencies, commercial talent agencies, literary agencies, voice-over agencies, broadcast journalist agencies, sports agencies, music agencies and many more. Having an agent is not required, but does help the artist in getting jobs (concerts, tours, movie scripts, appearances, signings, sport teams, etc.). In many cases, casting directors or other businesses go to talent agencies to find the artists for whom they are looking. The agent is paid a percentage of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Live At The Apollo (TV Series)
''Live at the Apollo'' (formerly titled ''Jack Dee Live at the Apollo'') is a British stand-up comedy programme performed from the Apollo Theatre, West London. Despite the title, the programmes are recorded, not live. Jack Dee hosted the first two series and the opening show of the third series, performing a short segment before introducing a guest comedian. Until 2015, all episodes were broadcast on BBC One. The show moved to BBC Two in November 2015. The programme was renamed for its third series which was filmed over three evenings in October 2007. The format was changed to suit with one of the night's performers assuming hosting duties. A fourth series began transmission on 28 November 2008. It showcased a variety of the newer stand-up comedians and was rescheduled from Monday nights to Friday nights to replace ''Friday Night with Jonathan Ross'' after Ross's suspension in the wake of the Sachsgate row. After hosting the first episode, Michael McIntyre got his own show of a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Who Feels Love?
"Who Feels Love?" is a song by the English rock band Oasis, written by the band's lead guitarist Noel Gallagher. It became the second single to be released from the album '' Standing on the Shoulder of Giants'', peaking at number four on the UK Singles Chart and entering the top 20 in Ireland, Italy, and Spain. The album was noted for its psychedelic feel, and "Who Feels Love?" was held up as the most extreme example of this. Mark Stent was praised for his production on the song, creating a "trippy" feel like that found on Beatles songs such as "Rain". With the psychedelic and Eastern sound, the song also reminds of George Harrison achievements like "Within You Without You" and also some of his solo work. However, despite the acclaimed production, the song itself was not well received by the critics, with ''NME'' stating that the production "triumphs over any real sort of feeling... pure mock Maharishi spirituality that not even Liam can salvage from the realm of self-parody". ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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