Thursday, February 09, 2006
Drunk PBS, or Springtime for Gay Hitler
One time, I fell asleep to PBS, and woke up to Telletubbbys. The Baby in the sun sent me into the kind of terror that is reserved for bachelors who don’t like kids who are hung over and seeing babbling babies floating in the sun. It was bad, confusing juju, friends. It was a defining moment that helped make me what I am—a horrible, broken shell of a dude, who shuns the sun, human contact, and grace and beauty in general.
But, we as humans, we are a resilient lot. We adapt, we evolve, we—dare I say it—heal. That’s what we do. And, I was getting back into the swing of things…until last night.
I got home, a good amount buzzed and turned on the TV. And, it was like waking up to the baby sun thing all over again. But, it was going to sleep to a German knock off of friends.
Where do I start?
The name of the show, as far as I can tell, is “Extra” but I don’t know really. It was the only word written in English. This is where I’m a bit like a cultural anthropologist type…a cultural anthropologist who was drunk. I had to reverse engineer things on the account that I don’t speak that language. So, bear with me as I sort through clues, context, and body language. And I could have imagines some stuff that wasn’t really there because: drunk.
At first glance, it is “Friends” on the production value level of “You Can’t Do that On Television,” and they could only afford 4 principles, instead of 6. Weird because when The British Show, “Coupling” co-opted the basic premise of Friends (loosely speaking anyway), the made it substantially better in every way. With “Extra” or whatever it’s called, not so. It reminded me of a production put on by junior high people. Junior high people who were angry with their audience and held them in contempt. It also didn’t seem to pull off the far less entertaining “Perfect Strangers” vibe. You know that show where Bronson Pinchot tried to turn a 2-minute Cameo in “Beverly Hills Cop” to a several season run on Network TV.
The premise seemed to be that An American was abroad in Germany, and had a wacky roommate. Hilarity no doubt would ensue. You could tell he was an American because he had a shirt—no foolin’—that said “American.” And he spoke English every now and then (in a weird Germanized version of English that sounded not at all American), and it looked like her tried to affect a stammering quality to his German…or maybe he was just a shitty actor.
Side note, about the only joke I got was when the American threw his bright red shirt into the laundry load of whites, and—wait for it—made the whites pink!!!!!!!! Are you rolling in the floor? Are you?
The other absurd premise they wanted you to believe is that the American and the wacky German roommate were straight. At one point, in English, they holler, “Girls, Girls, Girls!” then hug and make out a little. These two Eurotrash, Thom of Finland poster boys are not fooling anyone. As far as I can tell, they are not even trying.
I couldn’t understand stuff, but I actually could. They must have seen my drunk, non-German-Speaking ass coming because they often pantomimed stuff. It was like old Vaudeville, but instead of being done by old Jewish people, it was done by foppish caricatures of their former mortal enemies. Where as the old Jews ruled at the vaudevillian pantomime, seeing the Germans do it (with an ironic lack of precision) is much like seeing white people dance or do the blues, or “sizzle” their words.
I got that the American Phoned home…kind of a device to sum up the episode, to tell the possibly drunk-on-thick-beer, Teutonic audience what the moral message of the story was, and quite possibly because they saw Doogie Howser do a similar thing when he typed stuff at the end of his show to sum up what we all learned.
I figured out that they were trying to go on dates—allegedly with women; I knew they were trying to prepare the American for the grueling, demanding precision necessary to be a very gay German Waiter. And apparently these fresh, never-before seen scenarios bristled with fresh, never before seen jokes. I guess. I mean like I said, I couldn’t understand the actual language. But the audience (or laugh track) bristled with fresh, precise laughter.
The only thing that actually giggled me is how eerily similar our own language is to theirs sometimes. When American guy killed some chick’s plant, she held it aloft and hollered in a guttural, un-feminine baritone “Planten!” That cracked me up. To that end I think I kina know German. Cause whenever I try to emulate the speech of our Black Forest buddies across the pond, I just add an N on the end of words. I also learned that we Americans need to be better with plants. We should get into agriculture in our country in some form or other.
Ok, there is more I can say, but why? Just try to watch it yourself. It’s weird.
Also, I want to throw out a disclaimer. While I intend to berate the fish in the Barrel that is the show, I really didn’t mean to be anything more than playfully jabby toward the Germans. But much like the African American may use the N word, I am 1/4 German, so I can make fun of those guys a bit. I don’t feel I need to apologize to the world at large, and don’t mistake this for altruism. It’s just that German women tend to be tall, and I like tall women. Have you noticed? Any of them out there want to help me heal? Or at the very least explain this damn show?
But, we as humans, we are a resilient lot. We adapt, we evolve, we—dare I say it—heal. That’s what we do. And, I was getting back into the swing of things…until last night.
I got home, a good amount buzzed and turned on the TV. And, it was like waking up to the baby sun thing all over again. But, it was going to sleep to a German knock off of friends.
Where do I start?
The name of the show, as far as I can tell, is “Extra” but I don’t know really. It was the only word written in English. This is where I’m a bit like a cultural anthropologist type…a cultural anthropologist who was drunk. I had to reverse engineer things on the account that I don’t speak that language. So, bear with me as I sort through clues, context, and body language. And I could have imagines some stuff that wasn’t really there because: drunk.
At first glance, it is “Friends” on the production value level of “You Can’t Do that On Television,” and they could only afford 4 principles, instead of 6. Weird because when The British Show, “Coupling” co-opted the basic premise of Friends (loosely speaking anyway), the made it substantially better in every way. With “Extra” or whatever it’s called, not so. It reminded me of a production put on by junior high people. Junior high people who were angry with their audience and held them in contempt. It also didn’t seem to pull off the far less entertaining “Perfect Strangers” vibe. You know that show where Bronson Pinchot tried to turn a 2-minute Cameo in “Beverly Hills Cop” to a several season run on Network TV.
The premise seemed to be that An American was abroad in Germany, and had a wacky roommate. Hilarity no doubt would ensue. You could tell he was an American because he had a shirt—no foolin’—that said “American.” And he spoke English every now and then (in a weird Germanized version of English that sounded not at all American), and it looked like her tried to affect a stammering quality to his German…or maybe he was just a shitty actor.
Side note, about the only joke I got was when the American threw his bright red shirt into the laundry load of whites, and—wait for it—made the whites pink!!!!!!!! Are you rolling in the floor? Are you?
The other absurd premise they wanted you to believe is that the American and the wacky German roommate were straight. At one point, in English, they holler, “Girls, Girls, Girls!” then hug and make out a little. These two Eurotrash, Thom of Finland poster boys are not fooling anyone. As far as I can tell, they are not even trying.
I couldn’t understand stuff, but I actually could. They must have seen my drunk, non-German-Speaking ass coming because they often pantomimed stuff. It was like old Vaudeville, but instead of being done by old Jewish people, it was done by foppish caricatures of their former mortal enemies. Where as the old Jews ruled at the vaudevillian pantomime, seeing the Germans do it (with an ironic lack of precision) is much like seeing white people dance or do the blues, or “sizzle” their words.
I got that the American Phoned home…kind of a device to sum up the episode, to tell the possibly drunk-on-thick-beer, Teutonic audience what the moral message of the story was, and quite possibly because they saw Doogie Howser do a similar thing when he typed stuff at the end of his show to sum up what we all learned.
I figured out that they were trying to go on dates—allegedly with women; I knew they were trying to prepare the American for the grueling, demanding precision necessary to be a very gay German Waiter. And apparently these fresh, never-before seen scenarios bristled with fresh, never before seen jokes. I guess. I mean like I said, I couldn’t understand the actual language. But the audience (or laugh track) bristled with fresh, precise laughter.
The only thing that actually giggled me is how eerily similar our own language is to theirs sometimes. When American guy killed some chick’s plant, she held it aloft and hollered in a guttural, un-feminine baritone “Planten!” That cracked me up. To that end I think I kina know German. Cause whenever I try to emulate the speech of our Black Forest buddies across the pond, I just add an N on the end of words. I also learned that we Americans need to be better with plants. We should get into agriculture in our country in some form or other.
Ok, there is more I can say, but why? Just try to watch it yourself. It’s weird.
Also, I want to throw out a disclaimer. While I intend to berate the fish in the Barrel that is the show, I really didn’t mean to be anything more than playfully jabby toward the Germans. But much like the African American may use the N word, I am 1/4 German, so I can make fun of those guys a bit. I don’t feel I need to apologize to the world at large, and don’t mistake this for altruism. It’s just that German women tend to be tall, and I like tall women. Have you noticed? Any of them out there want to help me heal? Or at the very least explain this damn show?
// posted by Tim @ 11:45 AM 
