Review of Brittas Empire, The (The Complete Series 3)

Introduction

It`s amazing how much British comedy has changed in the past fifteen years. It seems almost scary to think that at the beginning of the last decade, audiences had never seen an episode of `I`m Alan Partridge`, `The Office`, `The League of Gentlemen`, `Marion and Geoff`, `Little Britain`, `Coupling`, `Spaced`, `Men Behaving Badly` etc ; shows which now seem to be pillars of the humour community. This almost begs the question `What on earth did the Homo Sapiens of 1991 AD have to entertain themselves?` Other than Sonic the Hedgehog, that is.

A whole decade before David Brent tested his staff`s patience to the maximum and managed to bag his creators every award going in the process, Gordon Brittas, Manager of `Whitbury New Town Leisure Centre`, was busy aggravating the hell out of employees and well meaning customers alike, capturing not only the zeitgeist of the self obsessed era (which we still have to properly say goodbye to), but also the boss that everybody loves to hate.

Chris Barrie is the aforementioned dictatorial Sports Centre Fuhrer, who was at this point neatly dividing his sitcom time between running a swimming pool and, err, living in space. In fact, `Red Dwarf` had already run for three series before `The Brittas Empire` managed to further harness his comedy potential, creating the Nightmare Boss AND husband simultaneously. Fans of Channel 4`s fantastic hospital based comedy `Green Wing` from 2004 will already have been reacquainted with long suffering wife Helen (Pippa Haywood), who essentially played the same character in both shows - although varying the level of vulgarity.

Ironically however, for all the star plaudits that were heaped upon Barrie`s depiction of the hopeless jobsworth, it was ailed assistant Colin (Michael Burns) who proved to be the most enduring character. His endless list of scabs, boils, cuts and infections became the show`s greatest asset and something that could be wheeled out whenever the episode was flagging slightly. Series 3 also sees parts played by both Eastenders` Billy Mitchell (Perry Fenwick) and CBBC`s Demon Headmaster (Harold Innocent), who both fall prey to Brittas` style of mismanagement in episode 1.

Video

The show is presented in 4:3 aspect ratio, which suits this sort of sitcom just fine. As has already been mentioned in a previous review of `Brittas`, Eureka Video have done a great job of transferring the series under licence from Auntie.

The look of the program itself is undeniably early nineties, although I`m not completely sure that any leisure centres actually ever looked like Whitbury. It is more akin to the set of `Bodger and Badger` than to any swimming pool that I ever visited whilst in training for my 100m front crawl badge, yet the stylised look seems to help the writers get away with the more outrageous plotlines.

Audio

The soundtrack is presented in Mono, which is perfectly adequate. As with most productions of this era, there is no emphasis on the audio elements, other than the dialogue. This seems to illustrate how much things have changed in the intervening period - especially when you consider that `Spaced` even released its own OST record!

Features

The features are the interactive game `Where`s Ben`, a gallery, a web link and a Wogan interview

`Where`s Ben` involves the player going from room to room in `Whitbury Leisure Centre`, looking for receptionist Carol`s child, which she famously keeps in a variety of cupboards and draws throughout the series. The computer designed rooms aim to imitate those in the program, and manage it with varying degrees of success.

The interview by Radio 2`s mainman Terry Wogan (our `Tel) is from back when he strung coherent sentences together and presented his own Prime time chat show. Chris Barrie tells of his time in `Spitting Image` and also of how he created the character of Gordon Brittas, but with the interview lasting not much more than 5 minutes, it leaves you with more questions than it does answers.

Conclusion

That `The Brittas Empire` was such a success that it managed to run for seven whole series should not come as that much of a surprise. Fitting as he does both characteristically and chronologically between Mr Fawlty and Mr Brent, Gordon Brittas` persona represented the car crash TV boss of the early nineties. To place him in a leisure centre - the Mecca of the self involved - was, in a manner of speaking, a stroke of genius. Yes, he may be as annoying as hell, but you just can`t help watching.

Series 3 represents the series at the peak of its powers. With all the cast and writers in place, there will be moments that you`ll certainly remember if you watched them on their original transmission - the electrocution of all of those being baptised in the swimming pool, a tarantula on the loose and, most memorably, the entire place being blown up in an explosion (although I`m pretty certain that may have happened at several points in Mr B`s tenure).

Although it has been far surpassed in the years that followed it, `The Brittas Empire` still represents a cultural point in British mainstream comedy. Before you needed a bit more than an irritating voice, a few shakes of the head and someone with woodlice in the ear to raise chuckles, this passed as good honest, decent humour. It is unlikely that, in 2005, BBC3 would even commission such base humour antics (and, let`s not forget, they have `Two pints of lager…`!) but as a reminder of simpler times, this will do just fine.