Toast Of London

The British Comedy Awards 2014

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2014 has been a fantastic year for British Comedy, and The British Comedy Awards exists to showcase a large proportion of that to the public.

Last year’s post about the British Comedy Awards ceremony was largely negative, as a result of the production rather than the comedy being nominated and awarded. The show was aired live, which meant that mistakes could not be hidden and the timing issues were obvious, with some speeches having to be cut short which seemed outrageous. This year, however, the programme aired on Channel 4 on December 17th, rather than live, on December 16th, which meant the whole affair appeared far more professional and respectable, if a little fake, to the television audience.

It was a delight to see the wonderful Harry Enfield receive three awards (individually for Best TV Comedy Actor and teamed with Paul Whitehouse (Harry & Paul) for Best Sketch Show and Best Comedy Moment). Katherine Parkinson (The IT Crowd) also won Best TV Comedy Actress, which I think is incredibly well-deserved and so endearing to see how shocked she was to be recognised. Matt Berry was nominated for a whopping six awards, though he lost to Nick Helm for Best Comedy Breakthrough Artist, which is just as it should be seeing as Berry has been a television comic for over a decade. I’m a big fan of Berry’s Toast of London; it was great to see such a strange style of sitcom win an award for once.

The person I was most pleased to see win an award was certainly Aisling Bea, who won Best Female TV Comic. Seeing this absolute ray of sunshine crawl onto stage in her dress and heels and inadvertently turn herself into a “hospital DJ,” made me laugh so much and just proved that Aisling is a funny woman through and through. I am unbelievably pleased for her and can’t wait to see what this award does for her career in the coming year. Another beautiful moment was hearing an emotional speech from Brendan O’Carroll (Mrs Brown’s Boys), who was rightly awarded with the Writers’ Guild of Great Britain Award.

It’s easy to be cynical whilst watching such a grandiose display of wealth and status, and there were times throughout the production where I did feel like the spirit of British Comedy was being exploited, but, unlike Stewart Lee, I chose to ignore that this year. From the position of a viewer rather than a performer, I can see that The British Comedy Awards gives comics a platform to boost their careers or give them recognition for their lifetime achievements, and that can only be a good thing in my opinion, however unfair you believe the results to be. Out of the nominees for King or Queen of Comedy, however, Greg Davies will always win in the end.

I think my favourite part of the whole affair was hearing Tulisa say “I’m a big comedy fan.” Yes, that part made me laugh the most.

TV Review: Toast Of London, Series 2

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The king of voiceovers, the prize idiot, the most unsuccessful actor ever to grace our television screens: Steven Toast is back.

Matt Berry is a true talent who has proved he is able to play a huge variety of different roles, but each character always has that signature Berry-style about them, and that’s what makes him so enjoyable to watch. Series two comes armed with recurring jokes from the first series, with appearances from Ray “Bloody” Purchase and regular and consistently awkward conversations with the delightfully irritating Clem Fandango.

Steven Toast has an air of self-importance and a clear sense of disgust and disregard for anyone else, despite him often being the one portrayed as the fool in a wonderful example of dramatic irony. This dramatic irony is what makes the series so entertaining and even painful to watch in some places; Toast is an arrogant cretin who says and does the most terrible things, yet the joke is always on him.

With its offbeat storylines accompanied by incredible and hilarious musical interludes (written and performed by Berry), Toast Of London is peculiar, rapidly changing and absolutely outrageous. The stable and sarcastic character of Ed Howzer-Black (Robert Bathurst) compliments Toast’s childish pedantry brilliantly, with his dead-pan delivery of such horrendous lines. As well as Bathurst, Doon Mackichan is a delight to watch, playing Toast’s agent, Jane Pleugh. Mr Pleugh gets the limelight in one of my favourite scenes of the series, her incredibly funny acid trip in episode four (“High Winds Actor”). The new instalment of Toast Of London also includes appearances from the likes of Peter Davison (Doctor Who), Matthew Holness (Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace), Morgana Robinson (House of Fools), Steve Pemberton (The League of Gentlement) and Terry Mynott (The Mimic).

Toast of London has been accused by some of being sexist but surely it is satirical. Steven Toast is a man that we aren’t supposed to really like. He’s a moron; an egotistical snob who’s career really isn’t going anywhere. The show is often uncomfortable and intentionally distasteful, smooth to the extent that the sarcasm can be missed, to the point that watchers may be inclined to look away from the screen or cover their ears. My reading, however, is a positive one. Many parts of the show I found unnecessary, such as the sheer amount of nudity in every episode, as I generally don’t think a good comedy needs to hide behind crude references in order to be funny; Toast could do without it, though it’s likely that this aspect is relied upon for Toast’s own character development.

The second series of Toast of London has taught me a lot about my own taste in comedy, and the more I think about the programme, the more I realise how much I enjoyed watching it.

CATCH UP WITH TOAST OF LONDON, SERIES TWO ON 4OD.