I'm Alan Partridge
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| I'm Alan Partridge | |
|---|---|
 Alan Partridge:Every Ruddy Word |
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| Format | Sitcom |
| Run time | 30 minutes |
| Creator(s) | Peter Baynham, Steve Coogan, Armando Iannucci |
| Starring | Steve Coogan, Felicity Montagu, Simon Greenall, Phil Cornwell Barbara Durkin Sally Phillips Amelia Bullmore |
| Channel | BBC 2 |
| Air dates | November 3, 1997 – December 16, 2002 |
| No. of episodes | 13 |
| IMDb profile | |
I'm Alan Partridge is a British sitcom. Two series were produced, the first in 1997 and the second in 2002. Six episodes were produced for each series. Armando Iannucci has expressed doubts about creating a third [1]. Steve Coogan stars as Alan Partridge.
Both series were written by Steve Coogan, Armando Iannucci and Peter Baynham. They starred Coogan as Alan Partridge; Felicity Montagu as his faithful, mousey PA, Lynn Benfield; Simon Greenall as Geordie Travel Tavern handyman/BP garage attendant, Michael; and Phil Cornwell as Dave Clifton.
Contents |
[edit] Series One
In this series, the former chat show host Partridge has been divorced by his wife, Carol; has distanced himself from his children and ended up living in the Linton Travel Tavern, a cheap hotel equidistant between London and Norwich. At this stage of his life, Alan's career consists of broadcasting his own radio programme, "Up with the Partridge" on the fictional "Radio Norwich" during dead time (4am to 7 am), and occasionally making corporate appearances for various low-profile local businesses. Alan's personal life is shown to be crushingly empty; he has separated from his wife Carol, and his only interaction with other people consists of chatting mindlessly to his personal assistant, Lynn, and the staff of the Linton Travel Tavern.
Throughout the series, Alan displays his usual sexism, racism, homophobia, and general bigotry. His social life is minimal, consisting solely of infrequent phone calls from Bill Oddie, and banal, inane chats with the staff of the Travel Tavern.
Two unusual plot devices used during the series surround Alan's somewhat neurotic personal life. One consists of glimpses into Alan's mind, depicting a fantasy night-club, which Alan seems to think of often and at the most inappropriate moments. In his club fantasies, Alan is a table dancer, dancing for whichever television authority he aims to please (usually Tony Hayers, but also two Irish TV executives he meets on one occasion). Even in these fantasies, Alan retains his unbearably boring and socially inept persona; he dances in a rubber thong but this is offset by wearing his jumper, shirt and tie in addition to his "erotic" apparel, and in his fantasies, Alan launches into his trademark dull and inane conversations. The second plot device used throughout the series revolves around a drawer in Alan's hotel room. The viewers never see what is in the drawer, but the contents are occasionally glimpsed by other characters; Lynn becomes speechless when seeing the contents, Sophie bursts into a fit of giggling, and Alan himself goes to extreme lengths to keep the drawer closed when people are in the room.
Series one was released on DVD in the United States for the first time on October 24, 2006.
[edit] Secondary characters
The supporting characters of the series (besides Alan) are:
- Lynn (played by Felicity Montagu). Alan's hard-working, long-suffering, personal assistant, Lynn appears to run Alan's life to such an extent that he cannot survive without her organisational skills. Besides dealing with Alan's work life, Lynn's other duties range from the banal to the truly ridiculous; accompanying Alan to visit a show home, buying medicinal powder for Alan's fungal foot infections, cooling Alan with a hand-fan, and frequently listening patiently to Alan's pointless conversations and endless whining. Lynn is a member of the English Baptist Church, which Alan finds strange but is willing to tolerate. Her mother, whom Lynn possibly lives with, is apparently housebound, but Lynn seems able to balance her life between looking after her mother's affairs and those of Alan. When accompanying Alan, Lynn is very shy and nervous in public, but seems capable of easily blending into social situations when Alan is not present. Despite her intense and frequently ludicrous workload, Lynn receives a paltry £8,000 per year, due to Alan's greedy penny-pinching.
- Michael (Simon Greenall). An all-purpose worker at the Linton Travel Tavern, Michael speaks with a heavy Geordie accent, which Alan barely understands (and, being Alan, never fails to tactlessly point it out). Michael is arguably Alan's only friend, and Alan is glad of his presence when he needs to have a heart-to-heart or, more often, inane chat. However, Michael is almost as desperate a character as Alan (shown most clearly when Alan looks out of his room window to see Michael tearing at his hair in a state of some distress). Michael frequently tells stories of his time in the army, and the surrealism of some of his stories suggests that he is in fact a compulsive liar. During a period of military placement in the Philippines, Michael married a Filipino woman, and the two moved back to Michael's native Newcastle-upon-Tyne. However, his wife now apparently lives with Michael's brother in Sunderland, possibly shedding light on the origins of Michael's neuroticism. In the last episode, Michael appears at Alan's party already drunk on Scrumpy Jack and proceeds to insult the other guests. He also appears in the second series of "I'm Alan Partridge".
- Susan (Barbara Durkin). The manager of the Linton Travel Tavern. Susan appears to be a stereotypical front-desk worker, with a dazzling smile and sickly sweet manner, but even these forced skills are not enough to deal with Alan's terrible flirting and mindless anecdotes. Alan frequently makes tactless comments to Susan about her appearance (once suggesting to her that she "could have been throwing up all night" but that her smile would not falter). In reaction to these comments, Susan's painted-on smile is sometimes momentarily replaced by a look of shock and bemusement. Susan displays a general dislike of Alan, becoming increasingly bored of his feeble attempts at conversation as the series progresses, and at one stage being terrified by Alan's poorly-planned practical joke in which he dresses as a zombie and creeps up on her at reception. Nevertheless, she never says a harsh word to Alan - at least, until the end of the last episode, in which she explodes at Alan at his party.
- Sophie (Sally Phillips). A recently-employed receptionist at the Travel Tavern, Sophie is also rarely without a smile - however, in her case it is normally due to the fact that she is suppressing a laugh. While Susan brushes off Alan's social faux pas with a smile, Sophie is rarely able to control her laughter at Alan's appalling lack of social skills, and often has to leave reception to prevent laughing in Alan's face. Much to Alan's annoyance, Sophie often jokes about him behind his back.
- Ben (James Lance). Another member of staff at the Travel Tavern and Sophie's boyfriend. Alan is jealous of Ben's romance with Sophie, and does his best to sabotage their romantic trysts. In later episodes, Alan attempts to forge a friendship with Ben, despite Alan's earlier irritance at Ben's informal and somewhat lazy manner. Predictably, Alan's attempts to befriend Ben are unsuccessful.
- Dave Clifton (Phil Cornwell). A fellow Radio Norwich DJ whose popular programme begins at the end of Alan's morning show. During the handover every morning, Alan always engages in witty banter with Dave, but their chatting fails to disguise the bitter rivalry between them, and is only thinly veiled by their jocular chit-chat. Dave usually gets the better of Alan, but on at least one occasion Alan won their daily battle of one-upmanship (by swearing on what was technically Dave's show). Dave is an alcoholic and has a driving ban, according to Alan. Much to Alan's surprise and chagrin, Dave is a friend of Spandau Ballet's Tony Hadley. Dave also appears in the second series of "I'm Alan Partridge".
[edit] Episodes
- "Room with an Alan": Alan and Lynn view a show-home, where Alan displays his usual bigotry, and manages to both confuse and bore the estate agent. Later in the day, Alan attends a luncheon at the BBC headquarters with Tony Hayers (played by David Schneider), the fictional programme commissioner of the BBC, about the possibility of a second series of Knowing Me, Knowing You. During the lunch, Alan dashes his chances of getting a new series, as his ideas for new programmes bore, bewilder, or upset Hayers. When he is told that he is not to be re-commissioned, Alan attacks Tony Hayers with a lump of cheese and flees the restaurant while shouting "I've got cheese, this is cheese!". After a heart-to heart with Lynn, Alan returns to his hotel room, attempts to order an Irish coffee, and gives himself a black eye while attempting an athletic leap from his bed.
- "Alan Attraction": Without a second series of his programme, Alan is forced to fire all of the staff at his company, Peartree Productions. However, when the staff ask him if he has a second series, Alan misinterprets Lynn's signals and tells them that he has been successful. While the staff prepare a party, Alan tries to extricate himself by firing staff members for various "offences"; leaving an unwashed coffee cup on the table; rolling eyes, and being a woman. While locked in his boardroom, the staff leave, with the exception of Jill, a mid-50's, chain-smoking divorcee who is somewhat attracted to Alan. The two go on a date to a nearby owl sanctuary, where Alan's attempts at conversation bewilder Jill. In the evening, the two attend a Valentine's Day dinner at the Travel Tavern, where Alan makes a fool of himself on the karaoke and Lynn repeatedly attempts to sabotage Alan's evening with the uncouth Jill. Alan and Jill return to Alan's room, and in one of the most memorable moments of the series, Alan attempts to make love to Jill while providing a running commentary and attempts a discussion of the pedestrianisation of Norwich city centre. After Jill's attempts at eroticism leave the room covered in chocolate mousse, Jill leaves and Alan goes to work, where he tells Jill over the radio that she is sacked.
- "Watership Alan": After making various unsympathetic comment about farming on his radio show, Alan becomes an object of hatred for local farmers. But he doesn't have time to worry about this as he is more concerned with shooting an advertisement for a small boating company. While filming the video, Alan attempts to blend in with the hard-drinking crew and again displays his chronic lack of basic social skills. While trying to impress the video's executives, Alan invents the ladyboy drink combination, the effects of which result in him spending the rest of the evening on the phone to his ex-wife Carol, trying to insult her partner's car. On his radio show, Alan interviews the leader of the local Farmers' Union (played by Chris Morris), but instead of apologising, enrages local farmers even further by making increasingly insane comments about farmers. The next day, while filming his boat video (riddled with examples of Alan's pathetic ineptitude), he is crushed by a dead cow thrown from a bridge by local farmers. Alan returns from hospital with a neck brace and broken fingers, and is forced to humiliate himself by phoning reception and asking them to reconnect his television pornography.
- "Basic Alan": Throughout the episode, Alan is desperately bored and does various things to pass the time, including dismantling a trouser press and dressing up as a zombie in a poorly planned practical joke. His boredom culminates with he and Michael attempting to steal a traffic cone.
- "To Kill a Mocking Alan": Alan hosts "An Afternoon with Alan Partridge" at the hotel which is attended by his "biggest fan", Jed Maxwell. He is also visited by network executives (played by Graham Linehan and Arthur Mathews) who are considering giving him a show on Irish television.
- "Towering Alan": After a depressing afternoon hosting a small village fayre, Alan is delighted to discover that Tony Hayers has died and his successor is a big fan of Knowing Me, Knowing You. He immediately snaps up the opportunity to finally win his sought-after second series.
The series ended with a party in Alan's room as Alan and Lynn tidied up to the theme from The Adventures of Black Beauty, after all the guests have prematurely left. The series ends on a surprisingly upbeat note, with Alan pretty pleased with himself.
[edit] Series Two
By series two, we catch up with Alan five years after he left the Linton Travel Tavern. He himself admits that in the intervening time he's been "clinically fed up", which culminated in him putting on a lot of weight and driving to Dundee in his bare feet whilst gorging on Toblerones. By the start of this series, he believes himself that he has "bounced back", which is also the title of his poorly-selling autobiography. As well as his autobiography, he has Radio Norwich's 3rd best slot (his rival from Series 1, Dave Clifton, again follows his show, but this is now a 'graveyard' midnight slot), a military-based game show called Skirmish on fictional cable TV channel "UK Conquest" and has released a video called "Crash, Bang, Wallop, What a Video!"
Alan now finds himself living in a static caravan outside his partially built dream home. He is flanked by his friend Michael, who has left his job at the travel tavern to become a cashier at the local BP garage (this recalls Alan's odd question in the first episode of the first series to the estate agent, when he asked if there were any petrol stations near the house with minimarts - 'scaled down supermarket, fits inside a petrol station'). Alan now has two women in his life, not only is he still tended to by his personal assistant Lynn but he has a Ukrainian girlfriend, Sonja, played by Amelia Bullmore.
[edit] Episodes
- "The Talented Mr Alan": While visiting his old friend Michael, Alan has a chance meeting with his old teacher Frank "Sweaty" (or Cacky) Raphael. Alan convinces him to let him do a talk for the sixth formers at the school he is now head teacher of.
- "The Colour Of Alan": Alan is asked to present a sales conference for Dante's of Reading, a company that fits fireplaces.
- "Brave Alan": Alan makes a new friend (not to mention doppelgänger) at the BP garage called Dan (played by Stephen Mangan). The both like the same beer, the same deodorant and both drive Lexi ("the plural of Lexus"). Dan owns Planet Kitchens, and sets it up so that Alan can present the Coleman's Mustard Bravery Awards.
- "Never Say Alan Again": Alan plans a Bond-athon for the bank holiday weekend with Michael. This all goes pear-shaped when Lynne destroys his Bond movies after spilling Sunny Delight over them. When he discovers that Michael has another friend, Tex (played by Peter Serafinowicz), he un-invites Michael. Alan homes in on John the builder to be his new friend. Alan also decides to give the group a physical run through of the entire opening sequence of The Spy Who Loved Me.
- "I Know What Alan Did Last Summer": Alan is worried about being investigated by Inland Revenue, and takes Sonja to "Bono's house" as a present.
- "Alan Wide Shut": Alan's house is finally built and Sonja is angling to cohabit. Meanwhile, Alan's book Bouncing Back has been unsuccessful, and is to be pulped. He is interviewed on a radio show called Prayer Wave.
[edit] Geography
All the places namedropped in I'm Alan Partridge are real locations in East Anglia. Linton and Longstanton are in Cambridgeshire, though neither has a Travel Tavern nor a spice museum. Swaffham is a market town in Norfolk, and of course there's the city of Norwich. The (Great) Ouse and the Waveney are major rivers, as referenced in Radio Norwich's ident. Linton really is equidistant between London and Norwich (about 60 miles in each direction). Not all Norfolkers are happy with the association though. [2]
