It’s now over 20 years(!) since the Royle Family started on BBC 2. It’s hard to understand now just how quietly revolutionary it was at the time – for starters, there was no laugh track. And there were very few ‘jokes’, or contrived situations. Most of the characters weren’t funny, yet it was one of the funniest comedies yet shown. We weren’t really invited to laugh ‘at’ any of the characters for being stupid. In other words, in contained nothing of what we’d come to expect from British sitcoms over the years. I was only 15 in 1998, but I could immediately see that we had something radically different on our hands. The dialogue was delivered so naturalistically that you could genuinely believe it was a fly-on-the-wall documentary about a real northern family.
The reason it seems hard to believe how revolutionary all this was is due to the influence of the Royle Family. Almost overnight the use of a laughter track seemed prehistoric, and so did the stagey acting and silly situations of more traditional sitcoms – see My Family or similar nonsense for proof. So why do I say that the Royle Family doesn’t get the credit it deserves? After all, it’s hardly an obscure and forgotten footnote in the annals of comedy. Well, it’s because The Office, for one reason or another, almost always gets the credit for all of the above. Remember that The Office won two Golden Globes, and propelled Ricky Gervais to (bafflingly longlasting) global fame. It’s probably true that The Office was better, and was somehow purer in its approach, but there’s no denying that the Royle Family took more risks, and did it first. Gervais and Stephen Merchant have spoken at length about their American influences, but I never heard either of them mention The Royle Family.
Why do I say The Office was ‘purer’ in its approach? Well, the Royle Family didn’t entirely break away from old-fashioned comedy tropes – the ‘my arse’ catchphrase, and fact that Jim Royle is a genuinely funny person means it would always be easier to get laughs than with The Office, where none of the characters were funny and no one had a catchphrase.
But The Royle Family kicked off a revolution in British comedy that still lasts now – take Derry Girls for example. In many ways it’s a very traditional sitcom, complete with weird over-acting from most of the cast. But imagine how weird it would seem with a laughter track. Go back further to a massive hit, Gavin and Stacey, in 2007. Again, in format this was very traditional, with the character of Nessa always available for an easy laugh. But the lack of laughter track was even by then so ingrained that it would have seemed completely out of place. I’m Alan Partridge almost got there first, in 1997, but they had the laughter track and the catchphrases still in use. Watch it now and you’ll be struck at how old fashioned the whole thing feels (although the writing is still as sharp as ever). It’s interesting to note that their second series, in 2002, came under heavy criticism for, among other things, its use of a laughter track. The Inbetweeners is also traditional in many ways (see the dimness of Neil), but again didn’t have a laughter track. It’s interesting to read interviews with Simon Bird (Will), in which he talks about the influence of guess-which-programme.
Peep Show in interesting here as well. It started in 2003, after both The Office and The Royle Family, obviously, but often seemed like it didn’t quite know what it wanted to be. At its best it was as good as any comedy I’ve seen, but it suffered from an identity crisis. It had no laughter track or catchphrases, of course, and the main characters were played entirely naturalistically, but the writers couldn’t stay away from silly situations and over the top grotesque characters (see Super Hans, admittedly brilliantly played by Matt King).
One comedy that does get forgotten is the excellent Marion and Geoff, which also predated The Office (but needless to say, came after The Royle Family). Roy Brydon, in a role he unfortunately has never bettered, played a taxi driver who gives a series of monologues in which his cheery disposition can’t quite disguise the disasters that have befallen him. There is no laughter track or any catchphrases, and, cliché though it is, you often don’t know whether to laugh or cry.
The League of Gentlemen is another great example here. The nature of it is completely at odds with the new style of comedy I’ve talked about here, so it’s fascinating to see that between its second series (2000) and third series (2002) it got rid of the laughter track and catchphrases, and to some extent dialled down the grotesqueness of its characters. This was signalled by the killing of Edward and Tubbs (possibly the most famous characters) in the first episode. It was a strange move for the programme to make, and had the (presumably) unintended effect of making that one series feel like a different programme altogether. Such are the vagaries of influence, but it shows how strong the change was that it convinced the makers of a very high-profile programme to make such a fundamental alteration.
It’s a shame that The Royle Family ruined its own legacy in a series of awful ‘specials’, which ironically enough was always the mark of traditional sitcoms. The Office had the good sense to end before it had outstayed its welcome, the incomprehensible David Brent film notwithstanding. So why the lack of recognition in cool comedy circles for The Royle Family? It’s not as though it was any less glamorous or fashionable than The Office – in fact, you’d be hard pressed to say which one was less glamorous. Perhaps it’s down to the fact that Caroline Aherne and Craig Cash simply had no interest in fame, whereas Ricky Gervais immediately revealed himself as a fame whore extraordinaire. Can you imagine Caroline Aherne having ever wanted to present the Golden Globes? Well, exactly. It also never takes much to convince me of an anti-Northern bias in culture in general, so I’ll claim that too. But it’s impossible to watch comedy from before and after The Royle Family, and not conclude that its influence is still so prevalent as to have changed the entire genre.
Wilson Picked It 