Years behind the rest of the world it seems, my wife and I have discovered The Kumars at No. 42. I only get about three-quarters of the cultural references, but it is still brilliant comedy. When I compare it to Jay Leno holding up barely-entendre newspaper headlines, I weep for the state of US talk shows.
In similar BBC America news, we are now fans of So Graham Norton, too.
You american rarely get out of your own country for entertainment do you?
And when you do, it’s what? Canadian?
I cant say I’m a big fan of it, but as jokey chat shows go it is one of the better ones around. Something about it just doesn’t sit right for me but I do love the grandma.
Worse than that, there’s this compulsion to rework the shows into a US version. They’ve ruined many a good show that way. Fox even had a version of The Kumars called The Ortegas. It featured a Latino family living in Van Nuys. It was so awful that a previous network dropped it as soon as they saw the pilot, Fox picked it up, and then decided not to air it.
If you took away the Canadians, US comedy would be in very bad shape.
Americans are so arrogant and self-centeredly myopic they can’t stand to watch anything original from outside the country.
American: “That’s some British thing, right?”
{American watches a bit}
American: “Not terrible, but I really wish it was more American.”
Why wasn’t I told about the Kumars before?
Because it’s not funny?