The Golden Age Of Alternative Comedy

A love letter to comedy from the mid-1990s to the late 2000s.

December 2020

In an interview with The Telegraph in 2013, John Cleese put forward the notion that good comedy was dying out while simultaneously lamenting that the “golden age of British comedy” was over, an era he pinpointed as beginning in the 1950s and ending somewhere in the mid-1980s - a period lasting around 35 years.

Of course, as a revered comedian and “national treasure” - God I hate that expression - John Cleese is a man worth listening to when it comes to comedy. His time frame ticks all the right boxes too, covering much-lauded shows like Fawlty Towers, Only Fools and Horses, Monty Python’s Flying Circus, Porridge, Dad’s Army, Citizen Smith…the list goes on.

In fact, Del Boy falling through the bar in Only Fools and Horses was once voted the funniest British comedy moment of all time in a UK poll. Yes, OF ALL TIME! - a statistic alternative comedian Stewart Lee lampoons in his excellent Comedy Roadshow.

Unfortunately, much of this “golden age” comedy now falls flat in the digital age. It has become dated, sometimes problematic and often painfully unfunny as attitudes and cultural trends have changed over the decades.

To be fair to John Cleese, when he did this interview, British comedy consisted mostly of shows like Miranda, Bad Education, Phone Shop or Benidorm with only a few real gems (the IT Crowd, Toast of London, Newswipe) providing much-needed respite.

Cleese was pretty much correct then; really good British comedy was struggling and let’s be honest, it still is. But what about the period in between? The period after this so-called “golden age”, beyond the 1980s but before the downfall of the 2010s? A period where mainstream comedy was losing its appeal but underground comedy was flourishing? This, my friends, was The Golden Age of Alternative Comedy.

From the mid-1990s to the late 2000s, an embarrassment of richly inventive comedy shows were unleashed on unsuspecting UK audiences - given their chance by TV execs willing to take big risks to find that next hit. These shows were created by teams of wildly talented writers, directors and comedians and typically featured an unusual premise or location, insane characters and even more insane performances.

Channel 4, the edgy alternative to the comparatively straight edge BBC, helped enable some real gems. In April 1995, the first episode of Father Ted aired. Written by Arthur Matthews and Graham Linehan, its off-beat brand of surreal Catholic Priest based comedy was a huge hit with critics and viewers alike. Short-lived, at only three seasons, it has since achieved legendary status, and Graham Linehan would go on to write another top-rated show, the IT Crowd, airing in late 2006 on, you guessed it, Channel 4. The stars of the show, however, weren’t quite so fortunate: Dermot Morgan passed away soon after it ended (the day after shooting for Season 3 wrapped no less) and Ardal O’Hanlon starred as “Thermoman” in “My Hero”. You can decide whose fate was worse.

Throughout the 1990s, Channel 4 continued to deliver cutting edge comedy. Chris Morris’ barbed satire Brass Eye brought with it an anarchistic punk energy and Spaced (this writer’s favourite sitcom of all time) introduced the world to the inimitable directorial style of Edgar Wright, the sharp-witted pop-culture laced writing of Simon Pegg and Jessica Hynes (nee Stevenson) and the effortless comic performances of Nick Frost and Mark Heap. Explosive sketch show Smack The Pony brought women to the forefront with a bang, ridiculing gender inequalities and satirising relationship tropes in a satisfying, well-judged and surreal fashion, and mock chat show Da Ali G Show took aim at mainstream perceptions of youth culture, made fun of an out of touch establishment and introduced the world to Borat, for better or for worse.

During this period the BBC wasn’t just resting on its laurels. Bizarrely, Sunday lunchtimes on BBC Two were handed over to the young comedy duo of Stewart Lee and Richard Herring and their close-to-the-bone satire of breakfast television This Morning With Richard, Not Judy resulted in a slew of complaints from a mainstream public who didn’t quite get it.

At the same time, the Beeb were busy producing quality sitcoms like Red Dwarf, Rob Grant and Doug Naylor’s masterpiece of goofy science fiction and cult sketch comedy series Big Train - a show from the writers of Father Ted that not only starred Simon Pegg and Mark Heap (The Green Wing) but also featured future stars Julia Davis (Nighty Night), Catherine Tate (The Catherine Tate Show), Rebecca Front (The Thick of It) and Kevin Eldon (arguably the hardest working actor in British comedy). There were even crossover hits like the League of Gentlemen which somehow managed to achieve mainstream success whilst still being deliciously bizarre and oddball. 

This successful procession of brilliant alternative comedies didn’t stop there and as the turn of the millennium came and went, the number of available channels skyrocketed. To compete for attention, the Beeb launched BBC Three, a hip and trendy channel aimed squarely at younger generations. While BBC Three was responsible for some questionable television, it still introduced the world to several groundbreaking shows where surrealism and darkness were the order of the day.

The macabre genius of Noel Fielding and Julian Barratt brought forth the jazz goth, art-punk, surrealist insanity of The Mighty Boosh, unveiling radical new talents Richard Ayoade (The IT Crowd), Rich Fulcher and Matt Berry (Toast of London) along the way.

 Fulcher and Berry would go on to create Snuff Box, a part sitcom, part sketch show following two friends working as hangmen, rapping with babies and ordering copious amounts of “WHISKAAAAAY!!!”.

But there was nothing quite as dark as Monkey Dust, a comedy sketch animation so jet black in tone and content it boggles the mind that it was ever aired and to this day contains one of the darkest sketches in any comedy series ever. You’ll need to do that one out for yourself.

Big Train alumni Julia Davis also wrote the suburban black comedy Nighty Night, following a beautician who murders her husband and covers it up. It also starred former co-stars Kevin Eldon (it’s easier to list what he’s NOT in), Rebecca Front (memorable for her bumbling performance as Nicola Murray in Armando Iannucci’s peerless political satire The Thick Of It) and professional weirdo Mark Gatiss (The League of Gentlemen).

Part of the magic of the time was that the writers and performers weren’t tied to any particular channel and this melting pot of talent (or comedy inbreeding if you will) allowed for shows like Garth Merenghi’s Darkplace, the brainchild of comedian Matthew Holness, to be made. Richard Ayoade and Matt Berry had central roles alongside Alice Lowe (who also played parts in The Mighty Boosh and Snuff Box) with cameos from Noel Fielding, Julian Barratt, Graham Linehan and even Stephen Merchant (co-writer of The Office). Holness played the titular Merenghi, a fictional horror novelist who wrote and starred in his own television show, set in a spooky hospital where supernatural happenings were an occupational hazard. Part making-of documentary and part horror satire, it’s a great show with a fantastic soundtrack.

Charlie Brooker and Chris Morris created Nathan Barley (again starring Julian Barratt and Richard Ayoade), a show with a social commentary far beyond its time and perhaps even more relevant today, displaying a foresight that Brooker has demonstrated consistently on his Black Mirror series. The internet prankster character of Barley (Nicholas Burns), perfectly embodies the shows “rise of the idiots” theme and perhaps foreshadowed today’s YouTube celebrity culture.

Brooker would later turn his hand to horror satire with Dead Set, dealing with a zombie outbreak in the Big Brother house, and Morris would write Four Lions, a farcical look at a home-grown terrorist cell and one of the funniest comedy films of the past decade.

There are far too many shows to cover here but other notable mentions include Black Books starring Dylan Moran as a grotesque and mean-spirited, alcoholic book shop owner (co-starring Bill Bailey and Tamsin Greig and again involving Graham Linehan and Arthur Matthews), Look Around You, a faux 1970s educational science program (featuring endless cameos from many of the performers already mentioned), Peep Show, which introduced David Mitchell, Robert Webb and Olivia Coleman to the mainstream (becoming the longest-running series in Channel 4 history in the process) and The Inbetweeners, which resonated with misfits and outcasts everywhere.

Many of these shows only ran for two or three seasons, perhaps stopping them from becoming stale and it’s telling that many of those involved have now become household names, Noel Fielding is on the Bake Off for goodness sake, and some, in the case of Simon Pegg and Olivia Coleman, have even become genuine A-listers. Some of the best in more recent British comedy has come from these same people too. Flowers, an extremely bleak comedy, stars Julian Barratt and Olivia Coleman, Toast of London sees Matt Berry at his ridiculous best and Charlie Brooker’s A Touch Of Cloth is a lovingly crafted parody of the police procedural.

Unfortunately, with the current popularity of reality TV and spectacle shows (Britain’s Got Talent, Strictly Come Dancing etc) showing no sign of waning, there’s far less space for new comedy on British television these days. As a result, there may be a reluctance to invest in risky or unique shows with new and exciting talent and that’s a damn shame. It’s not all doom and gloom though. There are still people out there fighting to get new shows made, pushing the boundaries and putting their faith in new and existing talent. Channel 4 produced Fresh Meat and Friday Night Dinner this decade and recently put out the fantastic Derry Girls only last year. The BBC has continued to support the ever-popular Still Game for nine glorious seasons (sadly ending for good in 2019) and at the same time have introduced stars like Brian Limond (Limmy’s Show) and Greg McHugh (Gary Tank Commander). Even Sky have been pushing homegrown comedy with shows like You, Me and the Apocalypse.

Whilst not nearly as prolific as it once was, British comedy is not dead. If you know where to look, you can still find great new shows being made today and it seems that’s not going to end anytime soon. But, in an era where these shows are fewer and farther between, you can always return to the Golden Age of Alternative Comedy. You won’t be disappointed.

Peace.