BBC Three and the Future of Comedy Online
As on-demand services like Netflix and Amazon Prime change the TV landscape, where next for broadcast comedy? Our Northwest Comedy editor and Stuart Laws of Turtle Canyon Comedy consider whether BBC Three moving online heralds a bright new future for British comedy
Flicking around the TV channels of late, you might be forgiven for thinking you’d stumbled across UK Gold more than once, such is the present trend for resurrecting old shows.
Open All Hours has seen a reboot on the Beeb, while sitcom Birds of a Feather is back on primetime on ITV.
Though remakes, reboots and re-ups are common among cinema fare, it’s a strange phenomenon for comedy to be going back to the well. The beauty of most sitcoms is that they are timely, the writing reflecting the era in which they are presented, and so to bring back shows that finished in 1985 and 1998 respectively is extremely odd.
Recently it has been announced that there are remakes afoot for Porridge, The Good Life and Are You Being Served?. That you may not even recall any of these shows from their first go around is testament to the fact that TV isn’t making shows for you any more.
There is no longer any need to decry the state of comedy on TV because it seems to have given up.
Assuming young people don’t watch TV, the Beeb has recently moved its ‘yoof oriented’ wing BBC Three onto the world wide web. It was always the intention to move BBC Three online when the cancellation of the channel was first announced back in early 2014 but, at the time, original online content was not as prevalent and people felt this was simply a winding-down of the good work the alternative channel had done – and of course, there were the thousands bemoaning the lack of Family Guy repeats just as they're getting the munchies.
Though many might see this as the death knell for the television channel, it may turn out to be the saving grace for an ageing format. If ol’ Auntie Beeb gets this right, then they may have the jump on their competitors.
"TV will fall"
As the coveted 16-30 age range increasingly watches its TV via the internet, be it through Netflix, Amazon Prime or more nefarious means, television will surely be left behind.
Stuart Laws runs Turtle Canyon Comedy, an independent production company that makes whatever kind of comedy it likes with some of the most exciting talent the stand-up scene currently has, including David Trent, James Acaster and Evelyn Mok. Like many others currently churning out content for hungry internet dwellers, Laws believes the advancement of technology and viewing trends will marginalise television.
"It’s difficult to imagine a world where the status quo of now doesn’t exist – surely the news, event TV like X Factor and daily shows like Loose Women and The Wright Stuff will always be in demand? Not necessarily," he says. "As the generation who have only known on-demand get older it will shift viewing habits away from prescribed schedule broadcasting. There will be a big effort to get everyone watching at the same time so that hashtags and second screens and advertisers can be pleased but it’s going to be tough. TV will fall. Long live TV."
BBC Three leading the way?
The Netflix revolution, which has seen shows such as Orange is the New Black, Master of None, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt and BoJack Horseman prosper, is a thing of beauty, an unrestrained outpouring of excellent must-see television that was never meant for that medium. Unfortunately there is no British production wing of these online streaming sites as of yet, and so British TV keeps on making British TV, which is why you will continue to see rehashes of old shows for demographics that have a penchant for nostalgia and fear the change the internet is inevitably bringing.
Laws believes BBC Three moving online should see a casting-off of the creative shackles inherent in television production.
"It should be the emergence from the cave, right? A loosening of the leash that TV demographics create. So hopefully they'll be free to start taking bigger risks and give comedians the opportunities they deserve to produce original films and series. Comedians are the ones who know what is funny."
Unfortunately, there are still a few drawbacks to the freedom that this new Internet haven presents. "It’s pretty shortsighted; TV is still in charge of what we watch and BBC Three has produced so much amazing stuff that it will now not have an audience for," Laws says. "I love comedy and I haven’t even been on the BBC Three website, if they even have one. I should do that, I’m going to do that today."
Sponsored comedy
The other option, of course, is ‘sponsored content’, a prime example of which was the Foster's comedy shorts series from 2011, which saw Reeves and Mortimer and Alan Partridge back on the small screen. Though still a nostalgia trip of sorts, this saw the Foster’s logo in the bottom corner of the screen, as well as idents at the top and tail of the sketch but no real creative input from the lager brand, something Laws believes is key, as "comedians are the ones to have the final say on whether a line, or a scene, or a prop, or a costume is funny.
"Or failing that, if the sponsor wants loads of control over content then they'd better be cool and make me and the brand look cool."
This didn’t quite lead to a massive overhaul of the comedy landscape in which brands would produce new sitcoms (all it did was get Reeves and Mortimer and Partridge back on the telly), but such branded content gives advertisers exposure without people clicking past the pre-rolls, and gives the audience something good to watch. The seed is sown, but the tree is yet to grow.
Experiments in online content
BBC Three does have priors in presenting online content, with short sketches mainly its go-to, but last year saw a watershed moment when it presented several pilots, inviting the viewer to decide which might go on to a full series. A full series on terrestrial television, that is; but, you know, baby steps and all that.
The pool of talent was made up of the likes of rising stars Liam Williams, Fern Brady, Phil Ellis and Dane Baptiste, whose Sunny D show was the lucky winner. Though it was Baptiste who won the prize, many of the others were reviewed extremely favourably, which for a comedy pilot is especially impressive. Brady’s Radges and the sketch collective People Time were particular standouts, and one would hope that with this new-found online freedom (to an extent), more new programming might appear.
The people behind People Time, however, have decided not to wait and created their own show available for free on Vimeo. Titled 2016, the series sees Al Roberts, Ellie White, Jamie Demetriou, Daran Johnson, Liam Williams and Natasia Demetriou continue their misadventures throughout the year, with each episode named after a calendar month. Though it has lost the sketch element of People Time, it maintains the anarchic and strange spirit that made it much-loved by audiences (but left on the shelf by the BBC).
2016 Episode 1: January from 2016 on Vimeo.
In order to keep pushing boundaries in comedy the BBC must embrace the way television is being viewed now (i.e. not on a television) and keep hold of young, talented comics who are making exciting things. The beauty of online content is that it stays around for people to find at a later date; viewing figures will rise as people discover things over time. If you build it, they will come.
Let’s just hope they see it through, lest they get left behind.