Knowing Me, Knowing You with Alan Partridge

Steve Coogan's Alan Partridge character just wouldn't lie down. After filling the sport slot in Christopher Morris's brilliant TV news show spoof "The Day Today", Coogan and his co-writers devised this devilishly funny and close-to-the-bone mickey-take of the ever-popular celebrity chat programme, with all the accoutrements of real-life prototypes by the likes of real-life stereotypical hosts (we know who they are) complete with guest house-band, fake starry guests and all their other familiar trappings (mix and match guests, the shared couch, the shallow content).

Coogan in particular rips into the title character with relish, a gormless, ignorant, sexist, bigoted, power-crazy narcissist who says what he thinks before he even thinks it. To play his guests, stock supporting actors like Rebecca Front, David Schneider and Patrick Marber change clothes and personalities from show to show, but somehow always end up as the unwilling victims of Partridge's prejudices.

All of the shows in the series are big on laughs, my favourite characters being the dead-on-his-feet ventriloquist act Cheeky Monkey, the cringe-worthy "Knowing Another Alan Partridge" section involving a recently deceased namesake and of course his quite literally go-out-with-a-bang climax.

Once you settle down to watch it, so convincingly played are the characters that you actually do end up thinking it could somehow be for real on an obscure satellite channel, although after the final bombshell which ends each episode, you snap out if it but realise how close to the truth it actually was.

For Coogan the character has never gone away, spawning the brilliant "I'm Alan Partridge" sequel and most recently a movie incarnation "Alan Partridge Alpha Papa", which I've not yet seen but it will be hard-pressed to beat the plentiful laughs on show here.

Satire, satire, satire...A very funny send up of the dreaded ubiquitous chat show. Actor Steve Coogan plays show business blight, Alan Partridge, a thoroughly unlikeable character who hosts an odd assortment of meaningless guests on his ridiculous chat show that is ridiculously titled, Knowing Me, Knowing You. The title of course is taken from the ABBA song of the same name, and Partridge himself mysteriously uses the A-Ha refrain from the song as his personal catch phrase. Completely idiotic but completely funny and eerily cogent. Alan Partridge the man likewise is as completely idiotic as he is pompous, condescending, moronic, cruel, vindictive and completely out of touch with reality. He also just happens to be 24 karat comic gold. In Alan Partridge, Coogan has created the perfect embodiment of an entertainment show-biz phony, cardboard jackass. An all too familiar character that sadly we as viewers now accept as normal. His pathetic C minus guest list parades one low-level pseudo-personality whacko after another. Said guests are all so excellently portrayed, that not being English, I initially was unable to tell if the people were actual Britsh celebs or not. Though Coogan is definitely top banana, the show in actuality is more troupe sketch format a la Monty Python then a solo tour de force. We see the same 4 or 5 actors switch disguises to portray each and every guest, with only a few exceptions sprinkled in now and again. They all deserve equal credit for the show's success. Knowing Me, Knowing You is the Sammy Maudlin bit from SCTV taken on as an entire show. Personally, I never got enough of Sammy Maudlin.

In terms of this type of fare, there is no American counterpart. Forget that satire itself has very little in the way of broadcast outlets, American entertainment simply does not or will not go after its own a la the Brits. That might well be because producers think American wont laugh at show business parody, but somehow cynicism makes me seriously doubt that. Even the terrific Larry Sanders show, ostensibly a similar type satire of the chat show genre, though hilarious, never once made Larry Sanders himself look professionally incompetent. To be fair, Knowing Me, Knowing You, is a fictional chat show of the type we don't really have in America, as its a hybrid of a Letterman format with a Regis daytime format. They may not have them in England either. Evening chat shows are likely in America to be very stiff, formal and almost nerve wracking as the hosts do their very best to keep celebrities ill at ease, in further glorification of the said host. I wont argue with success. So though the satire might be hard to relate to, the comedy makes that fact immaterial. I will say that if you have an aversion to British comedy in general, you will not change your opinion after watching this show. Yet the converse is definitely true. British comedy fans, this is what you live for!

I have rarely laughed so much. Maybe Derek and Clive and some M.Python but Alan Partridge is consistently hilarious. I find him even more loathsome than George of Seinfeld and that takes some doing. What a loser! But brilliantly written, and the timing is impeccable.Vintage British comedy which is making me snicker as I write this. Some scenes such as his cross country run to get away from his stalker, and his baying in the car park for his so called friend that he has caught sight of, oh the mans incorrigible! Every now and then in ones life you hear a song that you wish you could have written, you see a painting that you wish you could have painted and similarly........... comedy. Brilliant,brilliant, brilliant.

KMKY gets off to a great start in the opening edition when Alan`s guests include a showjumper , an egotistical DJ and the world famous Roger Moore . No seriously Roger Moore is a guest on the first show . The later episodes drag slightly especially the French edition but KMKY picks up in the final two shows which feature Terry Norton a boxing promoter who has just beat a murder rap ( Alan kindly reconstructs the murder in question ) " Partridge Over Britain " which is a political debate , some revelations about Glen Ponder the band leader , and Joe Beasley and cheeky monkey - Abbadabadoo.

This is a really funny show which is very well remembered even though only six regular episodes and a Xmas special were made . This says an awful lot about the quality of the writing and performances . Perhaps the best compliment paid to the show is the fact that some viewers actually phoned up the BBC to complain about the content and the way Partridge treated his guests !!!!! I kid you not , some people didn`t realise this is a spoof chat show with Steve Coogan playing a comedy character called Alan Partridge !

And on that bombshell - AHA

I can't recommend this series highly enough. Chat-show host 'Alan Partridge' is like nothing you've ever encountered before, and yet 'believable' - if you've not seen this, you're in for a fantastic ride!

Watch out for guests: Joe Beasley and Cheeky Monkey - as AP says "hold onto you're sides, they might just split".