Funny Woman

I largely enjoyed Funny Woman but I do understand the negative reviews. The problem, IMO, is the show is about a woman in comedy in the 1960s and not actually a comedy.

Gemma Arterton plays Barbara Parker, an attractive woman who learned to love comedy from her father. The show is about Barbara rebelling against the stereotypes associated with being an attractive woman and wanting to make her own way.

When it sticks to that premise, it's fantastic. We see Barbara fighting to be comedic when everyone else just wants to see her assets. Her relationship with her father is an absolute treat.

Another great part of the show is the relationship with her friends. Women sticking together instead of stabbing each other in the back.

It's great as the show runner, writers, and other lead slowly understand she's funny, that audiences laugh at her. Is she actually funny to modern viewers? Not really but considering Lucille Ball is the standard she measures herself against, you get what she's trying to do.

Where it fails is when it tries to be comedy, particularly the slapstick scenes they throw in every episode that are just totally out of place. It's not a comedy! Even the writers seem confused by this, let alone the viewers.

This would be one of my favorites if they stuck to the premise instead of trying to make it comedic. It's a drama and a darned good one.

Loved this mini-series. These days, they usually go on for too long, but there's not an ounce of fat on this one and it breezes by in six episodes.

Gemma Arterton shines as the funny woman, and Rupert Everett is quite hilarious, seemingly channeling Alastair Sim a bit. The rest of the cast is excellent, and the script is very fine. I haven't read the book, so I cannot compare the two, but I found this totally enjoyable and highly entertaining. The recreation of the 1960's was very good, including some imaginative use of vintage films of London with Arterton skillfully inserted into them. Highly recommended.

They've created the perfect, feel-good comedy drama with this. Everything about this just works. I can't think of anything at all which could make it any better. It's beautifully written, beautifully photographed and its optimism just makes you feel happy. You can't help but smile when you watch this.

In some ways it has a similar feel to the American show, MRS MAISEL but because the characters are more normal it's a little more relatable. It's instantly engaging and you yourself are fully on board with Sophie's journey. Gemma Arterton was born to play this role.... and Rupert Everett is hilarious.

I am old enough to remember all of the sixties, though I was more or less still a child when the decade ended. The period detail, in terms of scenery etc seems authentic. The characters are more or less right, except, whilst feminism became a thing during the sixties, it wasn't, I think, quite such a big deal as it is for the cast here. The show writers here are obviously meant to be Galton and Simpson (albeit that those writers are referenced by the characters) and I guess that Dennis is Dennis Main-Wilson. The two main characters of the show within the show being an unmarried couple though is a bit anachronistic. Yes, in the cinema the reality of life was being portrayed, in stuff like A Taste Of Honey, Poor Cow, Up the Junction etc and I think it may have been touched upon in TV drama, but not in the sitcoms everyone sat down to at 7.30pm. Anyway, it's not quite real but it's amusing enough.

Based on the book by Nick Hornby Funny Woman start's with a Blackpool beauty queen, who has her future mapped out for her. Bored in her Blackpool rock making factory, destined to marry the local butcher. She gives it all up to head south to London in search of fame and fortune.

As always this does not go to plan wannabe comedian actress Barbara Parker aka Sophie Straw. Works her way through various mundane job's in between auditions before getting her break in a TV situation comedy written and staring by oxbridge performers who fail to grasp her northern humour.

Set in the swinging sixties Funny Woman is a delightful nostalgic trip through the period of early television and how women were faced prejudices to be seen as funny in what was a man's world. 8/10.