Drop the Dead Donkey

During my 2 year stay in the UK, I grew addicted to this show. To a newcomer, the satirical bite to this show gave me the "real" feel of how the dry news of the day was perceived by the public. The writing was great and was brought to life by a brilliant cast! I was elated when I found this show was to be shown on Comedy Central in the US, but it took one viewing to realize that without the daily access to the british news, this show was lost here. Too bad! It was extremely funny! BTW, can someone please tell me what happened to that poor chap, Jerry the camera man?

As an Irish observer, this comedy has to be one of the high points of 1990's comedy.

While the main talking point of the series initially was it's topicality (being written and filmed in the week before filming so as to include observations and jokes about breaking news stories), later series were far less dependent on the topicality angle and more on funny honest and sharp character development.

It was immeasurably superior both to other office based comedy (viz the overrated IMHO "office") and to the likes of other newsroom comedies viz Murphy Brown. DTDD's humour was sharp acidic and right on the money. No-one was spared it's barbs.

On reruns and DVD releases a brief voice-over identifies the week each particular episode was shown and what the major stories breaking that week were.

More interestingly a lot of what was clearly the target of DTDD's humour (the dumbing down and tabloidisation of news reporting promoted by TV newstations) are even more in evidence today 10-15 years later as witnessed by the likes of FOX News and Sky News I wonder who Sir Royten Merchant was really based on....

It is only dated because each episode tried very hard to include topical and amusing news items. All of the main characters are distinctive. George, the editor, is conscientious but seems totally out of place in the newsroom environment as he is a bit of a fragile eccentric. His boss Gus, a bit of a sad bachelor, is the king of Politically correct sound bites. Dave, who's job is a bit obscure, is the office 'stud' as well as being a chronic gambler. Henry, the aged newsreader, has clearly seen better days but is still convinced he is up to competing with Dave. The other newsreader, Sally, has a sex life which is mainly in Lorry parks and service stations. Joy,the officer gofer, is not a girl to be messed with and takes no prisoners. Damian, the young fearless reporter is totally obsessed with fame and has no regards for the feelings of others, particularly his on location staff. Helen, a lesbian, replaced Alex early on as Gerorges No 2. There is a bit of slapstick but the humour, which comes thick and fast, is mainly verbal.

Never having traveled abroad, I have no idea what the references to British media were about. Nonetheless, the episodes that ran on Comedy Central were still terrific! Perhaps it was a matter of which episodes out of the six year run were aired over here, but what I saw was an excellent ensemble cast with pithy writing that any "homegrown" sitcom would rightfully give an arm and leg to have.

I wish episodes were available in NTSC DVD form, 'cuz I'd like to see more...! :)

Being an ex-pat, the growing interest in downloading and viewing whole TV series has given me many hours of entertainment. I used to watch Drop the Dead Donkey live in the 1990s and liked it then, but re-watching it now, in 2015, I'm finding it pretty hilarious and it's now my daily accompaniment to breakfast, and the occasional episode when I simply want a laugh. The fact that the news items referred to are ancient now, doesn't matter one bit - the way that they are handled in DTDD are so funny because I think that news channels now are pathetic in their handling of the news, and they all appear to be run on the lines of Global News. Really!

The series is rich with really excellent journalist stereotypes, much mentioned in the other reviews here, so not needed to be repeated by me. I don't know where I will turn to when I finish all the series I have.