Kath & Kim

Not sure why Americans needed to remake an Aussie classic. It's an Aussie series with very Aussie humour. The nuance of the jokes don't translate into American humour. This show tries to replicate what it simply cannot. It should not have been made.

I am a huge fan of the Aussie version of 'Kath & Kim', so I was a bit worried about how an American copy would turn out. And, true to form,they missed a lot of what made the original , well, original. A little too studied, not as fresh. I imagine that the 'thought police' were out in full force- where is the smoking, for a start? But I gave it a chance and it is not as bad as I expected. Molly Shannon is pretty good as Kath, but Selma Blair is not quite right for Kim. She has the languid behavior down, but not the utter selfishness, nor the weight issues. Teeny Selma missed the point. I got the feeling I was seeing 'acting', rather than real people behaving normally. Perhaps a bit of the old Hollywood-style elitism? That those who live in the suburbs are to be ridiculed rather than appreciated for their own style? We are meant to laugh at them and not with them. Part of the charm of the original, for Americans, are all the Aussie idioms, and I would have liked to see a bit more of that type of dialogue in the American version- we have our own quirks, too! Also, in the original, part of the fun was that the two were almost the same age. Selma Blair was too much the juvenile, age-wise. It took a while but I did warm up to this version on its own merit. The basic idea is still there. When you have to expand the season into so many more shows the writing seems to suffer. A shorter season usually means better shows. But,I would love to have a beer with the Aussie characters, odd though they are- just to see what they would come up with next-the Americans didn't come across as interesting or as compelling. A little too politically correct? Here's a radical idea- how about bringing American audiences the Aussie show?

The original Australian Kath & Kim is brilliant. Why do American producers need to remake & ruin yet another classic show? Remember the original version of "The Office" with Ricky Gervais, It was an absolute masterpiece, and there was no need to remake it. The producers said that the British humour from "The Office" and the Australian humour from "Kath & Kim" would not translate to an American audience......... WHAT??? So basically they are saying that Americans are too dumb and stupid to understand the jokes, so they need to remake the shows with over-the-top childish gags, so that the Americans can understand the humour. The original Australian version of Kath & Kim is fantastic and very funny. Avoid the American version like the plague!!

I watched the first episode and I found it to be a very wooden performance.

I have watched the original from it's early days on Big Girls Blouse to the last series on Channel seven. Kath and Kim was a great Mocumentary and it's humor is something that most people get.

However in this American version I found it to be dull, Molly Shannon is to fashionable to be Kath Day, Kath's wardrobe is supposed to be stuck in the 80s with her frizzy perm. While Selma Blair's figure hugging clothes isn't as good as what the original Kimmy wore. I also found that Selma seemed to be puffing her belly out a lot, she is obviously a (Australian) size 12 where Kim should be (Australian) a size 16/18.

The exchanges from Molly and Selma is obviously so scripted and there is pauses where there shouldn't be pauses or the pauses are a bit long, as someone suggested there could be a laughter track in there during those pauses. It's like Molly and Shannon are not used to each other, there is no Mother/Daughter chemistry.

Phil was okay he had the eccentric air around him like Kel. However Craig was to handsome and not the sweet plain humble Brett from the Aussie version.

I found watching this was like watching a very bad stage play. The acting was pretty much wooden and the exaggeration of Selma's expressions wore the funny off after ten minutes. Especially her sulking scenes.

To sum up, I find this show to be a waste of time, the script obviously has been dumbed down for Americans which most on the board say they prefer the original. If NBC wanted to show Kath and Kim why not pay the producers the money to screen the original.

All I can add is Magda you are one smart cookie for not letting the producers use your character of Sharon.

...but I came away pretty cool on this.

I have not seen any of the Australian sitcom that this show is based off of so I have no real way of comparing. I've checked the message boards and the comments and read enough remarks doing such and it seems in the majority that the original series is held in better esteem than this production.

What I can do is rate THIS show,and I must say that it seems to hold a fair swath of talent but seems to be uninterested in making itself particularly clever or very likable. Instead,it's just Molly Shannon(for whom I was very stoked to see back on television)and Selma Blair(maybe not quite as much)basically trading one-liners between two very vapid and dense characters and laboring VERY hard to be funny(all while modeling sexy,slinky Florida-inspired casual-wear). John Michael Higgins(as KAth,Shannon's character's earnest,sandwich store manager boyfriend)seems to shine the best,as his lines seem authentic and there's something likable,albeit in a nebbishy way. Mikey Day feels one-dimensional as Kim(Blair's character)'s ex-husband,though he can play stupid quite effectively. Maybe TOO much so.

NBC publicized the heck out of this,rolling the dice and as such,it seems to have crapped out at least for now. Maybe some writing re-tooling and character changes might infuse some inspiration here. Not really sure,and from what I've seen so far,not real certain I want to find out.