Time To Leave The Office
The Age
Monday November 21, 2005
THE OFFICE SPECIALS (ABC, 9.30pm)
IT'S as embarrassing, discomforting and as humiliating as ever - more masochistic than Fawlty Towers, nastier than Garry Shandling's outrageously manipulative satire, The Larry Sanders Show. It's as excruciating and desperate as it is funny.No wonder, then, that the ABC seems to have had trouble understanding what to do with the final writhing agonies of David Brent and The Office. Ricky Gervais, its co-creator and star, is starting to attract attention again with his new series, Extras, another cringe-making comedy. Extras, in which Gervais plays a struggling wannabe actor, goes to air on the ABC next year, so wrapping up The Office for those still waiting patiently is probably wise.Gervais' David Brent, the most finely flawed, boorish character from a British comedy to win us over since Captain Mainwaring in Dad's Army, was, of course, retrenched from Wernham Hogg, the most famous paper merchants in Slough, some three years ago.Fired, really. A scapegoat, he says, for that BBC documentary about working conditions. Head-butting a female interviewee made him look like "the biggest plonker of the year".There's been some downsizing and a merger, though, as the BBC returns for its follow-up, tell-all program on the company and how it's coped. There are some familiar faces around. The sycophantic Gareth (Mackenzie Crook), promoted to regional manager, has taken over, preaching a regime of discipline rather than Brent affability. Still heartbroken and frustrated is Tim Canterbury (Martin Freeman), stuck with his dreams of receptionist Dawn Tinsley (Lucy Davis), now a young mother in Tampa, Florida.And there are the new office wits and bosses, crude but unable, it appears, to get the message through to Brent that he needs to warn them when he plans to drop in.And the new David Brent? Well, Gareth lets us know he spent his redundancy package on producing a flop video CD single. Although not anxious to push the matter, it seems the man who saw himself as a desk-jockey superstar is back on the road again, selling office-cleaning products door to door. Following his not-quite-a-hit CD, he does have an agent and, introduced by the village DJs, is making minor celebrity appearances in the local pub versions of Blind Date.The Gervais-Stephen Merchant comedy is razor-cruel, finely balanced. There's tension and there are gags that beg for further resolution.And, as always, just as you start to feel a little sympathy for the podgy Brent, he manages to stuff both his feet firmly into his mouth. The gaffes are great, but you're even more grateful that they'll not be around forever.WORTH WATCHINGGrey's Anatomy Seven, 8.30pmNo pretence now at medical drama. It's simply a sexy, sudsy soap with scalpels and sutures. Tonight, however, interns Meredith, Cristina and Izzie have some fun helping Seattle's first pregnant man prepare for the delivery.Who Wants To Be a Millionaire Nine, 8.30pmSlightly odd end-of-season special from Eddie McGuire. For this week's Millionaire, he's gathered 10 pregnant women hoping for the arrival of yet another big prize. A heightened air of expectancy about the studio?Numb3rs Ten, 10pm Final shoot-out for those who enjoy their crime stories wrapped incomprehensibly within Markov chains and Bayesian equations. Tonight, maths genius Charlie Eppes (David Krumholtz) helps his FBI agent brother, Don (Rob Morrow), calculate the odds on recapturing two killers.
© 2005 The Age