Somewhere in the darkest yet most well-decorated rooms of the BBC.
Ricky Gervais: Stephen! Glad you could meet me. I know you've got a lot of winsomely charming voice-overs on the go, right now, so that's clearly keeping you busy -
Stephen Merchant: Go fuck yourself, Gervais. I hate you. I hate you so much. All you ever do is show up, play yourself, rake in the cash, and tell everyone you could probably have done it without me.
Ricky Gervais: That's not up to me to decide, really. So, though, if the public want to brand me as -
Stephen Merchant: There's no way you could have done it without me, Richard. I could have done it without you, though. Easily. Because there's only one cocksucker in this room who knows how to be funny deliberately, and we both know it isn't you.
Ricky Gervais: Don't call me Richard.
Stephen Merchant: Give me two hundred grand of the money you owe me for making people think your petulant fucking bullying is fucking fucking hilarious, and I'll think about it.
Ricky Gervais: Anyway -
Stephen Merchant: Prick.
Ricky Gervais: Anyway. I've got an idea for a new show.
Stephen Merchant: Do you? Or do you just want to do The Office again with all your famous mates and pretend it's a new show?
Ricky Gervais: Are you talking about Extras?
Stephen Merchant: No, I'm talking about you being a worthless ballsack. Extras is just Exhibit fucking-A.
Ricky Gervais:
Stephen Merchant: Will it be about an egotistical loser completely unable to recognise his lack of talent, good looks, or comic ability?
Ricky Gervais:... Maybe.
Stephen Merchant: Will it be stuffed to the gills with your famous mates pretending to be idiots so people can get a cheap laugh?
Ricky Gervais:... To an extent.
Stephen Merchant: So what's different about it?
Ricky Gervais: This time we'll be taking the piss out of dwarves.
Stephen Merchant: Wait, what?
Ricky Gervais: We'll get Warwick Davies to do it. It'll be hilarious. He's a dwarf, but we'll make him a David Brent style prick! Literally the same! That way no-one will feel sympathy when we mock him for being small!
Stephen Merchant... Well, at least it'll make a change for you to not -
Ricky Gervais: I'll be in it.
Stephen Merchant: Oh, of course you will.
Ricky Gervais: And you. And our famous mates will keep popping in to see us.
Stephen Merchant: So why do we need Warwick Davies in this at all?
A very long pause
Ricky Gervais: Liam Neeson say's he'll do the first episode.
Stephen Merchant: Urrrrrrgh. OK, fine. I'll write that bit so it's absolutely fucking awesome.
2 comments:
To be fair, Warwick Davis has talked for years about getting a comedy series together focusing on life as a dwarf; I very much doubt this is a case of exploitation. I remember reading an interview with him (possibly in SFX) in the early 2000s, possibly the late 90s, talking about the amusing and frustrating situations that occur every day for dwarfs in the modern world.
I haven't seen it though, so I have no idea if it's any good (I actually wasn't even aware of its development or arrival on our screens, but then I'm not watching much telly at the moment).
Which would be fine it that's what we got, but the first two episodes involve him chastising a dwarf for not knowing "Hi Ho, Hi Ho", using "dwarf as a hat" as an example of how different his clients looks, falling out of his big car, and being forced to dress as a teddy bear at a wedding. I wasn't intending to (and don't think I did) imply exploitation as such, more that much of the dwarf-based jokes seem pretty lazy, and most of everything else is just the exact same stuff Gervais and Merchant have done before.
Even the one genuinely funny "dwarves end up in frustrating situations" scene, in which Warwick has to ask passers-by to ring a high doorbell, rapidly devolves into Warwick being pissed off that no-one realises they're helping a celebrity, which is far too similar to The Office Christmas Special.
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