Sunday 1 June 2008

Iσως, Iσως, Iσως

I've recently found out, mainly accidentally, that there is a sitcom called Coupling. It features three girls and three guys, and ventures through their love-lives via a complicated and often non-chronological way of storytelling.

Oh, what? You already knew this?

I highly doubt it.

Welcome to Greek Coupling. It's Coupling, but in Greek. Instead of Steve Taylor, we have Stephanos. It's the little differences I like. I love how the opening credits are the same, how the sets are the same and how the dialogue is the same. The DVD has a similar design too.

Having just watched Part One of the above episode (the first five minutes of a forty-five minute show), I can tell that it is Sex Death and Nudity, a Coupling episode from series one. In the clip, you can see Greek Jeff Murdoch explaining the giggle-loop. Watch it. It's the scene where Greek Jeff puts down an empty pint glass, and the explanation that follows. It seems quite serious, doesn't it? Now watch the scene from the UK version. That's pretty damn funny, isn't it? It makes you wonder why the BBC cancelled it. Maybe because Richard Coyle didn't return to do a fourth series, and they got Richard Mylan, who hasn't seem to do much since. Except star in Grown-Ups. And that wasn't very good at all.

Does Steven Moffat know of this translation of his show? It doesn't seem to credit him. Or maybe it does, but they credit him as Stephanos.

2 comments:

Andrew said...

I suppose this is what happens if you select your cast based on how similar their names are.

Stuart Ian Burns said...

Moffat very much knew about it and was creative consultant. He mentioned visiting Greece for this during the interviews about taking over Dr Who.