RaspberryLucozade
'Chewin' The Fat' seems to have fallen out of favour with viewers these days which considering it spawned a sitcom spin-off, the wonderful 'Still Game', is very strange indeed.Greg Hemphill and Ford Kiernan first worked together in the mid '90's on the hilarious ( though short lived ) BBC2 sketch show 'Pulp Video'. In 1999, the pair, along with Paul Riley, Mark Cox and the gorgeous Karen Dunbar, went on to do 'Chewin' The Fat', which like 'Naked Video' before it, had transferred from radio to television. The show was slow to catch on at first. The first series included opening and closing segments featuring Ford and Greg as themselves chatting to the audience ( almost like those featured in 'Alas Smith & Jones' ) which made the show seem disjointed. Furthermore, it was also marred by some patchy material. By the second series however, these little flaws had been repaired. Ford and Greg's opening and closing segments were dropped, the writers tightened up on the material and BBC Scotland found themselves with another winning comedy show on their hands. Before long, the show's catchphrases could be heard being used in schools and in workplaces ( am I the only person who says ''Gonnae no dae that!'' whenever someone does something irritating or out of the ordinary? I very much doubt it! ).Many stock characters were born, as is the case with many sketch shows, such as The Lighthouse Keepers ( one of which constantly endures pranks from his workmate which culminates in him uttering the aforementioned ''Gonnae no dae that!'' ), inexperienced actor Ronald Villiers who constantly makes a chump of himself at auditions, Glaswegian hard-man The Big Man who whenever meeting a confrontational situation, barks his favourite saying: ''Is there a problem here?'', Ballistic Bob - a middle aged man who ends up losing his patience and smashing up everything around him in a violent rage whenever something doesn't go his way, also there was Betty, a randy old woman with fond recollections of her amorous past and, last but not least, the mischievous Glaswegian pensioners Jack and Victor, who were so popular they were spun-off into their own sitcom, which, as I mentioned earlier, was 'Still Game'.It was good fun, though it was not for everyone. Some critics claimed that the show was responsible for introducing anti-social behaviour in school playgrounds. In true Scots dialect, havers! It was already there. Many memorable sketches evolved - 'Bools' saw two bowlers resort to childish methods in order to outdo each other. In another sketch, we saw a man in a pub complaining to a barman that the pint he has just been given doesn't have much of a head on it to which the barman puts his mouth over the top of the glass and blows vigorously into the man's drink, frothing it up immensely. Also hilarious was the spoof documentary 'Will I Come Back & See Ye' which featured two Glaswegian born men now living in Canada returning to their birthplace and meeting with no welcome from the natives. Perhaps the most successful sketch was 'Gie Us A Swatch Of Yer Fanny!' in which two little boys jokingly ask a sexy female ice cream van proprietor for a glance at her downstairs area to which she calls their bluff and flashes her offending area at them, leaving them speechless.Though some of the humour failed to travel, 'Chewin' The Fat' was one of the best sketch shows of the millennium and why it has been forgotten is a mystery to me.
Laurynrw
I've lived in one of the rougher areas of Glasgow all my life and grew up with such comedies as Rab C Nesbit and Naked Video, and i can honestly say that Chewin' the Fat is a near perfect representation of real life in this part of the dear green city! The characters portrayed in the show are people i see in every day life - there's a Jack and Victor on most Glaswegian buses at any given point in the day! And an earlier comment made about the school teacher and her pupils being disrespectful, well thats exactly what happened when i was at school and i have it on good authority from my younger brother that the case is still the same today. If you don't 'get it' then fair enough but no show on TV has annoyed me enough to make me feel like logging on here and going off on a multi-page rant about it. Basically if you don't like it - then its probably not been aimed at you in the first place, so get over it.
Billy Bonnet
Comedy is in the eye of the beholder. Have read some of the comments about Chewin' The Fat and can't believe people who laugh at Bottom or The Young Ones feel qualified to put this brilliant show down.The Scots are capable of laughing at themselves and if the English or Americans don't get it then all the better.Not every piece of work is created for an international market and you have to wonder at people who only produce work for the Americans. After all there is nothing funnier out of America than their President!!Chewin' The Fat is a refreshing and often strangely realistic interpretation of some of the finer points of Scotlands society. I don't laugh all the way through it, nor would i expect to, but I have laughed heartily at a good bit of the show. Thats enough to keep me happy.
thebrokendrum
The BBC must have been drunk when they approved this show. 20 years ago people might of found it funny and I suppose some 8 year olds today probably do. These guys should stick to Christmas panto. The "humour is seriously dated. Long sketches that end with the weakest punchlines since sooty threw a cream pie at sweep are given ridiculous canned laughter. I was initially looking forward to this programme as I had heard it compared to the great Scottish sketch show "naked video". a comment I find insulting to the naked video team.
