Review: 'W1A'

As an American, I think it's fair to say that some British humor is an acquired taste for those of us in the States. It's not just that British television humor seems to only have two levels: dry to the point of blowing dust or an endless procession of wanker jokes. It's that some of the cultural references just fall flat for viewers who have never traveled farther East than New York City. Sure, there are plenty of great British comedies that I find amazingly funny. But there are also those that I watch and find myself thinking "huh?"

The BBC2 comedy W1A often falls into the latter category. The show returns for a second season (or series, as they say over there) on April 23rd, and while I enjoyed season one at times, there were a lot of moments where I felt as if I was watching a comedy written in a different language. W1A is a spoof of the BBC and because of that, there are a lot of references that an American audience just won't grasp. But even at its most obtuse, W1A was entertaining enough that I wanted to see more.

Hugh Bonneville - best known in the U.S. for playing Robert Crawley in DOWNTON ABBEY - plays Ian Fletcher, the head of values at the BBC. He's the epitome of television bureaucracy and a character whose hapless behavior will seem familiar to American audiences. He describes his job as primarily to "clarify, define, or re-define the core purpose of the BBC across all functions." Actually, that perplexing job description will sound pretty familiar to anyone who's ever worked in a large American corporation.

Basically, the BBC is worried about its future and the bad press its received in recent years, so they hired Fletcher to put a good face on things. He had previously run England's 2012 Olympic efforts (recounted in the series TWENTY TWELVE) and they had no idea how much he struggled behind the scenes. Sadly for everyone involved, things didn't get any easier once he got to the BBC.

Much of season one's four episodes found him struggling with a myriad of programming and publicity challenges, ranging from trying to launch the show "Britain's Tastiest Village" to the scandal that develops after a BBC Newscast accidentally uses a photo Trudie Styler (wife of Sting) instead of one of Syria's first lady Asma al-Assad. The episodes are filled with inside BBC jokes and a number of current and former presenters on the network. It's often very funny, but if you're not familiar with British television than you're going to be quite lost at times.

That having been said, there are a number of idiotic corporate ideas that will be familiar to any audience. My favorite was the BBC's new plan for "hot desking," which meant anyone could sit anywhere and work. A noble idea, but the result was a fair part of everyone's day was spent lugging their laptop around the office trying to find an open desk.

Season two kicks off with an episode that is mostly about a Royal visit to the network from Prince Charles that might not be as well planned out as everyone thinks. The visit spirals into chaos and it includes a number of cameos, including Matt Baker and Alex Jones from THE ONE SHOW and Cambridge University's Mary Beard. And then there's the search for a new show to replace the failed "Britain's Tastiest Village." Entertainment Format Producer David Wilkes (Rufus Jones) comes up with what he thinks is the perfect title - "Up Town, Down Town" - but doesn't have a cast or even a format worked out yet.

But it's one of the lesser subplots of the episode that I found the funniest part of the premiere. The very dense intern Will Humphries (played by Hugh Skinner) is tasked with searching the archives of TOP GEAR to delete all the episodes in which host Jeremy Clarkson uses the word "tosser." The episode was shot before Clarkson's very public exit from the show and from the BBC. Jon Morton (who created the show and who directs this episode) decided to keep the footage in the season premiere, but wrung a few more jokes out of the situation by bleeping Clarkson's voice and clumsily pixilating his face. The entire situation makes for some wonderful moments and it's hard to imagine any American network allowing even a gentle parody of their business decisions.

As always, the rest of the cast of W1A is very good. David Tennant returns to do the narration of the episode and Jessica Hynes (who co-created the comedy SPACED) is always spot-on in her role as network brand consultant Siobhan Sharpe. Sharpe and Fletcher worked together on the Olympics and they loathe each other. Which would be funny enough, but Sharpe also spews corporate verbiage every time she open her month: "If you get bandwidth on this, you've got maple syrup on your waffle at the get-go."

This week's episode is an hour long, with three half-hour episodes airing to complete the second season. And while I can't say that I quite understand all of the cultural references in W1A, I can say that even at my impaired level of comprehension I find it funnier than many of the newer American TV comedies.

The new season of W1A premieres on BBC2 on Thursday, April 23rd at 9:00 p.m.

While W1A is not yet available in the U.S. TWENTY TWELVE is available for streaming on Hulu Plus.