''People Like Us'' is a British radio and TV comedy programme, a spoof on-location documentary (or

mockumentary A mockumentary (a portmanteau of ''mock'' and ''documentary'') is a type of film or television show depicting fictional events, but presented as a Documentary film, documentary. Mockumentaries are often used to analyze or comment on current event ...

) written by John Morton, and starring

Chris Langham Christopher Langham (born 14 April 1949) is an English writer, actor, and comedian. He is known for playing the cabinet minister Hugh Abbot in the BBC sitcom ''The Thick of It'', and as presenter Roy Mallard in '' People Like Us'', first on ...

as Roy Mallard, an inept interviewer. Originally a radio show for

BBC Radio 4 BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. The station replaced the BBC Home Service on 30 September 1967 and broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes from the BBC's headquarters at Broadcasti ...

in three series from 1995 to 1997, it was made into two television series for

BBC Two BBC Two is a British free-to-air Public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom, public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's second flagship channel, and it covers a wide range of subject matte ...

broadcast between September 1999 and June 2001.

Radio version

Each episode features the affable, bumbling BBC journalist Roy Mallard following a day in the lives of representatives of a particular career or lifestyle. A comedy of wordplay and misunderstanding, ''People Like Us'' builds on an inept

protagonist A protagonist () is the main character of a story. The protagonist makes key decisions that affect the plot, primarily influencing the story and propelling it forward, and is often the character who faces the most significant obstacles. If a ...

helpless as forced to relate to the absurdity incarnated in the "professionals" he meets, where his relatively sensible inquiry fails in front of the disproportionate facts. A regularly recurring joke is that of the shocked reactions Mallard gets as he reveals he is married – ranging from disbelief to exaggerated congratulations, from invitations to be more realistic to database systems refusals to accept such a piece of data. These bewilderments may root in the frequent hints throughout the episodes that Mallard is not just oddly looking (e.g. the patient at the doctor's recognizing walls and windows but giving up deciding what Mallard was), but terribly dishevelled – as it is even seen in one extremely rare shot including him in the video recording (as he is helping fixing presentation equipment). Another recurring theme is Mallard's quest for a coffee, or a meal, or even a room fit for a good night's sleep. The character of Roy Mallard was based on an exaggeration of the writer John Morton himself. Morton had been a fan of Chris Langham's performances since seeing him on Smith and Jones, and had Langham's voice in mind when he was writing the scripts. At the end of each episode, as

Dave Brubeck David Warren Brubeck (; December 6, 1920 – December 5, 2012) was an American jazz pianist and composer. Often regarded as a foremost exponent of cool jazz, Brubeck's work is characterized by unusual time signatures and superimposing contrasti ...

's " Unsquare Dance" is played, the mockumentary cast is credited as a list of people to which Roy Mallard is grateful («Roy Mallard would like to give a special "thank you" to Chris Langham...»). The radio show was named Best Radio Comedy at the

British Comedy Awards The National Comedy Awards (known as the British Comedy Awards from 1990 to 2014) is an annual awards ceremony in the United Kingdom, celebrating notable comedians and entertainment performances of the previous year. The British Comedy Awards (1 ...

in both 1996 and 1997 as well as winning a gold

Sony Radio Award The Radio Academy Awards, started in 1983, were the most prestigious awards in the British radio industry. For most of their existence, they were run by ZAFER Associates, but in latter years were brought under the control of The Radio Academy ...

for best comedy.

Television version

Eleven of the radio episodes were adapted for TV, with one original episode – "The Actor". The TV version featured an array of acclaimed guest stars including

Bill Nighy William Francis Nighy (; born 12 December 1949) is an English actor. Known for his work in numerous stage, television and film productions, he has received several awards including a British Academy Film Award and a Golden Globe Award, and ...

David Tennant David John Tennant (; born 18 April 1971) is a Scottish actor. He is best known for portraying the Tenth Doctor, tenth and Fourteenth Doctor, fourteenth incarnations of The Doctor (Doctor Who), the Doctor in the science fiction series ''Docto ...

Geoffrey Whitehead Geoffrey Whitehead (born 1 October 1939) is an English actor. He has appeared in a range of television, film and radio roles. Early life Whitehead was born on 1 October 1939 in Grenoside, Sheffield. After his father was killed in the Second Wo ...

and

Tamsin Greig Tamsin Margaret Mary Greig (; born 12 July 1966) is a British actress. She is known for both dramatic and comedic roles. She played Fran Katzenjammer in the Channel 4 sitcom '' Black Books'', Dr Caroline Todd in the Channel 4 sitcom '' Green W ...

. Mallard is hardly visible in the TV episodes. He is usually just out of sight, but viewers can spot him, or part of him, in every episode; on one occasion he is reflected with the camera in a shop window. Much of the humour is verbal as characters take a literal interpretation of what others say, use redundant expressions and non-sequiturs. Alongside this verbal aspect there was more conventional humour. Mallard encountered bizarre behaviour from his featured characters and their counterparts. For all his own mediocrity and haplessness he could appear sane and competent compared to those alongside him. The lack of

laugh track A laugh track (or laughter track) is an audio recording consisting of laughter (and other audience reactions) usually used as a separate soundtrack for comedy productions. The laugh track may contain live audience reactions or artificial laught ...

and the dead-pan approach led some viewers to believe they were encountering a "straight" documentary. A third series was planned but was cancelled in favour of ''

The Office ''The Office'' is the title of several mockumentary sitcoms based on a British series originally created by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant as '' The Office'' in 2001. The original series also starred Gervais as manager and primary charac ...

''. The TV version was well received, with the first series winning the 1999 Silver Rose d'Or for comedy.

Home video release

The first TV series was released on

VHS VHS (Video Home System) is a discontinued standard for consumer-level analog video recording on tape cassettes, introduced in 1976 by JVC. It was the dominant home video format throughout the tape media period of the 1980s and 1990s. Ma ...

and

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for digital video disc or digital versatile disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any ki ...

on 16 September 2002. The second was due to be released in 2003 but was cancelled, eventually being released (in Australia only) in November 2007. In September 2009 the complete two series were released in the United States on region 1

NTSC NTSC (from National Television System Committee) is the first American standard for analog television, published and adopted in 1941. In 1961, it was assigned the designation System M. It is also known as EIA standard 170. In 1953, a second ...

DVD. The second series was finally released on DVD in the UK on 24 May 2010.

List of episodes

Radio series

Television series

References

External links

* * Comedy Guide * {{IMDb title, id=0214362, title=People Like Us
People Like Us (TV)
an
People Like Us (radio)
series from

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People Like Us
(radio Show) from an

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website 1995 radio programme debuts 1997 radio programme endings 1999 British television series debuts 2001 British television series endings 1990s British comedy television series 2000s British comedy television series BBC television comedy BBC Radio comedy programmes British mockumentary television series British English-language television shows Television series about television British parody television series Radio programs adapted into television shows Television series based on radio series Television articles with incorrect naming style People_Like_Us