The Wrong Door
Encyclopedia
The Wrong Door is a comedy sketch show, first aired on BBC Three
on 28 August 2008
. The programme is the first comedy show in which almost all of the sketches have a CGI
element. As such, it was produced under the working title of The CGI Sketch Show. The show also contains strong language, adult humour and toilet humour.
, Gina Bellman
, Matt Berry
, MyAnna Buring
, Michael Fenton Stevens
, Neil Fox, Simon Greenall
, Laurence Hobbs, Rasmus Hardiker
, Pippa Haywood
, Humphrey Ker
, Burt Kwouk
, Alex MacQueen
, David Reed
, Thom Tuck
, Lorna Watson and Lloyd Woolf
.
Episode 1: The World's Most Annoying Creature. In an attempt to create the perfect soldier, a bio-weapons lab creates the World's Most Annoying Creature, which promptly escapes. First shown 28 August 2008.
Episode 2: Njarnia. Edmund and Lucy wander through the back of their self-assembly wardrobe and find themselves in the magical, but slightly rubbish, world of Njarnia (a parody of Ikea
/Narnia
). First shown 4 September 2008.
Episode 3: The Smutty Aliens. A woman is abducted by aliens with rude names and a phallic spaceship. First shown 11 September 2008.
Episode 4: The Train Pirates. A group of ordinary commuters are transformed into pirates, led by Captain Goiter (Brian Blessed). First shown 18 September 2008.
Episode 5: The Wizard of Office. Dorothy is transported to an office in Oswestry
after a storm, in a twist on the The Wizard of Oz
. Also the London Underground is infested with Pac-Man
and a restaurant has a problem with its Death by Chocolate. First shown 25 September 2008.
Episode 6: Bondo. The secret clown agent Bondo tries to take down a ninja plot to destroy the Train Pirates and Xotang needs a holiday. First shown on 2 October 2008.
A highlights show was broadcast on 26 December 2008.
, and written by him, Jack Cheshire and a large writing team, including Phillip Barron, John Camm, the Dawson Brothers, Ollie Aplin, Tim Inman, Susy Kane
, Will Maclean, and Bert Tyler-Moore. (A full credits list can be found at the BBC's own The Wrong Door website).
due to a number of anger management
issues. He has a curious habit of tearing people to pieces, being, as he is, a large carnivorous dinosaur
.
The Philip and Melanie sketches are examples of deadpan humour
and often involve other characters in the scene treating the couple as if it were perfectly normal for a young female human to be dating a dinosaur, yet picking up on other curiosities such as their age gap.
dances normally, but the one in the blue tracksuit always has a special ability.
when a man in a black dress coat and white tie appears. He takes the cue
from one of the players and then makes a bet with the other. The mystery man then proceeds to perform an impossible trick shot
(which is done in CGI), takes his winnings and leaves while the remaining player stares in shock.
, Heat magazine and The Times; a review in the Daily Record
described it as "inventive, exhilarating, rude and sometimes astonishing sketch show combines sharp writing and performing with sci-fi standard special effects to create a whole new breed of futuristic comedy".
However, elsewhere it was not so well received; Metro gave it one star whereas a review in The Scotsman
described it as having "agonisingly poor material".
The programme's launch episode's ratings, however, were very good, gaining 546,000 (a 3.5% share), the highest ever audience for the launch of a comedy on BBC Three. Despite this the second episode and beyond dropped off of the channel's top 10 weekly ratings according to BARB statistics.
BBC Three
BBC Three is a television network from the BBC broadcasting via digital cable, terrestrial, IPTV and satellite platforms. The channel's target audience includes those in the 16-34 year old age group, and has the purpose of providing "innovative" content to younger audiences, focusing on new talent...
on 28 August 2008
2008 in television
The following is a list of events affecting American television in 2008. Events listed include television show debuts, finales, cancellations, and new channel launches.-January:-February:-March:-April:-May:-June:-July:-August:...
. The programme is the first comedy show in which almost all of the sketches have a CGI
Computer-generated imagery
Computer-generated imagery is the application of the field of computer graphics or, more specifically, 3D computer graphics to special effects in art, video games, films, television programs, commercials, simulators and simulation generally, and printed media...
element. As such, it was produced under the working title of The CGI Sketch Show. The show also contains strong language, adult humour and toilet humour.
Cast
Unusually for a sketch show, the programme lacks a core cast of performers, although some actors recur in different roles throughout the series. Among the performers involved are Brian BlessedBrian Blessed
Brian Blessed is an English actor, known for his sonorous voice and "hearty, king-sized portrayals".-Early life:The son of William Blessed, a socialist miner, and Hilda Wall, Blessed was born in the town of Goldthorpe, West Riding of Yorkshire, England...
, Gina Bellman
Gina Bellman
Gina Bellman is a New Zealand-born British actress currently starring in the series Leverage as Sophie Devereaux for which she was nominated for a Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actress in Television.-Personal life:...
, Matt Berry
Matt Berry
Matthew Charles "Matt" Berry is an English actor, writer, comedian and musician. Berry is perhaps best known for his appearances in The IT Crowd, Garth Marenghi's Darkplace and The Mighty Boosh; he also had his own series, Snuff Box...
, MyAnna Buring
MyAnna Buring
MyAnna Buring is a Swedish actress best known for appearing in the 2005 horror film The Descent.- Early life :Buring was born in Sweden but grew up in the Middle East...
, Michael Fenton Stevens
Michael Fenton Stevens
Michael Fenton Stevens , sometimes credited as Michael Fenton-Stevens, is a UK actor and comedian, a founder member of The Hee Bee Gee Bees and the voice behind the Spitting Image 1986 number 1 hit "The Chicken Song"...
, Neil Fox, Simon Greenall
Simon Greenall
Simon Greenall is a British actor, writer and voice artist from Longtown in Cumbria. He has appeared in a wide variety of roles in television, film, radio and the theatre, and is probably best known for his role as Michael in the TV series I'm Alan Partridge and as the voice of headmaster Iqbal in...
, Laurence Hobbs, Rasmus Hardiker
Rasmus Hardiker
Rasmus Kip Hardiker is an English actor from Sutton Coldfield. He is best known for his roles as Raymond in Steve Coogan's sitcom Saxondale and Ben in the Jack Dee comedy Lead Balloon. Hardiker was also in the BBC3 sketch series The Wrong Door.-Personal life:Hardiker was born in Sutton Coldfield,...
, Pippa Haywood
Pippa Haywood
Philippa Haywood is an English actress who trained at Bristol Old Vic Theatre School.Famous for playing the much-put-upon Helen Brittas in the BBC One comedy series The Brittas Empire, Haywood has an extensive television career which includes Julie Chadwick in the BBC Two comedy Fear, Stress &...
, Humphrey Ker
Humphrey Ker
Humphrey Ker is a British actor and an award winning comedian. He is one third of comedy troupe The Penny Dreadfuls.-History:Between 2001 and 2005, Humphrey performed with Edinburgh based improvisational comedy troupe The Improverts...
, Burt Kwouk
Burt Kwouk
Burt Kwouk OBE , born Herbert Kwouk, is an English actor of Chinese descent, known for many television appearances and for his role as Cato in the Pink Panther films.-Career:...
, Alex MacQueen
Alex MacQueen
Alexander Tulloch MacQueen is an English actor. He has appeared on television, film and radio in the UK in productions such as Holby City, Hut 33, The Thick of It, and Keeping Mum....
, David Reed
David Reed (comedian)
David Reed is a British actor, writer and comedian and one third of comedy troupe The Penny Dreadfuls.-Career:Between 2001 and 2005, David performed with Edinburgh based improvisational comedy troupe The Improverts in their weekly short form improvised sketch show as well as regularly appearing in...
, Thom Tuck
Thom Tuck
Thom Tuck is a British actor and comedian and one third of comedy troupe The Penny Dreadfuls.-History:Between 2001 and 2005, Thom acted in over thirty productions at the Bedlam Theatre in Edinburgh as well as directing and writing shows and performing with improv troupe The Improverts.In 2006, he...
, Lorna Watson and Lloyd Woolf
Lloyd Woolf
Lloyd Woolf is a British comedian and member of the four man group Cowards, which also includes Tim Key, Tom Basden and Stefan Golaszewski.Woolf was born in Swansea...
.
Episodes
Each episode in the series has a different narrative strand running through it.Episode 1: The World's Most Annoying Creature. In an attempt to create the perfect soldier, a bio-weapons lab creates the World's Most Annoying Creature, which promptly escapes. First shown 28 August 2008.
Episode 2: Njarnia. Edmund and Lucy wander through the back of their self-assembly wardrobe and find themselves in the magical, but slightly rubbish, world of Njarnia (a parody of Ikea
IKEA
IKEA is a privately held, international home products company that designs and sells ready-to-assemble furniture such as beds and desks, appliances and home accessories. The company is the world's largest furniture retailer...
/Narnia
The Chronicles of Narnia
The Chronicles of Narnia is a series of seven fantasy novels for children by C. S. Lewis. It is considered a classic of children's literature and is the author's best-known work, having sold over 100 million copies in 47 languages...
). First shown 4 September 2008.
Episode 3: The Smutty Aliens. A woman is abducted by aliens with rude names and a phallic spaceship. First shown 11 September 2008.
Episode 4: The Train Pirates. A group of ordinary commuters are transformed into pirates, led by Captain Goiter (Brian Blessed). First shown 18 September 2008.
Episode 5: The Wizard of Office. Dorothy is transported to an office in Oswestry
Oswestry
Oswestry is a town and civil parish in Shropshire, England, close to the Welsh border. It is at the junction of the A5, A483, and A495 roads....
after a storm, in a twist on the The Wizard of Oz
The Wizard of Oz (1939 film)
The Wizard of Oz is a 1939 American musical fantasy film produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. It was directed primarily by Victor Fleming. Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson and Edgar Allan Woolf received credit for the screenplay, but there were uncredited contributions by others. The lyrics for the songs...
. Also the London Underground is infested with Pac-Man
Pac-Man
is an arcade game developed by Namco and licensed for distribution in the United States by Midway, first released in Japan on May 22, 1980. Immensely popular from its original release to the present day, Pac-Man is considered one of the classics of the medium, virtually synonymous with video games,...
and a restaurant has a problem with its Death by Chocolate. First shown 25 September 2008.
Episode 6: Bondo. The secret clown agent Bondo tries to take down a ninja plot to destroy the Train Pirates and Xotang needs a holiday. First shown on 2 October 2008.
A highlights show was broadcast on 26 December 2008.
Music
While the series does feature original music composed by Dominic Nunns, it also uses a large amount of licensed music. This is a partial listing of the licensed music used in the series (as originally broadcast).| Blondie Debbie Harry Deborah Ann "Debbie" Harry is an American singer-songwriter and actress, best known for being the lead singer of the punk rock and new wave band Blondie. She has also had success as a solo artist, and in the mid-1990s she performed and recorded as part of The Jazz Passengers... |
Heart of Glass | End Credits of Episode 2 |
| Graham Coxon Graham Coxon Graham Leslie Coxon is an English singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and painter. He came to prominence as the lead guitarist, backing vocalist and occasional lead vocalist of rock band Blur, and is also a critically acclaimed solo artist, having recorded seven solo albums... |
Freakin' Out | End Credits of Episode 3 |
| Kasabian | Club Foot | End Credits of Episode 6 |
| Rob Dougan Rob Dougan Rob Dougan, also known as Rob D , is a genre-blending music composer. Mixing elements of orchestral music, trip hop, and bluesy vocals, his work is tangentially relatable to electronic music. He was known primarily for his breakthrough 1995 single "Clubbed to Death ", further popularised by 1999's... |
Clubbed To Death (Kurayamino Variation) | End Credits of Episode 1 |
| Transfixion | Over the Rainbow | End Credits of Episode 5 |
| Vampire Weekend Vampire Weekend Vampire Weekend is an American indie rock band from New York City that formed in 2006 and signed to XL Recordings. The Band has four members: Ezra Koenig, Rostam Batmanglij, Chris Tomson, and Chris Baio. The band released its first album Vampire Weekend in 2008, which produced the singles "Mansard... |
A-Punk | Dancing Game Girl sketch |
Production
The Wrong Door is directed by Ben WheatleyBen Wheatley
Ben Wheatley Animator, Director of internet viral ads, TV idents, TV adverts TV comedy shows and feature films.-Early life:Wheatley was born in Billericay, Essex. He went to Haverstock School in North London and it was here during the sixth form that he met Amy Jump who is now his wife and...
, and written by him, Jack Cheshire and a large writing team, including Phillip Barron, John Camm, the Dawson Brothers, Ollie Aplin, Tim Inman, Susy Kane
Susy Kane
Susy Kane is an English actress, comedy writer and musician.-Personal life:She is the daughter of opera singer Alison Warner and actor and writer John Kane, and the younger sister of comedy writer and actor Simon Kane...
, Will Maclean, and Bert Tyler-Moore. (A full credits list can be found at the BBC's own The Wrong Door website).
Recurring characters and sketches
As with many sketch shows, this show has a number of recurring characters and sketches throughout every episode.Philip and Melanie
Melanie has boyfriend trouble. Philip is rather insensitive and many of her friends and family think he's "a wanker". He left his previous employment at Nottingham Trent UniversityNottingham Trent University
Nottingham Trent University is a public teaching and research university in Nottingham, United Kingdom. It was founded as a new university in 1992 from the existing Trent Polytechnic , however it can trace its roots back to 1843 with the establishment of the Nottingham Government School of Design...
due to a number of anger management
Anger management
The term anger management commonly refers to a system of psychological therapeutic techniques and exercises by which someone with excessive or uncontrollable anger & aggression can control or reduce the triggers, degrees, and effects of an angered emotional state...
issues. He has a curious habit of tearing people to pieces, being, as he is, a large carnivorous dinosaur
Dinosaur
Dinosaurs are a diverse group of animals of the clade and superorder Dinosauria. They were the dominant terrestrial vertebrates for over 160 million years, from the late Triassic period until the end of the Cretaceous , when the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event led to the extinction of...
.
The Philip and Melanie sketches are examples of deadpan humour
Deadpan
Deadpan is a form of comic delivery in which humor is presented without a change in emotion or body language, usually speaking in a casual, monotone, solemn, blunt, disgusted or matter-of-fact voice and expressing an unflappably calm, archly insincere or artificially grave demeanor...
and often involve other characters in the scene treating the couple as if it were perfectly normal for a young female human to be dating a dinosaur, yet picking up on other curiosities such as their age gap.
Xotang
Xotang the giant robot is often found destroying the environments around him to do everyday tasks (e.g. destroying the London skyline in search of his keys). Oddly enough nobody has once made any attempts to destroy him despite his constantly wrecking the area around him.Gamer Girl
Gamer Girl is a stereotypical gamer character, described by the official website of the show as a "classic example of the perils of console addiction". Gamer Girl sketches often involve her world merging with that of the game she is currently playing or vice-versa.Superhero Tryouts
A parody of the popular talent show genre of television, Superhero Tryouts is a fictional television show looking for the next popular superhero. Hosted by Captain Justice, Lady Libido and Doctor Fox, the show is plagued by mediocre superheroes such as 'The Human Spider' who excretes web-like substances from his anus, and 'Moose-Boy', who has no obvious super powers at all, other than his own theme tune. There was also a reference to Batman, saying that he was The Raven with a body honed to perfection and his name being Bobby something.Dancers
Two dancers competing to see which one is better. The one in the red tracksuitTracksuit
A tracksuit is an article of clothing consisting of two parts: trousers and a jacket usually with front zipper. It was originally intended for use in sports, mainly as what athletes wore over competition clothing and would take off before competition. In modern times, it has become commonly worn...
dances normally, but the one in the blue tracksuit always has a special ability.
Snooker Hall
Two people are playing snookerSnooker
Snooker is a cue sport that is played on a green baize-covered table with pockets in each of the four corners and in the middle of each of the long side cushions. A regular table is . It is played using a cue and snooker balls: one white , 15 worth one point each, and six balls of different :...
when a man in a black dress coat and white tie appears. He takes the cue
Cue stick
A cue stick , is an item of sporting equipment essential to the games of pool, snooker and carom billiards. It is used to strike a ball, usually the...
from one of the players and then makes a bet with the other. The mystery man then proceeds to perform an impossible trick shot
Trick shot
A trick shot is a shot played on a billiards table , which seems unlikely, impossible, or requires significant skill...
(which is done in CGI), takes his winnings and leaves while the remaining player stares in shock.
Reception
Initial reviews for episode one were mixed. There were enthusiastic reviews in The GuardianThe Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
, Heat magazine and The Times; a review in the Daily Record
Daily Record (Scotland)
The Daily Record is a Scottish tabloid newspaper based in Glasgow. It had been the best-selling daily paper in Scotland for many years with a paid circulation in August 2011 of 307,794 . It is now outsold by its arch-rival the Scottish Sun which in September 2010 had a circulation of 339,586 in...
described it as "inventive, exhilarating, rude and sometimes astonishing sketch show combines sharp writing and performing with sci-fi standard special effects to create a whole new breed of futuristic comedy".
However, elsewhere it was not so well received; Metro gave it one star whereas a review in The Scotsman
The Scotsman
The Scotsman is a British newspaper, published in Edinburgh.As of August 2011 it had an audited circulation of 38,423, down from about 100,000 in the 1980s....
described it as having "agonisingly poor material".
The programme's launch episode's ratings, however, were very good, gaining 546,000 (a 3.5% share), the highest ever audience for the launch of a comedy on BBC Three. Despite this the second episode and beyond dropped off of the channel's top 10 weekly ratings according to BARB statistics.
Further reading
- Cheshire, Jack (7 August 2008). "On Location: The Wrong Door", Broadcast, EMAP. Retrieved on 19 August 2008.
External links
- | Archived BBC website
- BBC press release announcing the series