Over at MSN today: I've reviewed the premiere of BBC1's new sitcom BIG SCHOOL, starring and co-written by David Walliams, joined by Catherine Tate, Philip Glenister and Frances de la Tour.
The great thing about a sitcom in a school is that everyone has first-hand experience of that setting; in later life, one can start seeing things from the teacher's perspective. However, audiences are so attuned to this environment it's hard to do much that feels fresh and different. There are so many clichés in education-set programmes that they're hard to avoid, mostly because they're oddly alluring. Big School, BBC1's new Friday night sitcom, fell into a number of traps in terms of lazily-written characters: the obstinate headmistress, the nerdy science teacher (a virgin, at that), the "games teacher" with an eye for the ladies. All your favourite stereotypes are present, although that in itself lent a feeling of comic strip-style nostalgia.
Continue reading at MSN TV...
