Abigoliah: Hello there, this is All British Comedy Explained, the podcast in which I, an American, finally learn about all the British comedy shows I’ve been missing out on. I’m comedian Abigoliah Schamaun, and to guide us through our comedy labyrinth is writer Tom Salinsky.
Tom: Hello, nice to be here once again.
Abigoliah: Hello. I am looking forward to today. But before we dive in, why don’t you tell us what other online projects we have?
Tom: Yes. Well, chief among those is our Patreon. Yes. So if you’re enjoying the show and you’d like to support it, there’ll always be a free version. But if the ads are annoying to you, you can get rid of those entirely. For just £3 a month, you get access to the ad-free feed. If you like little bonus extras, which we are going to be recording after every one of these episodes, then that’s an extra £5 a month. So today we’re watching The Vicar of Dibley, and the question we’re going to be tackling this time is, would a little bit of drama make a comedy show better, or would it only make it less funny? Because particularly with one of the episodes you’re going to watch, there’s a little bit of seriousness, a little bit of extra drama in this one, which just kind of alters the mixture a little bit. I’d be very interested to see how that lands with you.
Abigoliah: All right. The Vicar of Dibley. I know a little bit about this.
Tom: Tell me what you know.
Abigoliah: Okay, so I know it stars Dawn French. And I know it is about a vicar in Dibley. And it is one of those shows that, again, my friend Joe Wells, who I do another podcast with called Neurodivergent Moments – I know we have a book coming out in – any – But he was angry I had never seen The Vicar of Dibley. Yeah. And he – like one of those – like, “How have you never seen The Vicar of Dibley?” So I’m looking forward to it. First – first question: is Dibley a real place?
Tom: I don’t believe so. Okay. It’s like a made-up village. This is a Richard Curtis joint.
Abigoliah: I’ve heard of him.
Tom: And Richard Curtis –
Abigoliah: Four Weddings and a Funeral. So, yeah.
Tom: He has this affinity with this sort of made-up England full of lovable British eccentrics. There’s a very clear line connecting The Good Life to The Vicar of Dibley.
Abigoliah: Okay.
Tom: It began transmitting in 1994.
Abigoliah: Okay, look at this. A modern sitcom for us.
Tom: It’s the year Nelson Mandela became president of South Africa. It’s the year of the OJ Simpson arrest – one of your country’s finest cultural exports.
Abigoliah: Yep.
Abigoliah: You’re welcome.
Tom: Jeff Bezos founded Amazon that year. And crucially, it’s the year that the Church of England ordained its first female priests.
Abigoliah: So I feel like in 1994 – you said – yeah. So South Africa’s nailing it, Britain’s nailing it, and America’s really struggling. Kind of like 2026. Yeah.
Tom: So there are kind of three different forces which all converge to bring The Vicar of Dibley about. And women priests is one of them. This was something that some people had been campaigning for since the 60s, but there was a lot of resistance to it. Yeah. So the General Synod, who were like the Church of England board of directors, they actually voted to allow women deacons, which is a lower kind of religious leader, in 1986. And the vote for women priests took place in 1992. And on the 12th of March 1994, 32 women were ordained priests in Bristol.
Abigoliah: Good for them. Yeah. So, okay, I’ve been to one Church of England service in my life. I don’t know much about that sect of Christianity other than the King – Henry – started it because he wanted a divorce. I know historically, but like, is there certain stuff I need to know?
Tom: No. Not really. It’s – it’s not wildly different from other kinds of Christianity. It’s just a bit more sort of light touch. There’s a joke I remember –
Abigoliah: Like Lutheranism to Catholicism, like they all are to Catholicism.
Tom: A really old joke I remember from a sitcom pilot that never went anywhere, with a comedian that I really like called John Dowie – who actually, it turns out, I only learned this by watching the Victoria Wood documentary that’s on at the moment – he and Victoria Wood used to gig together in the 70s. And John Dowie never really made it big, but I used to like him. And he did a one-off sitcom pilot about dying and going to heaven… which included a moment where he’s greeted at the pearly gates and asked if he had any kind of religion and he says “No I never really bothered,” and she says “I’ll put you down as C of E.”
So that’s kind of how the Church of England is seen. It’s the religion for people who don’t really bother.
Abigoliah: Yeah.
Tom: But like the idea that there might be a bring-and-buy sale or a fête –
Abigoliah: And they show up – a parishioner show up – at Easter and Christmas, the big hitters –
Tom: Which in a way makes the furious objection to women priests all the more surprising. You can see news footage at the time of angry men saying, “From this moment on, there will not be a priest leading the services. There will be a drag act.”
Abigoliah: Wow. And if there had been, it’d still be a man, so they’d be happy about it.
Tom: You think? Anyway, one person who took notice of this was Richard Curtis. So you say you have heard of Richard Curtis – you’ve seen Four Weddings and a Funeral.
Abigoliah: I’ve seen Four Weddings and a Funeral, I’ve seen Notting Hill, I’ve seen Love Actually. I know Richard Curtis is – yeah.
Tom: And he’d been writing comedy since the 80s. He was working on Not the Nine O’Clock News and other stuff with Rowan Atkinson, including, of course, Blackadder, which we will definitely come to at some point. And he attended a friend’s wedding that was conducted by a female vicar, and he began thinking this might be a good premise for a new sitcom.
Abigoliah: Okay.
Tom: So this was during the rise of the comedy indies –
Abigoliah: Alternative comedy is what we would have called it in America.
Tom: No – independent production companies.
Abigoliah: Nope. Tell me all about this.
Tom: So a show like Fawlty Towers or The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin would have been produced in-house –
Abigoliah: At the BBC.
Tom: At the BBC or ITV – Rising Damp. So the station transmitting the material is also responsible for making it. But in the 90s, there was this big rise of independent production companies, and particularly in comedy. So you get companies like Talkback or Hat Trick, which become major players in –
Abigoliah: Hat Trick is still around. Is Talkback still –
Tom: Around in some form, yes. I believe it is. So they make programmes and sell them to broadcasters, and that’s now routine. That’s the way things are generally done. And in fact, even a big broadcaster like the BBC essentially has an in-house indie that it buys shows off – but it all happens internally.
Abigoliah: And fun fact, a lot of those producers – because I’m talking to one – used to work at the BBC.
Tom: They’re all very incestuous.
Abigoliah: They all start there, and then they go do their own thing, and then they come back and pitch to the company of which they no longer work.
Tom: Yeah. So some of them are simultaneously production companies and talent agencies, which brings –
Abigoliah: Avalon.
Tom: Yes.
Abigoliah: Avalon is a good example, yep. Yeah.
Tom: And Tiger Aspect. So Richard Curtis was represented by Peter Bennett-Jones, and he had founded Tiger Aspect, which had recently produced Mr Bean for ITV, which Richard Curtis was one of the writers on. Okay, so it’s all very incestuous.
Abigoliah: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Tom: So once Richard Curtis’s script called The New Vicar was completed, Tiger Aspect knew just what to do with it. Because this is also the time when that alternative comedy fever is starting to die down a bit –
Abigoliah: Okay, finish this thought.
Tom: So those big exciting names – those Rik Mayalls, those Adrian Edmondsons – have started to become the new establishment. They aren’t the revolutionaries that they were in 1981.
Abigoliah: Yeah.
Tom: And the BBC is looking for a new sitcom. They want something with the same sort of broad appeal as The Good Life, or the show we’ll be ending our season with, Dad’s Army. Okay, so these are constantly being repeated, but they want something new. They want it to have that same family audience.
Abigoliah: Yeah. Sweet, wholesome – not breaking the third wall, not – no puppets, no puppets, no elephants.
Tom: Exactly. No puppets, no elephants.
Abigoliah: So just back up, because – so in 1994, Richard Curtis got wind that women were now allowed to be vicars in the C of E, and then within the same year, The Vicar of Dibley drops. That is a quick turnaround, and I know it’s only like six episodes or whatever, but to go from idea to finish production –
Tom: Well, this is the thing –
Abigoliah: That’s insane.
Tom: It’s because of Richard Curtis. It’s because of how powerful he was. So not only is he the hugely reliable writer of Blackadder and Mr Bean, he’s just had this huge hit with Four Weddings and a Funeral.
Abigoliah: Yeah.
Tom: So when Tiger Aspect turns up to John Plowman’s office at the BBC saying, “I’ve got you a new Richard Curtis script,” they can’t wait to get started.
Abigoliah: Of course, because he’s – he’s – he’s the golden boy.
Tom: Yeah, exactly.
Abigoliah: So he can do no wrong.
Tom: So these are the three forces that are converging, right? Yeah. Women priests, Richard Curtis wants to write a sitcom about this subject, and the BBC wants a new sitcom.
Abigoliah: Can I just say to you how cool it is that Richard Curtis still wants to write TV after Hollywood touched him? Because so many people just go, “Goodbye.” And he’s like, “No, no, no, no, no. I want to write a nice, wholesome sitcom.”
Tom: So whereas Absolutely Fabulous was conceived by its star, in theory a lot of people could have played the lead of The Vicar of Dibley, or The New Priest as it was written. So I think other names were in the running, but no one’s been very open about who those might have been. And it’s clear that Dawn French was in the conversation from very early on.
Abigoliah: So because she was an “it girl” then too, because French and Saunders was a big hit. Yeah, she’d just come back from maternity leave.
Tom: Exactly.
Abigoliah: Yeah. Because that’s why Ab Fab happened.
Tom: She would have been looking for a solo project for herself.
Abigoliah: Connecting all the dots.
Tom: I’m so proud. I’m so proud. So Richard Curtis and Dawn French hadn’t worked together before, but Richard Curtis and Lenny Henry had worked very closely on Comic Relief, which was the charitable organisation that Richard Curtis set up to help famine relief in Africa.
Abigoliah: And it’s still going. I’ve done work for it.
Tom: So it was clear that she would have been an obvious candidate. And then Richard Curtis had spent a lot of time talking to the Reverend Joy Carroll, who was a real female vicar, about what it was like and getting ideas from her. And she was thrilled to meet Dawn French and help in any way that she could.
Abigoliah: So I know – in the sea of what do you call your vicar – so like, I grew up Lutheran, so my pastor – we called Pastor Ed. Father Ted in Catholicism – what do you call –
Tom: Just vicar, I think.
Abigoliah: But no, like Dawn – it’s just “Vicar”?
Tom: The “Vicar Dawn” construction, which you see in other professions as well, always sounds very American to me.
Abigoliah: Okay.
Tom: It’s not a British thing in the same way. And maybe it’s because – and this is really all speculation now – maybe it’s because I can tell what class another British person is straight away, but with Americans they have to have a title to make it clear what – what class they’re in, because otherwise we don’t know.
Abigoliah: We don’t have that many – I mean, you have dukes and sirs.
Tom: I know, but – but you – emphasising “Doctor” –
Abigoliah: Okay. No, no, you’re right. Well, here’s the thing. My dad was a doctor, and I once had this conversation with him. He’s like, “I’d rather have someone call me Greg than Mr Schamaun,” because for him he was like, “I worked so hard to become a doctor.” Like he – you know – 12 years in medical school, residency and all that. He’s like, “I fucking earned that title.” But you bring up a good point, because I have friends who have PhDs, so they have doctorates, and they don’t go by Doctor. And if I had – if I had a PhD, I would insist everyone bring me on stage as Doctor Abigoliah Schamaun, even if I never referenced what I was a doctor in, I would insist on it. But that’s my own classism seeping through.
Tom: So the central character was called the Reverend Geraldine Granger.
Abigoliah: Okay, so vicar is Reverend, okay?
Tom: Yeah.
Abigoliah: Someone didn’t grow up going to church.
Tom: Really?
Abigoliah: Not going to hell, this one.
Tom: And as he so often did, he placed her in a village – a quaint English village full of lovable eccentrics. Dawn French’s chief concern when she read the script was she didn’t want to be the sensible one playing the straight role while everyone else got all the big laughs. So partly out of concern that this central character didn’t have enough punchlines, partly just looking at the workload, when the series was commissioned Richard Curtis recruited a couple of other writers to pitch in.
Abigoliah: Okay.
Tom: So one was Kit Hesketh-Harvey –
Abigoliah: What a name.
Tom: – who is half of Kit and the Widow.
Abigoliah: What a name. Is this a sketch group?
Tom: They were a song double act who were mainstays of the Edinburgh Fringe. They were essentially a modern-day version of Flanders and Swann – who were also one of us at the piano, one of them sings – a little bit Gilbert and Sullivan, a little satirical songs. Or – do you know Fascinating Aïda? They’re a little bit like a male Fascinating Aïda.
Tom: And then the other writer was Paul Mayhew-Archer, who had once produced I’m Sorry I Haven’t a Clue. I don’t know what happened with Kit Hesketh-Harvey – he’s a very talented guy – but it was Richard Curtis and Paul Mayhew-Archer who wrote all the rest of the scripts from the second series onwards.
Abigoliah: Okay.
Tom: And because this is a real prestige project, they got an incredible roster of actors for the supporting cast.
Abigoliah: So was Dawn just like – did she have to audition, or – yeah, it was just like, “You’re the one”?
Tom: I don’t think any of these people would have auditioned. So the cast includes Roger Lloyd-Pack, who was best known as Trigger in Only Fools and Horses.
Abigoliah: Okay.
Tom: James Fleet –
Abigoliah: Which, by the way, we will cover eventually. Okay. We can’t give it all away in the first two seasons, guys – we’ve got to feed it to you, we’ve got to feed it to you so you keep coming back.
Tom: James Fleet, who’d been in Four Weddings and a Funeral.
Abigoliah: Okay.
Tom: He’s Tom.
Abigoliah: Okay? Yeah.
Tom: Richest man in England. Oh no – fifth, I think that Branson fella’s doing awfully well.
Tom: John Bluthal, who’d worked with Spike Milligan and Tony Hancock. Gary Waldhorn, who’d been in a very successful sitcom called Brush Strokes, which was written by John Esmonde and Bob Larbey, who wrote The Good Life.
Abigoliah: Wait – who’s the name who worked with Spike and Tony?
Tom: John Bluthal.
Abigoliah: I want to meet him, because I bet he can handle anything.
Tom: And probably the least well known of the regular cast, Emma Chambers was Alice the verger, and she and Dawn French formed a double act.
Abigoliah: What’s a verger?
Tom: Assistant to the vicar.
Abigoliah: Okay. And that’s also a horrible name – verger.
Tom: There’s also an actress called Liz Smith. She appears as Letitia Cropley throughout the first season, but she was 73 when filming started, and possibly the BBC were worried they might not get her back, so she was killed off quite early on in the series run – the character was killed off. Actually, she outlived the series.
Abigoliah: Really?
Tom: She died in 2016 at the age of 95.
Abigoliah: Go off, Queen.
Tom: And the first series went out on BBC One in winter of 1994, and it went down very well indeed. Around 12 million people were watching. Warm reviews. Even the clergy seemed to like it. It returned for an Easter special in 1996 and then a Christmas special. But it was hard to reunite this cast and these writers on a regular basis.
Abigoliah: Because they’re so successful.
Tom: So successful with other projects, so famous. This is the problem with this kind of prestige project. So this is a huge hit, but a second full series isn’t shown until December 1997 – three years later.
Abigoliah: Okay. Which is kind of what Absolutely Fabulous had to do.
Tom: Well, it worked out its first few series quite quickly.
Abigoliah: And then they kind of took a break and then kept coming back. But didn’t The Young Ones take a two-year break?
Tom: Yeah – and for similar reasons. It had been a big hit and it was hard to reunite the cast. But this was a real struggle, I think. So when it comes back in ’97, it’s only four episodes, not even six.
Abigoliah: Okay.
Tom: Then there’s a further cycle of four specials shown two years later, which kind of cover a year in the life of The Vicar of Dibley. And they’re called Autumn, Winter, Spring and Summer. But they all went out over Christmas and New Year 1999. And then that seemed to be it. And then there was another pair of specials in 2004 and a final pair of specials in 2006, which runs for a long time but doesn’t put out very many episodes.
Abigoliah: You know – now – I wish, now that you bring this all up, we would have asked our very good friend David Tennant. I wonder if nowadays, when you sign up for a series, if there’s in the contract that you are –
Tom: Tied to –
Abigoliah: Required to – if it’s renewed, you’re required to come back.
Tom: In America, 100%. I mean, Patrick Stewart talks about deciding whether or not to do Star Trek: The Next Generation – yeah – because they wanted him to sign a six-year contract.
Abigoliah: Oh yeah.
Tom: And friends of his in Britain said, “Mate, it’s never going to work. Take the money. Sign it.”
Abigoliah: Who’s exactly – yeah. You’ll be back here in two years, maybe 18 months, maybe six months if it really goes badly.
Tom: He says he didn’t pack for the first six months.
Abigoliah: Little did they know.
Tom: Exactly. Of course, that brings us back to David Tennant, because Patrick Stewart was Claudius to his Hamlet.
Abigoliah: Oh, of course he was – which I have seen, not for a long time.
Tom: But the show became an institution, even though it was on so rarely. It came third in that 2004 poll of Britain’s best sitcoms, beaten only by Only Fools and Horses and Blackadder. Honestly, as much as I like this show, I think that there might have been a bit of recency bias there. I think it was a show that people missed and looked forward to seeing, and I understand why. I don’t quite think it’s top three. But it’s interesting that it’s passed by Blackadder, which was the same writer’s other big hit.
Abigoliah: Yeah. And how many – so how many episodes in its whole run did it actually release? Like ten?
Tom: Oh no, it’s more like 18 or something. I haven’t got it in front of me. But yeah, it’s a small number, given how long it ran.
Abigoliah: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Tom: And we’re going to watch series one, episode two. So we’ll skip the premise pilot, which is all about the vicar turning up and people being shocked that she’s a woman. Okay. And then we’ll jump into my favourite episode, which is one of the specials. It’s from series four, it’s episode one, and it’s just called Merry Christmas or Happy Christmas.
Abigoliah: I look forward to this. By the way, I have to say, every sitcom does a Christmas special, but only The Vicar of Dibley can do an Easter special.
Tom: Exactly, yes.
Abigoliah: Because when do they turn up for church? Easter and Christmas?
Tom: That’s right. One final question, actually – this pertains to episode two, the one we’re going to watch first. Do you know what Songs of Praise is?
Abigoliah: Well, I know it’s singing a hymn. Is it a hymn – a specific hymn?
Tom: It’s a very long-running television show which basically involves bringing cameras into a church, and it’s put out on Sundays. And Harry Secombe of The Goon Show was a regular host of it for quite a long time in the 80s.
Abigoliah: Wait – back up – because my coffee hasn’t kicked in. Is it a church service or is it a comedy show?
Tom: It’s not a comedy show. It’s just religious broadcasting on the BBC.
Abigoliah: Okay. Well, I mean, I grew up in America, so we had religious shows, but –
Tom: But on major networks? No. ABC wouldn’t give an hour to a local church.
Abigoliah: Christians have their own special network –
Tom: Yeah.
Abigoliah: Otherwise known as a tax haven.
Tom: Exactly. So – but yeah, Songs of Praise features quite heavily in series one, episode two. Okay. I wanted to make sure you had a little bit of context for that. What else are you expecting?
Abigoliah: I am expecting a drunk, old curmudgeonly parishioner.
Tom: That’s not a bad bet, you know.
Abigoliah: Like – or maybe the caretaker of the church fits that – you know, an old guy who’s just always putting a little whiskey in his coffee mug, cleaning up. And I am expecting witty dialogue, but maybe not a lot of physical comedy.
Tom: Interesting.
Abigoliah: And I am expecting beautiful shots of scenery, as – be real.
Tom: Excellent. All right, let’s go and watch The Vicar of Dibley.
Abigoliah: Let’s go see this. Oh, I’m looking forward to this one.
* * * * *
Tom: We are gathered here in the sight of these microphones to talk about The Vicar of Dibley, a long-running but short-on-episodes British television sitcom. We shall now hear from Abigoliah Schamaun.
Abigoliah: Seeing Dawn French stick her whole head into a chocolate fountain might be one of the most horrifying things I’ve ever seen. Like – it genuinely – when she pulled her head out, I was like, “That’s disgusting.” And I loved it. I thought it was great. Now, I know we’ve seen shows that have episodes that have a little more heart to them – say like The Office, the Christmas special where Dawn gets her – name’s not Dawn – but the paints –
Tom: Yeah.
Abigoliah: Yeah. Okay, I was right. And – but this is the first one where I’ve seen episodes that had a little bit more heart and a bit of a – serious – or more –
Tom: A little touch of drama.
Abigoliah: Yeah. Yes. Yeah. And like the sermon in the first episode, where she talks about people freaking out about women being vicars, and what we should really be thinking about is helping people and all this – I was like, this is a really serious tone, and this is a beautiful message that clearly, like, you know, Richard Curtis believes in. Otherwise why would he make a whole TV show about it? And then – and then it gets to her having to do the retakes.
Tom: Yes. And I think it was really important to everyone involved that the subject of religion was not there to be mocked. The comedy was going to come from elsewhere. It was going to come from the characters. Yeah. Because there definitely is a kind of irreligious or anti-religious – or even like a Life of Brian version of this – where the point is to satirise what can go wrong with religion. And that was just like – off limits for this show.
Abigoliah: And it was talking about real issues in the church, like women becoming vicars. Or – should they allow gay people to become vicars, which now they can be? Ironically, I know – I know a trans vicar because I’m cool. Fun fact: in the C of E, you can be a gay vicar, but you cannot get married in a Church of England church.
Tom: Right, yes.
Abigoliah: And also a vicar is not supposed to have sex outside of marriage. It’s a real conundrum. I don’t want to tell my friend’s story, but it’s interesting because –
Tom: We’ll have them on as a guest.
Abigoliah: I was thinking – I was like, “Oh, we should do a special episode with her,” because – I mean, she’s not a comedian, but she has some insight into the C of E and probably has some feelings about The Vicar of Dibley. It’d be a really interesting conversation. But yeah, I thought it was really – I thought it was so sweet. I thought the characters were great. Alice – the verger –
Tom: Verger, yes.
Abigoliah: Verger is absolutely great. So is the supporting cast. The old man – great. Did the – the elderly lady who just loves fucking in the first episode – she wasn’t in the last one, and I was –
Tom: She was the one who got killed off at the – I think it’s the beginning of the second series.
Abigoliah: That’s right. I’m sorry – you said that she got killed off. Her usual joke is – because –
Tom: She’s – she’s creating these extraordinary concoctions in the kitchen, so she’ll turn up with things like bacon-and-ice-cream sandwiches, that kind of thing.
Abigoliah: I mean, she’s a woman after my own heart. That’s what I like to do. I like sex and fucking around in the kitchen. It is a horny show.
Tom: It’s a weird tone, and I think it’s very Richard Curtis, because on the one hand it is this comedy with broad family appeal. Yeah. On the other hand, it does include topics which are to be taken seriously, and it’s not afraid to go to places like people sticking their hands up sheep’s backsides – or in fact just celebrating the fact he believes that sex with animals is now legal. Yeah, that’s quite – that’s quite confronting. You wouldn’t do that in the 70s, or if you did, it would be very late at night. But this is prime time BBC One. Yeah. So this is now what is acceptable to the majority. And at the same time, there is this sweetness running through it. Those more kind of grown-up jokes don’t undercut the general feeling of goodness that you get from it.
Abigoliah: Yeah. And even the guy – I forget his name – the bald guy –
Tom: David Horton.
Abigoliah: Yeah. So when David Horton just gives a little speech about how you haven’t wasted your life and you – you know – there’s a laugh coming, but it’s a real sincere, beautiful moment. And – and I think Richard Curtis and the other writers did a really good job of having these really beautiful, genuine moments that make you go, “Oh, wow,” and then just breaking it right away, you know?
Tom: And what did you feel about the laugh track on this one? Because this is shot much more like modern television, but it still has that laugh track. It was still shot in front of a studio audience.
Abigoliah: Yeah, I liked it. I mean, at this point we’ve watched pretty much – well, everything we’ve watched has a laugh –
Tom: Everything this season has a studio audience.
Abigoliah: In – in everything last season, bar The Office. I – I – I like a studio audience.
Tom: A show like that will have had a lot more pre-filming. There’s lots of edit jokes. Yeah. So when you suddenly cut to her in different clothes – yeah – so a lot of that is kind of pre-done. And one of the things I feel is that when you watch a show like Fawlty Towers, you said this is like watching a play – yeah – and you can kind of sense the audience is there. You can almost feel there’s virtually no gap, no space between the actors and the audience. Yeah. But here it looks much more professional. It doesn’t look like a play – it looks like a television show – and you can sort of see where the laugh has been dubbed in to cover the edit, because those two shots were actually done days apart. And to me, it does create a bit of a distance, and it feels more like a laugh track and less like watching a comedian in a comedy club having a dialogue with an audience. And I’m not so convinced that the studio audience necessarily helps with this show the way it definitely does with, say, The Young Ones.
Abigoliah: Yeah, I see what you mean. At the same time, it didn’t stick out to me as something that took me out of the piece. But maybe that’s because – because it was filmed in the 90s, in the early 2000s, the way it was shot was so reminiscent of the sitcoms I grew up with, so it was very familiar-looking to me, even though you don’t see stuff shot like that so much anymore. Yeah, I mean, I personally didn’t have a problem with it.
Tom: But people love this show. Yeah, that’s the other thing. They really embraced Geraldine Granger as a character. They really embraced all these other lovable British eccentrics as well. And it was hugely popular, even though episodes were scarce.
Abigoliah: I think, too, that that heart – those serious moments in it – is what really made it lovable. Whereas like, after we had just watched Hancock’s Half Hour and The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin, which – it was like, “Are these guys likeable?” But that was what was appealing about those, was how – oh – how cringey this, you know, is. Whereas this – I think if this didn’t have those serious moments, and having those discussions about what’s actually happening in the church, and watching David’s feelings change about Geraldine being a female vicar, I don’t think it’d be as successful.
Tom: That’s absolutely right.
Abigoliah: If it was all like, bang bang bang bang bang bang bang –
Tom: And equally, the last thing I want to see is Reginald Perrin actually talking about his feelings.
Abigoliah: Yeah, exactly.
Tom: No, thank you. Would you like to know what happened next?
Abigoliah: Oh – well, I have a question about the series. Now we know Geraldine is – is a – is a horny vicar. But does she ever – is there ever a romance, tryst? Does she ever date anyone in the show, or is it always just kind of out of her reach?
Tom: Spoilers or no?
Abigoliah: Spoilers, because –
Tom: The last episode is about her getting married.
Abigoliah: Really? Oh, that’s –
Tom: Also a fabulous episode. It was my second choice to show you, but I just didn’t want to give the ending away. Yeah, it’s a fabulous episode.
Abigoliah: Who did she get married to?
Tom: I’m gonna keep that one myself. Okay. She has a couple of romances, and in fact there’s a bit where Tristan comes back and says to her, “I’d like you to marry me to my girlfriend.”
Abigoliah: Oh, really?
Tom: But for a second she thinks she’s being proposed to.
Abigoliah: Oh.
Tom: Wow.
Abigoliah: Actually, talking about the heart and the humour and the laugh track – you know what this kind of reminds me of? The Golden Girls.
Tom: Oh, yes.
Abigoliah: Do you see it?
Tom: Absolutely.
Abigoliah: Like, it’s completely different circumstances, but how – it could be broad – but the writing is also – like, the words are so strong. But also there’s moments in The Golden Girls where you’re like, “Holy shit, we’re talking about this.”
Tom: And that may be what – because you remember I talked to you about Bea Arthur doing a version of Fawlty Towers?
Abigoliah: Yeah.
Tom: I think that’s what they had in mind. They thought, well, get her to play this acerbic character, but there’ll be heart there too.
Abigoliah: Yeah.
Tom: Which works for The Golden Girls –
Abigoliah: Yeah.
Tom: – does not work for Fawlty Towers.
Abigoliah: Nope. Can’t have it. Nope. Can’t have it. Yes – but tell me what happens next.
Tom: All right, so Dawn French and Emma Chambers, who plays Alice the verger, both won British Comedy Awards for their work on the show.
Abigoliah: Congratulations, girls.
Tom: Over the years it was nominated for ten BAFTAs.
Abigoliah: Whoa!
Tom: Four times for Dawn French – but it never won. Oh – it did take home the Rose d’Or in 2007, and Richard Curtis did accept a BAFTA Fellowship award the same year. And obviously he carried on working, writing many movies, some of which he directed. Dawn French carried on working with and without Jennifer Saunders. They both appear in the 2022 Poirot film Death on the Nile, and she does solo projects such as the anthology series Murder Most Horrid. And as I mentioned when we did Absolutely Fabulous, French and Saunders have their own podcast. Yes.
Abigoliah: Which we have not been invited on yet. We’re waiting, ladies. We’re waiting.
Tom: And because this is a Richard Curtis joint, as well as the regular episodes there were various Comic Relief sketches featuring the cast as early as 1997. There was a 2007 one, a 2013 one, a 2015 one. But around this time we started to lose some of the cast. So first of all, we lost Roger Lloyd-Pack in 2014.
Abigoliah: Go back and say their character names.
Tom: So he’s the one with his hand up.
Abigoliah: Oh no, I liked him. The guy who likes sex with animals.
Tom: Huge star from Only Fools and Horses.
Abigoliah: Yeah.
Tom: That’s what he’s still best known for. And then we lost poor Emma Chambers. She’d been suffering from ill health most of her life. She had various allergies and illnesses and had never been in the best of health. She passed away in February 2018 at the age of 53.
Abigoliah: Oh, Jesus.
Tom: Followed by John Bluthal – the one with the bow tie – in November.
Abigoliah: How old was he?
Tom: He’d have –
Abigoliah: Been 112.
Tom: Yeah. After that we all got sick with Covid, but Geraldine was there to help us through with four lockdown specials, which took the form of mini sermons delivered via Zoom. And then Trevor Peacock died in 2001. He’s – “no, no, no, no, no, no.” Gary Waldhorn, who played David, died in 2022, which now just leaves Dawn French and James Fleet from that cast.
Abigoliah: Jesus.
Tom: So you see, even with these modern shows, the story is always the same. Everybody’s dead.
Abigoliah: Oh my God. Wow. I really didn’t expect this one to have – I mean, watching it, some of the cast are obviously older people, so – but the fact that Alice the verger is –
Tom: Yes. That was very sad. Very, very sad indeed.
Abigoliah: She was young.
Tom: Yeah.
Abigoliah: Was there any backlash when this came out from any church people? I’m sure C of E kind of embraced it, because pretty much PR, but yeah – was the backlash zealots who were like, “This isn’t what Christian values are”?
Tom: The backlash was very much to the Church of England letting in women priests at all. But that was getting on for a year in the past by the time this aired. And those early – that first generation of women priests said, “Oh my God, nothing helped us more than The Vicar of Dibley,” because people who hadn’t been sure about us at first fell in love with Dawn French as Geraldine Granger. And then they were like, “Okay, maybe women vicars aren’t so bad after all.” So no, everybody seemed to love it. There really was no controversy about it at all. And that’s what I think is so interesting about it – that Richard Curtis, laser-like precision, walking right up to that line of what you could say in a family sitcom where there’s going to be generations of people watching, and never quite setting a foot over it. It’s really impressive.
Abigoliah: Did Richard Curtis and The Vicar of Dibley have any sway in getting the C of E to let in gay vicars?
Tom: I wouldn’t have thought specifically, but it’s one of those things that the – the circle of empathy –
Abigoliah: Yeah.
Tom: – on a long timescale always widens. So people who aren’t thought to be worthy of our love and affection generations ago now are.
Abigoliah: Yeah.
Tom: And that doesn’t mean there isn’t some temporary backsliding –
Abigoliah: Yeah.
Tom: – but the overall trend is in the direction of the circle of empathy getting bigger and bigger and bigger.
Abigoliah: Did – does Richard Curtis – did he grow up in a church, do you know?
Tom: I did briefly look into that, and I can’t see any mention of that one way or the other.
Abigoliah: I feel like that’s very C of E, you know what I mean?
Tom: Never really bothered.
Abigoliah: Because you look at people who… So, dogma, right?
Tom: Yes.
Abigoliah: You know Kevin Smith grew up – you know – going to church and had real feelings –
Tom: Oh yeah. –
Abigoliah: – about it.
Tom: That’s absolutely his anger about Catholicism, yeah.
Abigoliah: Yeah. And same with – I mean, George Carlin, who plays the cardinal in that, has really conflicting – well, I mean, I think he was basically an atheist – feelings about the church. Usually I feel like comedies around religion are written and produced by people who grew up around it, so have an insight into it – a point of view that they very much want to share.
Tom: I think the thing that really captivated Richard Curtis, the thing he wanted to write about, was like community and found family – that these people are united, and their focal point is the parish council and the church. But it’s not so much the metaphysical beliefs – it’s the feeling of family.
Abigoliah: I mean, I guess when we talk about dogma, we’re talking about the metaphysical. But like – so I grew up going to church, right? And what I think is so interesting is how they tackled – in the whole two episodes I saw – of how the church changes and how people view certain things. So like, again, about the idea of Geraldine being gay – David’s like, “Oh God, can you believe she’s gay?” And everyone’s like, “I don’t know, I thought she was a librarian,” and they just don’t give a fuck.
And it’s these questions that I think when you grow up in a religious institution – it’s not the – the questions that are argued about and the things I think people truly struggle with – if they grew up in religion – isn’t always like, “Is the host really the body of Christ?” Is – Is God in heaven? Were Adam and Eve real? It’s the relationships you have with people in the church and how you, as a religious person, are allowed to interact with the world. Like, what is seen as sinful? What is seen as faithful? That is far more, I think, the questions that churchgoers have than, like, “Is God an omnipotent being?” It’s – yeah – “Am I allowed to have sex before marriage?” You know, as someone who went to church – as a teenager – you know, that – that – that was the – that was my big question.
Tom: That is beaten into you, yeah. No pun intended.
Abigoliah: Yeah. Yeah. But yeah, so I don’t know, I’d really like to – I’m gonna write him a letter and be like, “I found this really interesting. I’d like to know your attachment to religion.”
Tom: But yeah, he’s –
Abigoliah: Because it’s community-based, and if you take the wrong step – yeah – like, okay, so I also grew up around a big – we had a lot of the Jehovah’s Witnesses – you’re familiar with –
Tom: With Jehovah’s Witnesses.
Abigoliah: Yes. And one of – this is – to my – like, this haunts me – but when my – he was a year younger than me – my – one of my sister’s friends – like, say we were like 13, so 12 – started to date someone at school who wasn’t a – in a Witness. There weren’t a lot of Witnesses, but there were enough. And his parents’ reaction to this – he was 12, so we’re not talking marriage, we’re not talking sex – we’re talking like –
Tom: Holding –
Abigoliah: Hands. Holding hands – shunned him.
Tom: Yeah, that is what happens. That is what they do.
Abigoliah: And – yeah –
Tom: Which is – that’s the playbook.
Abigoliah: Yeah. Which is just mind-boggling to me. And when we talk about church and community like that, that’s the thing – it’s like, can my son date someone who goes to his school? Not “Is God real?” That one we’ve settled on. You know what I mean? We know that one.
Tom: Yeah. It’s funny because, you know, he gets a lot of stick for some of the sexual politics in especially Love Actually, about the body-shaming and so on. But he’s always been incredibly progressive.
Abigoliah: Yeah.
Tom: So, for example, putting a deaf character in Four Weddings and a Funeral and then making sure that that character’s deafness is not just an add-on – it’s actually an enormous part of how the climax of that film plays out. It doesn’t work if he isn’t deaf. So really, really smart about that kind of thing, but then kind of falling back on some – sorry, Richard – kind of lazy fat jokes.
Abigoliah: Yeah. Okay, here’s my hot take on Love Actually. And you know what? Let’s save this for next year’s Christmas episode.
Tom: Here’s next year – we’re going to watch Love Actually.
Abigoliah: Great.
Tom: Okay, all right.
Abigoliah: Here’s my thing. Every time – every Christmas now – I feel like there’s always think pieces about Love Actually and how problematic it is for one reason or the other. And every time someone brings up a “Yeah, but this – yeah, but this” about Love Actually, I’m like, you make a good point. I don’t give a shit. I watch it every year. I like it. It makes me happy. It starts with that beautiful monologue with Hugh Grant, and it ends with them singing a Mariah Carey song. It wins Christmas every year for me. I don’t care if the girl who’s a size eight is “fat.” I can live with that.
Tom: Fair. All right, all right. So does this find a place on the shelf of fame? And remember, the shelf of fame is now full.
Abigoliah: I know.
Tom: It means –
Abigoliah: Something’s gotta come off. Exactly right. Yeah. I – I’m gonna go ahead and say yes. I thought – I – and to – I think this is the first one that made me really go, “Oh,” in a really – this one is different than the rest. And so Reginald Perrin is different than the rest because it’s so – like, he’s so unlikeable. And this is different than the rest because it’s – it’s got so much love in it, like genuine moments of love. So it definitely goes on the shelf of fame. And I think what we’re gonna do is we are going to put The Vicar of Dibley at number seven.
Tom: Okay.
Abigoliah: Below Fawlty Towers. So that takes Morecambe and Wise down to number eight. We have The Office at number nine, The Young Ones at number ten. The Young Ones was the first one to go on and now it’s number ten. And then The Good Life is – is out of there.
Tom: Okay.
Abigoliah: Because The Good Life was enjoyable and sweet to watch, but now I have something that truly is –
Tom: Yes.
Abigoliah: You know. So yeah, so we’re gonna say goodbye to The Good Life for now. All right? And put the vicar at number seven.
Tom: Farewell, Tom and Barbara. Welcome, Geraldine Granger. Yeah. All right. And listeners, viewers, if you want to watch more of this, I believe at the time of recording all episodes of this BBC show are available on Now TV. I’m not quite sure how that happened, but that’s where I found them.
Abigoliah: Perfect timing, since I have cancelled my Now subscription.
Tom: Excellent.
Abigoliah: Which also has all of Victoria Wood As Seen on TV as well.
Tom: Oh right – our show for next time.
Abigoliah: Yes.
Tom: Now, this is another one of those ones where I don’t quite know how this is going to land with you, because it is absolutely one of my favourites.
Abigoliah: Okay, well, we’ve seen that go wrong a lot.
Tom: It is also one of patron of the podcast Mr David Tennant’s favourites.
Abigoliah: I love it. It’s my favourite. It goes at number one.
Tom: It’s very male.
Abigoliah: I hate it.
Tom: It’s three men and it’s very verbal, and I think it is one of the best things that’s ever been on television. It’s – Yes, Minister.
Abigoliah: I am excited. Yes, Minister, which became Yes, Prime Minister.
Tom: That’s right. So we will watch the very first episode of Yes, Minister, series one, episode one, and then we’ll watch the first episode of the second series of its successor, Yes, Prime Minister, but as you’ll see, it’s basically the same show.
Abigoliah: I look forward to this. I’m very interested because you’ve been talking about this for ages now, and I finally get to watch it. What’s been interesting about doing this podcast is then I go away and I’m like, I do want to check out Blackadder or Upstart Crow or Yes, Minister, Father Ted, Only Fools and Horses. And I’m like, no, I just have to wait.
Tom: Yes.
Abigoliah: But guys, as always, thank you so much for joining us here on All British Comedy Explained. We couldn’t do this without you. Without you, we’re just shouting into the void. If you want to support the podcast, a couple of ways you can do it. One, make sure you’re subscribed on your podcatcher app. Also, we are on YouTube if you’d like to watch the show – we’d love for you to be there. Join us there. You can follow us on social media – mostly posting on Instagram and TikTok – but we have all of them, so pick whatever one. And leave us a five-star review if you have time in your podcatcher app. And also we have a Patreon now. So for £3 a month, you can get all of the episodes here on the main feed but ad-free. And for £5 a month you get the same thing, but also our mini bonus episodes where we tackle a question – a quandary – theme around the current episode. And after watching The Vicar of Dibley, the question we’re going to answer is –
Tom: Does adding a bit of drama make a show better, or simply less funny?
Abigoliah: As always, guys, thank you so much for joining us. We really do appreciate it. I’ve been Abigoliah.
Tom: I’ve been Tom.
Abigoliah: Thank you so much. Bye bye.