Reviving the golden art of the monologue.
A BBC comedy drama series performed solely by Rob Brydon, following the life of the impossibly optimistic Keith Barret, a Welsh taxi driver who never gets a fare because his radio isn't tuned to the right frequency. Instead, Keith drives the streets searching for a fare while musing on the wrong turns his life has taken and the separation from his adulterous wife, Marion (who left Keith for her work colleague Geoff) and their two sons.
"I don't feel like I've lost a wife, I feel like I've gained a friend. I would never have met Geoff if Marion hadn't left me."
Instead of harbouring anger and bitterness towards Geoff, Keith has nothing but respect for him, as if of all the people in the world, his wife couldn't have shacked up with a better man. And despite the fact that everything in his life seems to go wrong in some way or another, he fights back with a c'est la vie smile and constant persistance. In fact, the closest he came to any degree of success was almost picking up some passengers at an airport, only to find that the flight was delayed by five hours, forcing him to think up ways of kiling time.
"Right, I could have a look round the shops, that'll take forty minutes... maybe play some of the games in the arcades, that might take up half an hour if I play really slowly on the lower levels... that's about one hour twenty minutes, so that's three hours forty minutes left to fill... maybe browse in Smith's, if they don't move me on, that might take up half an hour... no, whichever way you look at it, it just doesn't add up."
- on ways to successfully kill time
Despite the endless failure of the hapless protagonist, you can either be carried along with his uncanny ability to look misery square in the eyes and tell it that things could be much worse (it's more enjoyable this way) or squirm over his soul-crushing denial in facing up to the dead-end his life has reached and refer to the show as "That program with the hopeless guy in a car". It's all down to perspective but be thankful that you're just the happy spectator, if Keith dropped his denial for just a second he would surely have a nervous breakdown.
"I like to take it easy, me. I sit in the middle lane and do about sixty, people must think its a good idea because they queue up behind me and flash their lights at me."
- on motorway driving (thanks teiresias)
Co-written by Brydon and the producer/director Hugo Blick, Marion and Geoff stands as probably one of the finest television moments of recent years and arguably the first equal great comedy series of the 21st century along with Human Remains, strangely enough also featuring Brydon along with Julia Davis.
(baby cow productions)