The Catherine Tate Show is a British television comedy sketch programme written by Catherine Tate and Derren Litten featuring a wide range of characters. The Catherine Tate Show aired on BBC Two and was shown worldwide through the BBC. Collectively, the show has been nominated for six BAFTA Awards, two British Comedy Awards and an Emmy Award, and it has won two Royal Television Society Awards, two British Comedy Awards and a National Television Award since its debut in 2004.
Broadcast
The first series of the show, which consisted of six episodes, aired from 16 February to 22 March 2004. A DVD of this series was released in August 2005.
A second series aired from 21 July to 25 August 2005, and a 40-minute Christmas special aired on 20 December 2005. For this series a new theme tune was introduced. A DVD of series two was released in October 2006.
The third series aired from 14 October to 25 November 2006. There had been speculation that this would be the final series; however, Tate explained in an interview on This Morning that she had never said this and would like to at least make specials in the future.
Tate filmed a Christmas special which aired on 25 December 2007. Tate had announced that there would be no further series after the special;"Cath's late Tate show ". Daily Mirror. Retrieved 26 November 2007. however, a Christmas special was shown on 25 December 2009. Another 30-minute episode involving the Nan character was shown in January 2014. Two new Christmas specials aired on 27 and 30 December 2015, again involving Nan. On 4 January 2016, Tate announced that she did not plan to make any more ‘specials’ as she was busy with other projects.
On 24 November 2018, during the Sydney show of her Australian tour at the State Theatre, Tate revealed that there would be another series of the show, though this has not yet materialised.
Characters and sketches
This is only a small sample of descriptions of the most popular or well-known characters:
Joanie "Nan" Taylor is a foul-mouthed grandmother who constantly swears at and criticises other people, especially when they are not present. These sketches always include her grandson Jamie (Mathew Horne). She often uses phrases such as, “What a load of ol' shit!". She is typically nice to visitors in a completely over-the-top manner, then, the instant they have departed, drops the façade and says, "What a fuckin' liberty!" in a disgusted manner (usually because of a completely spurious complaint). When her grandson takes her to a pound shop she asks the price of everything that takes her interest. Paul and Sam are a Thames Estuary/Essex couple played by Tate and former EastEnders actor Lee Ross, Sam comes home from work with ‘amazing’ tales of her mundane life at work and Paul hangs on to every word, getting as excited as she does over trivial things that they blow up out of all proportion. Their catchphrases include, "What am I like, What are you like" and "I dunno". In the third series Sam and Paul only appeared in the last episode due to Lee Ross' work on EastEnders as Owen. Lauren Cooper is an argumentative and lazy teenage school-girl who gets out of awkward situations by repeating her catchphrase, "Am I bovvered?" or "Look at my face, is my face bovvered? Face? Bovvered?" In 2006, this catchphrase was named Word of the Year and entered the Oxford English Dictionary. A spokesperson for the OED commented: In How Many, How Much two office workers, Kate and Ellen, who sit next to each other. While Ellen (played by Ella Kenion) is usually keen to get on with her work, she is frequently interrupted by Kate (Tate), who asks her to guess answers to questions and becomes angry when Ellen answers incorrectly; however, when Ellen then gives the right answer, Kate just says "...Yeah", insults her, and then gets back to work. The Aga Saga Woman is an upper middle class English woman who goes into a state of shock in various, seemingly harmless situations when confronted with people, places, or products, which are lower than her own social class. She has two children, Thomas and Chloe. She is identified as "Mrs Montgomery" in series 2 and later "Mrs Taylor-Thomas" in series 3. Derek Faye is a middle-aged "gentleman" who codes strongly as a gay bachelor. He lives with his elderly mother and "hasn't found the right girl yet." When well-meaning people reach out to Derek under the assumption he is gay he becomes extremely offended and defensive, dramatically exclaiming, "What on earth are you insinuating?", "How very dare you!" and "Who, dear? Me, dear? Gay, dear? No, dear." Elaine Figgis is a 34 year old woman who lives in York and works at a bakery. She exchanges online letters and falls in love with the cannibal, murderer and criminal Jeremiah Waynwright III, who awaits execution on Death Row in Texas. Janice and Ray are a couple from Beverley, East Riding of Yorkshire who express their disgust at the various signs of multi-culturalism in their very British circle. Sources of outrage include restaurant meals, due to their perception of over-pricing or the exotic nature of the food such as grapes in a brie cheese sandwich. They perceive global foods as adulterated British fare and view such culinary transgressions as personal affronts – finally responding with their catchphrase, “The dirty bastards!" Geordie Georgie is a frequent petitioner, always trying to get her co-worker, Martin, to sponsor "me and some of the girls" in her latest charitable endeavour. With facts such as "Every 38 minutes ..." she follows her statements up with "If you don't believe me then log on to the website w, w, w, dot...". When Martin offers some amount she invariably takes umbrage and berates him with further details of the people she is trying to help. After she accepts his second offer she does something – often assaults him – to "show him what it's like". Third series only. Ally is a tactless woman with good intentions who unfortunately is a perfect example of someone with foot-in-mouth syndrome. Unwittingly she offends all those she comes into contact with at parties, and then in an attempt to dig herself out of the hole she has created, only worsens the situation. Bernie is a vulgar Irish nurse with an infectious snort, who works at a hospital who is never shy from both saying it how it is, and from airing her personal problems or feelings with everyone and anyone, particularly the male patients and doctors.
Television series Series 1 (2004) The first series of the show, which consisted of six episodes, aired from 16 February to 22 March 2004. The programme's theme tune for the first series was "In These Shoes?" by Kirsty MacColl, featured on her 2000 album Tropical Brainstorm.
In the months preceding the launch of the second series, BBC Two aired three "best of" episodes, featuring a variety of the funniest clips from the six episodes of series one, including Lauren Cooper the teenager and Joanie Taylor the foul-mouthed grandmother. Meanwhile, repeats of all six episodes of the first series aired on UKTV G2 (now Dave). Tate also appeared in a comedy sketch with boy band McFly (see charity sketches for details).
In 2004, Catherine Tate won a British Comedy Award for "Best Comedy Newcomer" for her work on the first series of The Catherine Tate Show.
Series 2 (2005) The second series aired from 21 July to 25 August 2005. Following Tate's Comic Relief appearance with McFly, and speculation of her non-existent feud with David Schwimmer,"Catherine Tate denies Schwimmer feud". Digital Spy. Retrieved 15 August 2007. it received slightly more publicity than series one in the run-up to the first episode. BBC Two also promoted the series by running trailers showing Lauren arguing with a furry dog in the shape of the channel's logo.
This series was far more successful with viewing figures than the first, securing ratings of 2.89 to 3.92 million, with the final episode receiving higher viewing figures than the episode of Extras which aired beforehand."Weekly Viewing Summary. Scroll from 24/07/05 – 28/08/05 ". BARB. Retrieved 21 January 2007. Celebrities such as Peter Kay and Jill Halfpenny made guest appearances in series two. The series also had new theme music composed by Howard Goodall. For the opening, various characters are in an open field. The camera closes in on Lauren Cooper, zooms into her eye, then zooms out of Sheila Carter's eye. The camera pans to the right, where Bernie enters. The camera zooms into her eye, then zooms out of Nan's eye, where she is seen laughing. The end of the sequence shows the main title The Catherine Tate Show. The zooming is the same for both series two and three although Sheila Carter does not appear in series three (in the 2007 Christmas Special, Sheila is replaced by Geordie Georgie).
The second series began airing in Australia on 4 April 2007 on ABC TV."The Catherine Tate Show". ABC. Retrieved 10 April 2007. Before this the BBC-owned Australian cable channel BBC UKTV had aired the complete series starting in 2004. The re-runs of the series were shown starting from 6 May 2007.
In November 2005, Tate appeared in the 77th Royal Variety Performance in the guise of teenager Lauren Cooper, accompanied by Lauren's friends, Ryan and Liese. After Lauren embarrassed herself in front of the audience, Ryan pointed out that the Queen was laughing at her. Looking up at the Royal Box, she asked, "Are you disrespecting me?" and mimicked the Queen's accent, asking, "Is one bovvered? Is one's face bovvered?", before adding, "Who is looking after the corgis?""Tate asks if Queen is 'bovvered'". BBC News. Retrieved 28 December 2006. The Queen was seen laughing at this joke, and Prince Philip also appeared to take this in good humour. There were, however, reports that the Prince was extremely unimpressed by the performance and complained to the show's executive producer."Catherine Tate: The shy star". The Independent. Retrieved 10 August 2007. She also appeared as Lauren in a special sketch for the BBC's annual Children in Need telethon. The segment was a crossover with EastEnders (see charity sketches for details).
A Christmas show was aired on 20 December 2005. It featured appearances from celebrity guests Richard Park, Charlotte Church and Chas & Dave. During the show, Paul and Sam's two children were seen for the first time: they looked and acted exactly like their parents. The characters of Margaret and the enigmatic detective, who did not appear in series two, made appearances in the Christmas special. According to BARB's official viewing figures, over 5.66 million viewers watched the show, making it the most-watched programme at the time and the most watched programme on BBC Two the week it was aired."Weekly Viewing Summary. Scroll to 25/12/05 ". BARB. Retrieved 21 January 2007. The show was also nominated for the People's Choice Award at the British Comedy Awards in 2005, but did not win after it was announced that the show had received fewer votes than Ant and Dec's Saturday Night Takeaway. In an investigation, it was revealed in May 2008 that The Catherine Tate Show was the true winner of the British Comedy Award, and that Ant and Dec were wrongly awarded; Tate had actually received more votes from the public. A report by independent law firm, Olswang, said "Robbie Williams was invited to present an award. It was understood that he would be happy [to do so] if the recipients were Anthony McPartlin and Declan Donnelly. In order to ensure his attendance, this assurance was given"; however, it is not known if Williams' comments led to the wrong announcement."ITV admits comedy award deception". BBC News, 8 May 2008. Retrieved 8 May 2008. It was also exposed that the second half of the ceremony was not broadcast live but with a delay of half-an-hour, yet viewers were still encouraged to vote for the People's Choice Award, even though the votes had been counted and the trophy presented half-an-hour before.