It seems that the TV show "Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps" is always being shown somewhere on satellite TV at some point of the night and early morning. Flicking through the channels tonight after my Halloween Poker tournament (the cards were not with me tonight, but satisfied with the way I played - didn't make any mistakes and made some very good lay downs) it seemed that the dreaded sit-com was on almost every other channel. It's not a programme I would usually advise you to watch. It's rather broad in its tone and completely predictable and really life is too short. Also almost inexplicably it is named after a pop song and yet does not use that pop song as its theme tune. The only explanation I can think of is that they came up with the title and then the person who wrote the song decided they didn't want it used on this pile of cack and refused permission. And then rather than having to use any imagination and come up with another title they just stuck with it and wrote their own song (in which the singer asks for one pint of lager and a packet of crisps - so even their own song doesn't work!)
But I did end up watching one of the many episodes I had the choice of viewing as I noticed it was being signed for the deaf and I found that watching the poor woman forced to essentially mime the filth and rubbish that was on screen was far more entertaining than the programme itself. Let me rephrase that as it implies the programme might be slightly entertaining. Watching the woman signing was entertaining, unlike anything in the actual comedy.
Not only was it educational - I learned sign language for titwank (though to be honest my first guess as to what that might be would have turned out to be completely correct), also more amusingly that the word for monk is a kind of gesture where a hood is pulled up over the head - but it was a drama in itself, imagining the inner struggle of the woman doing the signing. Surely she found the programme terrible rubbish and it demeaned her to be forced to translate it. Was this a punishment for some transgression during another programme or is it just the first rung on the ladder to get to sign for one of the proper programmes? The inner struggle was as fascinating and affecting as anything in Hamlet. And I felt sorry for the deaf. Surely one of the few advantages of being unable to hear is that you CAN'T hear the dialogue of "Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps."
Also, somewhat unusually I thought, the woman also signed the audience's laughter. I don't know if this is a regular convention, but as the sign was a kind of sarcastic "Ho Ho Ho" it ended up looking more like a subtle satire of the shitness of the jokes or the moronic sense of humour of the braying audience. Even if it wasn't, the fact that she felt it was necessary to signal when the supposed jokes have occurred.
Anyway it made me laugh more than anything has done for a little while and I heartily recommend that you watch it. It is comedic alchemy, turning shit into gold. Plus if you watch it regularly you will be able to swear effectively at any deaf people you know or see in the street.
