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Article: New Britain, new comedy.(bites: BRIEF NOTES ON NEWS AND VIEWS FROM AROUND THE WORLD)(politics)
- Article from:
- Arena Magazine
- Article date:
- June 1, 2005
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2005 Arena Printing and Publications Pty. Ltd. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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A little-noted casualty of the rise of New Labour in the UK was a generation of alternative comedians who had built careers opposing the Tories. In the 1990s, the targets of alternative comics--Thatcher, student politics (The Young Ones), monarchy, empire and colonialism (Black Adder), Thatcher again, Major and the Murdoch press (A Bit of Fry and Laurie), sexism, neo-liberalism, Thatcher and Major once again, chauvinism, war (Comic Strip Presents, The Man from Aunty)--looked to be on the back foot.
Ben Elton turned to writing musicals with Andrew Lloyd Webber, while keeping up a steady stream of books. Stephen Fry, a friend of the trouble-prone New Labour ...