Mrs. Brown's Boys: Series One   Starring: Brendan O'Carroll, Jennifer Gibney, Paddy Houlihan and Fiona O'Carroll Universal Pictures (UK) RRP: £19.99 8282823 Certificate: 15 Available 03 October 2011

Nothing quite says ‘individual taste’ than comedy and this holds true for Mrs. Brown's Boys, a comedy starring Brendan O’Carroll as Dublin matriarch Agnes Brown, dressed like a latter day Irish Mrs Doubtfire.

If you missed the show in its original run on the Beeb, then here’s a chance to pick up the complete, six episode, first series.

The humour is broad, and ever so slightly offensive, with a liberal sprinkling of swear words. The scripts are likewise uneven, possibly the death sentence of a show in this environment where success is instantaneous or non-existent. What I didn’t like was the unevenness of the comedy, usually engendered by the poorer performances of some of the supporting cast, which are predominantly members of Brendan’s own family, for instance his real wife plays his daughter.

The show is filmed in front of a live audience, so some of the better pieces of the show is when Brendan breaks either the fourth wall or even challenges the whole pretence of a staged show, by walking visibly from one standing set to another. Of course, the whole conceit relies on the viewer finding middle-aged men dressed as foul mouthed women funny. If you do, then this is the show for you, as much of the humour springs from this one idea.

Disc one holds the complete six episodes, with the extras turning up on disc two. The largest extra is the pilot episode Dermot’s Dilemma, which would possibly be more impressive if it hadn’t been essentially the first episode with very few changes. The rest of the extras consist of a couple of trailers (2 min, 46 sec) which are quite funny, a number of extended scenes (10 min, 45 sec), which are ok, but you can see why they were trimmed from the show. Introductions (4 min, 37 sec) are just that with Brendan introducing the cast to the television audience. Interviews (11 min, 42 sec) has interviews with the stars and creators of the show. Outtakes (11 min, 40 sec) usually has the cast messing up their lines. The disc finishes up with Dedications (11 min, 14 sec) which has Brendan reading out the audiences dedications.

Comedy is always going to divide people, but I think that there is much to enjoy about the show and if it goes to a second series the more amateur elements will hopefully be addressed.

6

Charles Packer