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The IT Crowd

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This article is about the UK TV series. For the US TV Remake, see The IT Crowd (US TV series).
The IT Crowd
File:Theitcrowd.jpg
Jen, Moss and Roy
GenreSituation comedy
Created byGraham Linehan
Directed byGraham Linehan
StarringChris O'Dowd
Richard Ayoade
Katherine Parkinson
Country of origin United Kingdom
Original languageEnglish
No. of series2
No. of episodes12 (list of episodes)
Production
ProducerAsh Atalla
EditorPaul Machliss
Camera setupMulti-camera
Running time22 min.
Original release
NetworkChannel 4
Release3 February 2006 –
Present
Related
The IT Crowd (US)

The IT Crowd (IPA: pronounced [ɪt] or [aɪ tiː])[1] is a BAFTA-nominated[2] British sitcom written by Irish director Graham Linehan and produced by British Ash Atalla for Channel 4. Currently, two series of six episodes each have been produced[3] the second series started on Friday 24 August 2007.[4] Series one was recorded in front of a live audience at Teddington Studios. The first two episodes were broadcast by Channel 4 on Friday 3 February 2006. Series two was recorded in front of a live audience at Pinewood Studios, and had originally been intended to consist of eight episodes.[5]

Situation and plot

The IT Crowd is set in the offices of Reynholm Industries, a fictitious British corporation in central London. It focuses on the shenanigans of the three-strong IT support team located in a dingy, untidy and unkempt basement - a stark contrast to the shining modern architecture and stunning London views enjoyed by the rest of the organisation.

Moss and Roy, the two technicians, are portrayed as socially inept geeks or "standard nerds". Despite the company's utter dependence on their services, they are despised by the rest of the staff. Roy's exasperation is reflected in his support techniques of ignoring the phone in the hope it will stop ringing, and using reel-to-reel tape recordings of stock IT suggestions ("Have you tried turning it off and on again?" and "Are you sure it's plugged in?"). Moss's wide and intricate knowledge of all things technical is reflected in his extremely accurate yet utterly indecipherable suggestions, while demonstrating a complete inability to deal with practical problems like extinguishing fires and removing spiders, as well as his being socially inept.

Jen, the newest member of the team, is hopelessly non-technical, despite claiming on her CV that she has "a lot of experience with computers". As Denholm, the company boss, is equally tech-illiterate, he's convinced by Jen's interview bluffing and appoints her head of the I.T. department. Her official title is "relationship manager", yet her attempts at bridging the gulf between the technicians and the business generally have the opposite effect, landing Jen in situations just as ludicrous as those of her team-mates.

Cast

  • Roy - Chris O'Dowd: Roy is a laid back, lazy IT engineer who goes to great lengths to avoid performing his role within the organisation. He constantly eats junk food and has a low regard for his career in technology, despite signs that he is more than capable. He is a big fan of comics and often reads them when he is supposed to be working. He also wears a new geek related t-shirt every episode. Before IT, he held a job as a waiter, during which time he would carry the food of rude customers in his trousers until he served it to them.
  • Maurice Moss - Richard Ayoade: Maurice Moss (Age 32, although his online dating profile seems to assert it is 22) is a typical computer nerd, and displays characteristics typical of nerd behaviour. The humour in his character is derived from his comments and his intricate and detailed knowledge. He lives with his mother, and uses online dating services. Both he and Roy feel they never get the credit they deserve in the company.
  • Jen Barber - Katherine Parkinson: Jen is a woman who enters the department in episode one as a new starter, placed there seemingly at random by boss Denholm, despite her lack of technical or technology management experience. Her role is that of a relationship manager. She has admitted to a propensity for telling lies in order to further her own goals, as evidenced by her current occupation as a member of the IT support team.
  • Denholm Reynholm - Chris Morris: Denholm was a director of Reynholm Industries, and a parody of modern earnest upper management, always ready with new and often ridiculous initiatives, such as mixed-gender lavatories in the office, stress-busting seminars, and other equally ludicrous ideas, all intended to boost performance in a company he openly boasts as employing attractive people who do very little work and all engage in adulterous relationships. Denholm was also very easily distracted, and often pays little attention to the people he happens to be having discussions with. He committed suicide by jumping out of a window after a pension scandal.
  • Douglas Reynholm - Matt Berry: The son of Denholm, Douglas takes over Reynholm Industries after his father's death. He disappeared for seven years after a court case, but returned to attend Denholm's funeral. He shares several of his father's behaviours, including his arrogance.
  • Richmond Avenal - Noel Fielding: A Goth whose new-found love for the heavy-metal band Cradle of Filth instigates his downfall from being Denholm's second-in-command. He works in the server room behind "the Red Door" all on his own, shunned by the rest of the department, who find his affected sense of gloom infectious, even though he personally describes himself as "cheerful". The episode introducing Richmond and Jen's discovery of him is something of a parody of the Tim Burton film, Edward Scissorhands.

Guest appearances

  • Daniel Carey - Oliver Chris: Daniel is the security guard that Jen falls for, but unfortunately her plans for romance go pear-shaped after she fails to help him as a "phone a friend" on Who Wants to be a Millionaire?
  • Patricia - Alice Lowe: A woman who goes on a date with Roy. The date ends badly because Roy somehow winds up with a smear of chocolate on his forehead, which is perceived by Patricia to be excrement. This convinces Roy that girls want nothing to do with gentlemen, instead preferring the company of "bullies and thugs", rather than the more obvious point that women prefer "men without poo on their heads".
  • Rebecca - Hannah Bourne: Rebecca goes on a date with Roy after he puts in a classified ad online which made him sound like a psycho.
  • Paul - Danny Wallace: Fired by Denholm from his position as cultural adviser for his choice of gift to the Japanese, but regains his position after a quick hand on the "Profanity Buzzer" - never shown to actually speak.
  • Bill Crouse - Adam Buxton: Goes on a date with Jen and after being told by Moss that she'd subsequently died, told the entire office that he was the last person to sleep with her. Nicknamed "The News" because of his propensity to announce those who he has slept with.
  • Small Paul - David Garfield: The tiny, elderly post-room worker who dies of over-exertion after pushing Jen around on his cart.
  • Dr. Julian Holmes - Toby Longworth: A stress expert who visits the company to give a presentation, and ends up very stressed himself due to Roy and Moss's behaviour.
  • Dr. Mendall - Frances Barber: The company psychiatrist who has a crush on Moss, and the feeling is mutual. Roy claims that she looks exactly like his mother.
  • Judy - Cheryl Fergison: A horribly ugly woman that Roy gets entangled with while trying to meet a woman named Julie. Roy claims she has hair on her eyes and three rows of teeth. She is revealed to be a pod-person at the very end of the episode after the credits roll, in a clear reference to Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

Episodes

Further information: [[:List of The IT Crowd episodes]]

Cultural references

The show features a large number of references to geek culture, mostly in set dressing and props. Dialogue (both technical and cultural) is usually authentic and any technobabble used often contains in-jokes for geek viewers. Some of the more obvious references include:

DVD

File:Itcrowddvd.jpg
One of the DVD menus showing a parody of the many isometric adventure games such as Head Over Heels.

The first series was released in the UK as "The IT Crowd - Version 1.0" on November 13, 2006 by 2 Entertain Video Ltd. The DVD start-up sequence and subsequent menus are designed to resemble a ZX Spectrum game, even to the extent that the loading sequence features the famous striped border. Games similar to Jet Set Willy and Head Over Heels play while menu choices are made; characters are replaced with representations of the characters in the TV show.

Also included on the DVD are subtitles in leet. The leet subtitles, for the first episode, are not a direct translation of the show and include many references to geek culture that were not included in the original episode. The second episode has the subtitles ROT13 encoded, episode three has all the words in the subtitles sorted in alphabetical order, episode four has the text base64 encoded and the last two episodes are direct leet translations.[7]

It is possible to run the decrypted VOB files for episode four from the DVD through a subtitle OCR program such as SubRip which will give you a text file containing the base64 data. After removing the extra line feeds and time indexes, the resulting file can be processed by a base64 decoder and it will give you the 15.3KB plain text of the subtitles (using Unix linefeeds). The base64 encoding does contain one error: line 423 and 424 are duplicates and one must be removed for proper decoding (the text is "LAoKCgp0aGUgcGVvcGxlIHRoYXQgdHVybmVkIH").[8]

The DVD also included a short film written and directed by Linehan called Hello Friend, which starred Ayoade in a silent role, and also had an appearance from Little Britain's David Walliams.

The first series DVD was also released in Australia on December 6, 2006.

An American version of the DVD was slated for a September 4, 2007 release, but on August 14, 2007 it was revealed that since the American version of the show has been pushed back to a early 2008 release, the dvd will be released on February 18, 2008.[9]

According to various internet retailers (including Amazon.co.uk and Play.com), the series 2 DVD is due for release on October 1, 2007, and a boxset containing both the first and second series will be released on the same day.

Broadcasting

In a first for Channel 4, each episode was available for download via the station's web site for the seven days preceding its initial TV broadcast. Downloads were only available for UK viewers and were supplied in Windows Media Video format. Each download was encoded with DRM restrictions, though there was no DRM on the first two episodes. It was nominated for best sitcom for the 2006 Rose d'Or. The program attracted the interest of the software development community worldwide, resulting in almost immediate cracking of the DRM protecting the episodes and widespread availability on peer-to-peer networks like BitTorrent.[citation needed]

In Latin America, the show is broadcast on Sony Entertainment Television. In Canada, the series made its North American debut on July 16, 2007 on G4TechTV Canada. ABC TV aired the series in Australia.

Foreign remakes

See also: The IT Crowd (US TV series)

NBC filmed the studio audience portion of a pilot for an American version of The IT Crowd on February 16, 2007. The show will be remade with an American cast, although Richard Ayoade reprises his role as Moss.[10] Jessica St. Clair plays Jen, the female lead, and Joel McHale plays as Roy.[11] The show has been picked up for a midseason debut in 2007-08.[12]

A German version of the programme has been in production since June 2007, starring Sebastian Münster, Stefan Puntigam and Britta Holm.[13]

References

  1. ^ In the DVD commentary track for series one, writer Graham Linehan says both pronunciations are as valid as each other.
  2. ^ http://www.bafta.org/site/page129.html
  3. ^ ‘The IT Crowd’ Series 2 begins tonight!,
  4. ^ Standard Nerds
  5. ^ The IT Crowd to Return for Second Series
  6. ^ Ramaswamy, Chitra (June 4, 2006). "Divine intervention". The Scotsman. Retrieved September 10, 2007. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help)
  7. ^ "IT Crowd DVD has subtitles in leet".
  8. ^ "Decoding the Base64 subtitles".
  9. ^ "IT Crowd DVD News".
  10. ^ "Richard Ayoade to star in U.S. IT Crowd too".
  11. ^ "IMDB: The IT Crowd (2007)(TV)".
  12. ^ "NBC cans 'Studio 60,' 'Jordan'".
  13. ^ "German version".
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