Married For Life
- TV sitcom
- ITV1
- 1996
- 7 episodes (1 series)
Adaptation of US sitcom Married... With Children. It focused on the particularly dysfunctional Butler family, lead by selfish shoe salesman Ted. Stars Russ Abbot, Susan Kyd, Lucy Blakely, Peter England, Hugh Bonneville and Julie Dawn Cole
Press clippings
Failed UK remakes of successful US sitcoms demand time
If you been with Tellyspotting as a P1 since Day 1, or if you have joined the conversation at any point over the course of the last ten years, you are probably acutely aware of my lack of tolerance for poorly done American television remakes of British television output. That said, it never dawned on me that when the tables are turned, the track record is not much different when you look at UK attempts to remake American situation comedies, even ones were considered quite popular from an audience standpoint. Here are a four examples I found to easily illustrate my point.
Bill Young, Tellyspotting, 27th March 2021Can British remakes of American shows work?
Hang Ups, the new Stephen Mangan comedy based on Lisa Kudrow's original, is a rare example of the UK successfully taking on a US hit.
David Stubbs, The Guardian, 8th August 2018Failed British re-makes of American telly
When you look at UK attempts to re-make American situation comedies that were considered quite popular from an audience standpoint, they don't all work either. Here are a four examples I found to easily illustrate my point...
Tellyspotting, 4th May 2016Life sentence on sitcom Death Row
The man and his black box must have worked overtime on last night's Married For Life (ITV), but his heroic attempts to breathe life into the show were as futile as giving artificial respiration to a month-old corpse. [...] When even the TV times describes a new ITV sitcom as "seriously unfunny", you know it's going to be bad, but last night's episode exceeded my worst fears, hitting an all-time low for the network.
Victor Lewis-Smith, Evening Standard, 6th March 1996