Dinner for One: British comedy Germans have been laughing at for years (2018) | Hacker News Reader

Dinner for One: British comedy Germans have been laughing at for years (2018)

theguardian.com

152 pointsTomte82 comments

Literally watching it right now. The best part of the German sketch is that before the sketch there's a presenter explaining why it's funny.

I think the little blurb at the beginning is there because not everyone watching it knows English.

Because the humour is so physical though, that blurb is mostly all you really need to enjoy it even if you only know German.

The blurb is there because Germans are stereotypically terrible at humor (especially irony and sarcasm). It's a metajoke.

I can only hope you're being ironic, in missing that; or it's now doubly meta.

Speaking of little known shows in their own country becoming iconic outside,

Are Germans aware how popular the "Didi's Comedy Show" was in India during the 80s?

I grew up with that show and still crack up at Didi's antics.

Dieter Hallervorden? He used to be a staple in New Year‘s programmes, but not so much in the last ten, twenty years or so. As a child I always watched his shows.

No, I never would have guessed people would know him in India.

That's strange! I liked him when I was little, and today I know that he did and maybe still does some more serious stuff as well (mostly on stage). Have you seen his movies?

At least this German did not, and would not have guessed in a million years. Thank you for telling us this; it completely baffles me, and I love it.

His movies from the 80s are worth watching, especially "Non-Stop Trouble with My Double", because they have this comedic bitter tragedy I haven't encountered anywhere else.

I guess the opposite of this is that in Austria and Germany they don't really know The Sound of Music. And Edelweiss is not a song everyone in Austria and Germany sing all the time. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edelweiss_(song)#Austrian_atti...

If you have seen the sound of music a few times, you will surely enjoy Slavoj Zizek's brief analysis of it :)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wiTum8eQ51E

Can confirm. All I know about that movie is that at some point a Nun says "What is it you can't face?"

What does it mean in this context to be the opposite of this?

It's not really the opposite though.

The opposite of "British thing people in Germany love but few in UK have heard of" would be "German thing people in country X love but few in Germany have heard of".

"The Sound of Music" doesn't really count as an example of the opposite, because it is more of an American thing than a German or Austrian thing. It is an English-language 1965 American musical film, based on an English-language 1959 American stage musical, based on an English-language book written and published in America by an Austrian-American woman. Despite the Austrian setting, and parts of the film being filmed in Austria (the remainder was filmed in LA), on the whole it is more American than Austrian.

There were two West German films made based on the same book, Die Trapp-Familie (1956) and Die Trapp-Familie in Amerika (1958), and the creators of the 1959 American musical got their initial inspiration for the project from watching those West German films. Still that doesn't change the fact that the American musical and American film are American not German or Austrian. And I'm not sure how much of the actual content of the American musical and film are due to those West German films, as opposed to them merely being a motivator for the musical's creation.

opposite in the sense that everyone in austria and germany knows "dinner for one" and practically noone knows sound of music. while "dinner for one" is relatively unknown in other countries, despite being in english, but most know about "sound of music". i myself heard people talk about "sound of music" when i was travelling in europe and i only first watched it while in latvia. knowledge about "dinner for one" is only spreading in recent decades as it gets shared on social media and international discussion forums, as exemplified in this very thread.

Dinner for One is from the UK but hardly anyone in the UK knows about it while people in Germany love it. The Sound of Music is about a real Austrian family but relatively unknown in Austria and Germany while people in the USA (and I would guess other English speaking countries) love it.

I wouldn't think that musicals would translate well. And the von Trapp family still owns their resort near Stowe, Vermont, so most skiers in the Northeast at least would have heard of them.

https://www.spiegel.de/kultur/tv/dinner-for-one-sendezeiten-...

Airs on NDR, WDR, MDR, SWR, BR, HR, RBB (the regional broadcasters, N stands for North, W for West, easy enough) a total of 11 times, plus 6 times in re-stagings in various dialects (no dubbing here).

Then once on Das Erste (The First, run by the collaborative federal broadcaster ARD, of the above).

And once on ORF's (Austria's public broadcaster) ORF 1.

And the Swiss have their own recording of the same sketch, performed by the same two, but with variations of course, once each on SRF 1 and SRF 2 respectively, and the German version on SRF 2 once.

In a nutshell, it's on the TV schedule 22 times. Probably a bit more than that if you properly count RB and SR (smaller broadcasters whose schedule is mostly affiliated with NDR and SWR respectively). If you count those separately, add another 7 times.

> And the Swiss have their own recording of the same sketch, performed by the same two, but with variations of course

Since the Swiss recording is the one that was shown on Swedish television every New Year's Eve when I was young (maybe still is, Idunno), I've always assumed that's the one they showed in Germany and elsewhere too.

TIL that there are variations. I'd love to watch the Swiss version too see how different the gags are from take to take.

No, it‘s not hyperbole. Every German can quote at least parts of the sketch.

I‘ve just seen it the first time tonight, and will at least once more. There are at least 14 broadcasts tonight across the public TV stations. And several variations (Cologne dialect etc.) on top.

Something like 50% of the people in Norway watch this on "little Christmas eve" - December 23rd. For a lot of people, this is what officialy starts off the Christmas vacation.

Edit: Source: I'm norwegian and have watched this sketch with my family every single year since I was born.

I'd heard of it as a thing some years ago, but never actually saw it "in the wild" until I was skiing in Norway over Christmas a few years ago. The hotel had it on in one of the lounges, which filled with a variety of nationalities to watch it, notably lacking the British. We're quite mystified.

In fact, one year they were forced to put it on twice, as it was shown as part of a variety show, and was moved earlier than billed, causing an uproar when people realized they'd missed it.

AKA Christmas Adam

I just watched it about an hour ago (same procedure as every year) and this time I was somehow amazed at how good the drunkenness is acted. I did quit drinking alcohol somewhat over 4 years ago, and watching him stumble really reminded me of my worst days in my teens. For a second it made me want to feel that imbalance again, but then I remembered the rest that comes with it.

The actor was a teetotaler as well!

TIL he did it on hard mode. It is much easier to play very drunk when (even very) slightly drunk.

Quite long takes as well. Skillfully acted

Red Skelton and Lucille Ball did the same thing https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KY3eOtJwOhE

"Lucy Wins A Racehorse" -- was that the link you meant to post?

The Vita-Meata-Vega-Min patent medicine act: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=VitaMeataVegaMin&iar=videos&iax=vi...

Yeah no, thank you, that feels even more useless. Why would anyone but you click through and examine your myriad search results?

Since you didn't post a single actually relevant link, we'll provisionally conclude that Lucy didn't actually "do the same thing". You know what to do if you want to convince anyone of the opposite.

Full sketch, with the German introduction skipped.

https://youtu.be/To8g9XxAdXs?t=147

It's available on the Mediathek (streaming platform for public broadcast TV). Either from mediathekviewweb.de (search for Dinner for One), or direct links: https://mediandr-a.akamaihd.net/progressive/2024/1216/TV-202... (recoloured version) https://mediandr-a.akamaihd.net/progressive/2024/1216/TV-202... (original version)

Ironically it's blocked in Britain!

You are not missing much. It is amusing, but it's popularity is quite baffling.

Alcohol and it's something you can have on while sitting in the living room with the family, talking about random shit. It's a vibe thing.

I certainly wouldn't put it on to watch alone. But in that setting? It's fun.

For some it's just a beloved ritual and shared experience :-)

I've certainly seen it at least as many times sober as I have seen it drunk. First as a kid of course, but also now that I'm older (even though we have no kids and no other requirement not to drink). I have to admit it's funnier while enjoying a nice drink, though ;-)

Yes, I can see that. But it's almost unknown in the UK so it wouldn't work for us.

After each punctuation mark, you could have added "to me."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5XhiJP4qoQ

It's blocked here in Germany too, what the ...

VPN abschalten? :-D

Or go for the full Plattdeutsch experience. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2yiS7i43qQ

I grew up in Australia; our Danish neighbours introduced this to us. SBS (the Special Broadcasting Service, a government-owned TV station that serves Australia's many migrant communities) shows it every New Year's Eve, although always at a different time.

Same In Sweden where this has been a fixed point on television for decades. Christmas Eve - julafton in Swedish, when Christmas is celebrated here - means "Kalle Anka's jul" (Donald Duck's Christmas) on TV, 15.00, 1 hour long. New year's eve means "Grevinnan och betjänten" (the Countess and the servant) which is the Swedish name for this skit.

Yup, American expat in Germany here just watched it with family. I didn't understand the fascination but it's become funnier over the years, particularly with kids.

"The same procedure as every year" - the repetition, the ritual is a big part of it.

You may want to suggest they watch this as well >> https://archive.org/details/hogans-heroes-s-01-e-01-the-info...

Had never heard of it before meeting German spouse. Now I can’t get away from it, they’ve all gone next door to watch it.

Everyone watches it in Denmark for new years as well. Probably one of my earliest tv memories. Only met a couple of brits (all of them older) who knew the sketch.

I'm British, but had never heard of it until I spent New Year with my wife's family in Denmark a few years ago. Indeed it does seem to be compulsory viewing there, and no-one could believe I didn't know it.

Not just in Germany - I was pretty amazed it was little known in the UK. But I guess every country has their supposed iconic cultural touchstones of outside countries the mentioned countries know little about.

BTW: Go watch it if you can find it; it's actually pretty funny the first time around.

Most people who watch it will only understand the final joke after many viewings.

Definitely true for me, but then, I was a kid when I first saw it.

Ours is watching A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum. No body else thinks it's so funny.

I actually watched it as a stage production. I have never seen the film beyond this clip.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Ahqu1nd3Zu8

Hard to believe that Sweeney Todd was from the same man.

There are many Sondheim productions around Chicago. The last one that I saw was A Little Night Music.

Watched it for the first time today.

Horny men + women being the butt of every single joke. As if it was written by a horny teenage boy. Sure it’s the product of its time but it’s for the good “they don't make films like that anymore”

But surprisingly true to the actual Roman source material (it is basically several comedies by Plautus stitched together). Romans had a rather crude sense of humor by today's standards.

Right up there with German fascination with David Hasselhoff

David Haselnuss in Germany

This kinda reminds me of the anime Silver Fang (Ginga Nagareboshi Gin), which is hugely popular in Finland (well, at least among the millenials), but apparently quite unknown anywhere else, even in Japan where it originated from.

This reminds me of the butler android Kryten from the 90s tv show Red Dwarf. When we're introduced to him in the show, he is attending to the crew of a spaceship, however they have all been dead for an unspecified length of time. But apparently he's named "after a character called 'Crichton' in a play/film called The Admirable Crichton" [1].

[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/RedDwarf/comments/1aoio58/the_origi...

Ironically despite my central European heritage, I didn't watch Dinner for One, but I just watched that episode this December 29th, being on a Red Dwarf re-watch spree... again.

Just this morning I complained about the a news article here listing all the times and channels it will be broadcasted. I mean as a German it’s kinda normal to watch it at least once in life. My English teacher used it as a way to do role play (next to singing Whams last Christmas, the fact that I still know the lyrics speaks volumes how often we had to sing it ;))

Back then one had to wait for New Year’s Eve to watch it. But in the age of YouTube and Co the magic is lost for me. Yes people cling to only watch it on TV only on new years as a tradition.

See Google Today: https://www.google.com/search?q=dinner+for+one

Why did this catch on in Europe? It's got some humor and hint of sex, and easy-to-understand English, but is there something more?

There's some Anglophilia among certain parts of the population. They like to create a certain idea of Britishness, and like to associate themselves with that mental image, hoping it will make them appear sophisticated and slightly quirky in a way that makes them superior to the common rabble.

Feels hard to believe "Anglophilia" is the main reason people watch it, when it's all about making over-the-top fun -- way beyond Wodehouse, even -- of all the things those "Anglophiles" could be reasonably supposed to love.

Mystified as to why NDR (German TV station) would have wanted to record an English language performance of this sketch in 1963.

Would they not have preferred a German version? Was there a lot of English language TV being broadcast in Germany at that time?

(based on the German Wikipedia article) Freddie Frinton, the main actor, refused to make the performance in German. He worked for the British army in world war II and didn't like Germany much.

That's OK and perfectly reasonable, we all love him and Dinner for One just the same.

Version with puppets (Bernd the Bread is a popular German character):

https://youtu.be/NkS4H5fLcq4?si=QOblB3_C8WeuB4jv

Jesus Christ now it's on HN, too? I literally cannot escape mention of this on Silvester. /hj

t. German

Never heard "Silvester" before and thought it was some new German social network. Turns out it's just "New Year's Eve" in German.

Named after pope Silvester I., who happened to die on 31.12. .. somewhere around 300 AD I think

I'd guess in most countries that follow the Name Day[1] tradition (most countries in Europe and Latin America, it appears), Sylvester's day is on Dec 31st[2]. The Germans just use the name to refer to the day (and spell it with an 'i' -- which TIL seems to be the original spelling); dunno, maybe others do too.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Name_day

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Sylvester%27s_Day

At this point I think it's a bit of an NYE tradition on HN to link and upvote that guardian article from 2018. I don't mind it, less confused blank faces when I accidentally recite parts of it to people who aren't German (or Norwegian, apparently)

Same procedure as every year.

In general: You should upvote stories you don’t like and be happy. Now you can click on „hide“ and all further submissions will be dupes. Otherwise you‘d see lots of similar submissions of other articles about it.

that was very funny. thank you!

I don‘t know anyone who watches this.

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