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Arrested Development Goes To The UK: The Trump family in London
The Trumps are coming! Expect it to go as well as a US sitcom episode set in London
The one immutable law about TV sitcoms is the show should never leave its usual setting. Sex And The City’s worst episodes were when Carrie went to Los Angeles and – ooh la la! – Paris, where les français were très rude but the croissants were fantastique. That cultural insight looked positively authentic compared with the trip to Abu Dhabi in the second film, where “the girls” were terrorised by swarthy men and befriended by alluring ladies. This is what happens when a show forgets its appeal is rooted in a particular place, and when the scriptwriters have apparently never been abroad. Suddenly its site-specific references are swapped for national cliches even the makers of National Lampoon’s European Vacation would reject as “a bit obvious”.
Which brings me to the forthcoming episode of Arrested Development Goes To The UK, AKA Trump’s state visit. In a plot twist no one saw coming, Trump is bringing not just Ivanka, the daughter he once said he would date if they weren’t related, but his less date-able adult children, too: Donnie Jr, Eric… and Tiffany! Trump’s daughter with second wife Marla Maples is not a regular character, so it’s exciting when she makes an unexpected appearance. Sort of like on The Cosby Show when Lisa Bonet would come back “from college”, AKA shooting the sex thriller Angel Heart with Mickey Rourke. I’m not insinuating Tiffany is up to something similar, but I bet she’s having more fun than her half-siblings.
The Trump family’s overlaps with the Bluth family from Arrested Development have been the one consistent thing about them: there’s the shady, property-dealing father (George/Donald Trump); the stupid son desperate for his father’s approval (Gob/Donnie Jr); the amoral daughter who mistakes her own idiocy for genius (Lindsay/Ivanka); and the son who seems even dumber than the other one (Buster/Eric). I once thought Jared Kushner (also coming to London) was Michael, the one son trying to hold the Bluths together. But he is clearly Tobias, the moronic son-in-law, so maybe Tiffany is Michael. We’ll find out on this trip when she stops her father pussy-grabbing a minor royal.
Although TV shows always go wrong when they go abroad, they go especially wrong in Britain. Parks And Recreation, The Simpsons, Friends: all excellent shows, all instantly unwatchable when transplanted to SW1. Interestingly, they all went wrong in exactly the same ways, because there is a cliche checklist American sitcoms must follow: cringe-tastic appearances by random British celebrities; the obligatory sightseeing montage; scene in or outside Buckingham Palace; American character having a romance with British twit. So while it might have been dispiriting to watch Matt LeBlanc and Matthew Perry mug it up with Sarah Ferguson and Richard Branson (just your typical slice of London life), it is helpful in preparing us for what will happen on this state visit.
...
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/jun/01/trumps-are-coming-us-sitcom-episode-set-in-london
The one immutable law about TV sitcoms is the show should never leave its usual setting. Sex And The City’s worst episodes were when Carrie went to Los Angeles and – ooh la la! – Paris, where les français were très rude but the croissants were fantastique. That cultural insight looked positively authentic compared with the trip to Abu Dhabi in the second film, where “the girls” were terrorised by swarthy men and befriended by alluring ladies. This is what happens when a show forgets its appeal is rooted in a particular place, and when the scriptwriters have apparently never been abroad. Suddenly its site-specific references are swapped for national cliches even the makers of National Lampoon’s European Vacation would reject as “a bit obvious”.
Which brings me to the forthcoming episode of Arrested Development Goes To The UK, AKA Trump’s state visit. In a plot twist no one saw coming, Trump is bringing not just Ivanka, the daughter he once said he would date if they weren’t related, but his less date-able adult children, too: Donnie Jr, Eric… and Tiffany! Trump’s daughter with second wife Marla Maples is not a regular character, so it’s exciting when she makes an unexpected appearance. Sort of like on The Cosby Show when Lisa Bonet would come back “from college”, AKA shooting the sex thriller Angel Heart with Mickey Rourke. I’m not insinuating Tiffany is up to something similar, but I bet she’s having more fun than her half-siblings.
The Trump family’s overlaps with the Bluth family from Arrested Development have been the one consistent thing about them: there’s the shady, property-dealing father (George/Donald Trump); the stupid son desperate for his father’s approval (Gob/Donnie Jr); the amoral daughter who mistakes her own idiocy for genius (Lindsay/Ivanka); and the son who seems even dumber than the other one (Buster/Eric). I once thought Jared Kushner (also coming to London) was Michael, the one son trying to hold the Bluths together. But he is clearly Tobias, the moronic son-in-law, so maybe Tiffany is Michael. We’ll find out on this trip when she stops her father pussy-grabbing a minor royal.
Although TV shows always go wrong when they go abroad, they go especially wrong in Britain. Parks And Recreation, The Simpsons, Friends: all excellent shows, all instantly unwatchable when transplanted to SW1. Interestingly, they all went wrong in exactly the same ways, because there is a cliche checklist American sitcoms must follow: cringe-tastic appearances by random British celebrities; the obligatory sightseeing montage; scene in or outside Buckingham Palace; American character having a romance with British twit. So while it might have been dispiriting to watch Matt LeBlanc and Matthew Perry mug it up with Sarah Ferguson and Richard Branson (just your typical slice of London life), it is helpful in preparing us for what will happen on this state visit.
...
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/jun/01/trumps-are-coming-us-sitcom-episode-set-in-london
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