Translating The Office
May 11, 2004
One of the best-loved British series of recent years, The Office, has been remade in America. The two series of The Office were a huge success in Britain, but this article in the Guardian seems to suggest that its American remake is far from reaching the same acclaim. One anonymous contributor: "I'm an American, so how am I supposed to understand British? It's practically another language."
The fact that British English and American English have evolved into two distinct languages has widely been studied, but in this case, I think there is more to it than "two countries separated by a common language". This show is so steeped in the day-to-day reality of office life in Britain that it's hard to imagine how it can be adapted to a US office, considering how different the UK and US work cultures are. Besides, the timing of the release of The Office was perfect. It was aired at a time when every other TV program was a fly-on-the-wall show about "real people", and it was a breath of fresh air to see the reality TV "genre" turned on its head.
The cultural differences make this certain type of humour completely alien in an American setting. Humour is a result of the combination of several factors. You can't extract one or several of these factors from a certain reality, place them in another cultural context and expect it to work. It is not that Americans are unable to appreciate British humour (the original version of The Office has been a cult hit in the USA), but rather that for this trend of British humour to work, it has to be in a British environment, with British characters.
So, good luck to the people in charge of making the US version of The Office. As a translator used to strolling the treacherous gateway between the UK/US and the French culture and language, I know it can't have been an easy job.
U.S. versions of British comedy shows tend to fail (in my opinion), because the American producers try to strip out everything that was original or funny about the show, and end up making it as homogenised as the rest of their output.
The U.S. remake of "Men Behaving Badly" should have been re-titled "Men Behaving Blandly".
Posted by Robert Castelo on May 11, 2004 2:48 PMAre there any US comedy shows that get made into UK or French versions?
If so, have they ever worked? Is the problem US TV Producers or translating a comedy into any other culture?
Posted by Sarah on May 11, 2004 3:12 PMI think, like Robert, that US TV producers tend to "play it safe" and remove all concepts that might be offensive to US audiences, but the main problem is the cultural barriers that can be a nightmare to overcome.
Take Friends: surely this concept of 6 friends hanging out together in a couple of flats should be easy to transfer from culture to culture, shouldn't it? Well, no. Until recently, there was no need to have flatmates in France as rents tend to be a lot more affordable than in the US or UK big cities (I never even shared a flat when I was a student).
I can't think of any US or UK show that were adapted in France, but frankly, they have no reason to do so. The French are very familiar with the US and UK popular culture (particularly the US culture, I think) and it's a lot easier to air US and UK series than try and remake them.
When the first season of Coupling was shown in the UK it was referred to as the British version of Friends (3 boys, 3 girls, twenty something dilemnas) - of course their dialogue is far pithier and sharpier than that of their American cousins.
I think back in the early 90's there was a spate of UK sitcoms based on US ones....there was a remake of Golden Girls (was it called something dreadful like Brighton Belles?) and Who's the Boss.
Posted by flaming zinc on May 12, 2004 2:13 PM@Sarah: There are a huge number of US comedy shows dubbed in German on German TV. They are very popular. I don't watch many, but of course the quality of translation varies, and sometimes the voices are not right. I quite often happen to see Mash and Frasier, and they both come over well. I remember Alf has an almost better voice in the German than in the original. It isn't possible to convey all the jokes, but because they're situation comedies they do come across.
Today I could watch Golden Girls, the Simpsons, Charmed, Alias (can't swear to all the titles being the original ones), M.A.S.H., Roseanne, the Nanny, and others.
"Three's Company" was derived from a U.K. sitcom and it did very well in the States. There are a few others but this is the only one that really stands out in my head at the moment.
Posted by Roger on June 17, 2004 2:40 PM"Sanford and Son" was also a success here in the States, and it was a remake of an older British show, "Steptoe (sp?) and Son". Remakes can be successful if done carefully and not for a quick buck - which is why I'm worried that "The Office" won't be a success here.
Posted by Christopher Hayes on June 29, 2004 5:34 AMI loved 'Steptoe and Son' . I would never have imagined transposing it to the States. Amazing !
Next someone will be telling me that the Americans did their own Fawlty Towers (did they?)
They did three versions! In one of them, they got rid of the character of Basil Fawlty... ridiculous. They all bombed.
Posted by céline on June 29, 2004 2:36 PMPrevious: May 7, 2004
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