Remaking classic British television is asking for trouble, even if you have some of the brains behind the original--in this case the show's creator-writer, Paul Abbott--on hand. While most Americans won't have watched Abbott's Shameless, a drama about a family with a drunk patriarch who live on a Greater Manchester council estate, we have. So we've no choice but to compare Showtime's Chicago-based version, which debuts on More4 this Thursday (at 10pm), to the original.
Though strangely pitched and oddly un-American, Shameless US isn't horrible to watch. The writing is big, brash and funny, it's well paced and almost unnecessarily faithful to the original's tone and plotting. Actually, the tone (poverty romanticised) is part of the problem. When British comedy or drama idealises social deprivation, most of the time it's charming and daft, so we're happy to suspend our disbelief. Here, it's a little bit uncomfortable and disingenuous. US TV is much better at creating sympathetic middle class families.
In fact, not since Roseanne has a US network let through a (non-deep south) fictional account of working class life. And that only worked so well because its creator Roseanne Barr was writing about what she knew. Shameless, on the other hand, feels like it's penned from above. And to balance out the being-poor-is-all-a-bit-of-a-lark vibe (getting mashed with your alcoholic dad is BRILLIANT fun, or so it seems here) they've added in hard swearing, a broken washing machine and some awkwardly angled male nudity.
But Shameless's biggest problem is its star, William H. Macy. American Frank Gallagher may be a stinking, fall-asleep-in-his-own-vomit kind of booze hound (much like our own), but he looks like a gnome crossed with a sociology lecturer. It doesn't get any better when he talks. Macy badly needs boils, a gin nose and a 60-a-day rasp.
Emmy Rossum more successfully fills the Anne-Marie Duff role. Fiona, the oldest Gallagher child and substitute parent to her siblings, has a kind of malnourished beauty, a bit like Duff. But it's Joan Cusack who squeezes out the pilot's finest performance as the Gallaghers' neurotic neighbour. You'll want to know more about her. The new Gallaghers are much less intriguing. And without a convincing Frank, I'd rather stick with the first lot.
American shameless should be called Shameful; with Hank Gallagher! Not funny as it cannot mimic British comedy as it's unique. Very disappointed, but Americans may like it. Not impressed and it will flop! (especially here in uk!)- sorry!
There is only one Frank and the American never copy British humour, they don't have a sense of humour.
I loved it. Finished the entire first season. It has production value unlike most of our awful tv shows