What We Do In The Shadows review: Packed with jokes, there’s still plenty of life left in this vampire sitcom, writes CHRISTOPHER STEVENS
What we do in the shadows
Graves for Britain
Every loving parent believes this is their mission. “I can transform this blank canvas of a boy,” declared the deluded vampire Laszlo, “into the most interesting adult that has ever existed.”
The boy, whose name is The Boy, is not actually a boy, in the horror comedy What We Do In The Shadows (BBC2). He is the offspring of the world’s most boring vampire, Colin Robinson (Mark Proksch) – a toddler in a romper with an adult’s face superimposed by CGI. It’s remarkably creepy.
This blood-sucking sitcom started as a spin-off of the 2014 film co-written by Rita Ora’s husband, Taika Waititi, and has wrapped itself in so many layers of jokes that the new series should come with background information.
Most comedies reset at the beginning of each episode and return to the starting situation. This adds new complexities every week. Ultimately, it will have a backstory more complicated than Doctor Who.
Nevertheless, the stories revolve around two basic relationships. Laszlo (Matt Berry) and his undead wife Nadja (Natasia Demetriou) are crazy about lust, even though they can’t stand each other half the time. Nadja has a supernatural acquaintance: a ventriloquist dummy that looks and sounds just like her, but explaining that now is far too complicated.
Novak (Kayvan Novak) and Guillermo de la Cruz (Harvey Guillen) in What We Do in the Shadows (BBC2)
This blood-sucking sitcom started as a spin-off of the 2014 film co-written by Rita Ora’s husband, Taika Waititi, and has wrapped itself in so many layers of jokes
They share a dilapidated Gothic mansion on New York’s Staten Island with a lonely, vain, medieval warlord named Nandor (Kayvan Novak), whose only friend is his devoted servant Guillermo (Harvey Guillen). . . who happens to be a hereditary vampire hunter.
The plot twists threaten to be overwhelming, but are offset by a barrage of one-liners and jokes that burst from the script like bats from a cave.
While Nandor and Nadja visited Europe (by ship, in packing crates, the only way self-respecting vampires can travel), Laszlo let the house fall apart. He’s busy teaching The Boy to “sit” and “wait” before eating cereal from a dog bowl.
He’s also hooked on a real estate renovation and resale show brilliantly titled Go Flip Yourself. Instead of applying what he learns to fixing up his own house, he calls repairmen and devours them as they arrive—the vampire version of ordering takeout.
Berry’s vocal extravaganzas, all drawn-out vowels and tortured mispronunciation, were part of the joy of his actor sitcom Toast Of London. He keeps them under control here so that we can enjoy each one and the joke never gets old.
Professor Alice Roberts is more interested in the long dead than the undead, as she delves much deeper than the vampiric Middle Ages in Digging For Britain (BBC2).
As she wandered through northern England and Scotland, she visited a Pictish settlement on the side of a mountain, and a bridge in Durham where Christian pilgrims threw trinkets into the river for good luck.
Professor Alice Roberts (pictured) is more interested in the long dead than the undead, as she digs much deeper than the vampiric Middle Ages in Digging For Britain (BBC2).
But the most important research took place at Carlisle Cricket Club, in the shadow of Hadrian’s Wall, where the buried ruins of a Roman bathhouse have been discovered. The site is enormous, with foundations so deep that the building must have been two stories high; a spa fit for a Caesar, probably built for Emperor Septimius Severus.
Professor Alice inspected small semi-precious stones that fell from Roman jewelry into the sauna more than 1,800 years ago. Apparently the heat caused the glue holding them in place to melt.
Details like this make this a show that keeps me muttering, “Look forward to that.”
For example, I had no idea that climate change was causing crop failures in Saxon England during a mini ice age caused by an Icelandic volcano. The things you learn, huh?