15 Best British Sitcoms Of All Time

14. Extras

BBCBBCThe success of The Office clearly gifted Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant with a lot of trust and a luxurious budget to work with on their next project €“ which seemingly led to the pair smiling, rubbing their hands together and then discussing all the A-list actors that they would like to work with. The sitcom's impressive list of cameos includes Ben Stiller, Kate Winslet and Samuel L. Jackson - not to mention the money left over to entice the high-in-demand €˜Barry off Eastenders€™. Not only did the writing team convince the elite of Hollywood to appear on the sitcom, they also managed to persuade them to play unflattering parodies of their media portrayals. Orlando Bloom spends the duration of his appearance assuring anybody willing to listen (or himself) that he is a far more valid sex-symbol than his Pirates of the Caribbean co-star Johnny Depp. As easy as it is to get absorbed in all the high calibre cameos, the celebrities are never the main focus of an episode and are instead just very expensive subplots. The sitcom is centred around the anti-social, frustrated Andy, who is desperate to advance beyond work as an extra and his ditzy best friend Maggie, who€™s less driven by adjusting her career path and more focused on her lust to find a boyfriend. As the kings of awkward humour, Gervais and Merchant have laid out a whole host of uncomfortable occurrences that will have you bashing the rewind button just to confirm that your eyes were not deceiving you.
Contributor
Contributor

A wrestling enthusiast, currently educating the youth of Taiwan English; there are now a bunch of Asian kids running around with Yorkshire accents. Read about that trip and others at dragonstravel.com.