Defending the Guilty and playing it straight

Some sitcoms are more successful than others. Some run their course and never come back – like E4’s Wasted, which never really got the cult status it deserved. Some only get a short run because their creators have bigger ambitions – like Edgar Wright’s Spaced, which got the cult status it deserved, about 20 years ago. And some sitcoms – like Peep Show or Fresh Meat – have this immense staying power. One of the things that I think crafts a great sitcom, one that can retain viewers from series to series, is a sense of emotional resonance. Fresh Meat was definitely funny and occasionally also cruel, but it mixed light comedy with tension, creating difficult situations out of overarching jokes. Student sleeping with her professor? What if she falls in love with his son, without knowing they’re related? And then loses both of them, dealing a crushing blow to her academic career? You could argue that the first half of that synopsis is amusing, but it’s backed by the cutting counterpoint of the inevitable consequences in the second half. And that’s what makes the best sitcoms: that they stay grounded in the consequences of their gags, like the bit in Peep Show where Mark and Jeremy (hilariously) murder a dog, but end up pretending to eat it to cover their tracks, only to lose the cushy job (Mark) and the cushty girl (Jeremy) when the jig is up. Both of these sitcoms were written by Jesse Armstrong and Sam Bain, and Defending The Guilty has a lot of their hallmarks despite sharing none of the cast and very little relation besides. In fact, the series was written by Kieron Quirke, whose previous writing credits include shows no one has heard of and Cuckoo, which was… fine. But that’s by the by; now he’s done this.

Defending The Guilty is a British sitcom based on the book of the same name that focuses on the mishaps of a barrister-in-training called Will (played, exceptionally, by Will Sharpe) and an ensemble cast of characters who open as (admittedly earnest) caricatures but become well fleshed out by the end of the programme’s 6 episode run. Will is running around London for his teacher Caroline (Katherine Parkinson) and trying not to run out of steam through an inevitable millennial existential crisis (it should be noted, for the court, that this is an extremely relatable trope). Episodes cover a daft selection of topics, from a mock trial with actors who act up, to a running gag that the “creaky system” is making a trial impossible to run to time.

What Defending The Guilty manages to do very well is spin ridiculous ideas into emotionally resonant set pieces. One of the tenant barristers, Pia, is performing so well that two others, Danielle and Liam, make a ploy to share her disgusting secret and knock her down a few pegs. It works, but in the resulting kerfuffle Pia becomes so mentally wracked she ends up sharing Will’s infidelity with his girlfriend like it’s nothing – precisely because she now has nothing to lose. A rumour about Pia wanking a boy off into a cafetière helps destroy Will’s relationship. And when it is destroyed, it is properly destroyed; Will becomes homeless, he loses his morale, and he has one of those reticent meetings with his girlfriend where things are hashed out but nothing really changes. But because this is a comedy the meeting takes place in a pub on a match day. Still, it carries the energy of the situation incredibly well in a way few comedy shows manage to do.

A few years back, the BBC’s The Wrong Mans ventured to combine a comedy with a spy thriller and it got two series out of the idea before James Corden became too big of a deal to play a portly mail supply worker for the council. The Wrong Mans was funny and it was also thrilling, but it couldn’t do what Defending The Guilty does. Precisely because it was trying to make everything into a joke, its spy thriller elements couldn’t help but feel ridiculous, comical, staged even. It couldn’t cash its thriller cheques because it had thrown all its money into the metaphorical Bank of Comedy. Defending The Guilty doesn’t do this, and neither do Bain and Armstrong’s sitcoms.

The distinction is clear: there’s either a normal narrative told for laughs, or a laughable narrative told like it’s normal. Banal bants, or bants told banal.

The Wrong Mans, and other sitcoms like the IT Crowd and The Thick of It tend to fit the former, which means that when things suddenly get serious they tend to miss the mark. Peep Show, Fresh Meat, Wasted, Spaced - all the best sitcoms of our century, really, go for the latter. No one really kills a dog then ends up eating it for the sake of a girl. No one really installs a jacuzzi in their student flat to get some at a party. No one really pretends to be in a relationship just to get a London flat (actually, that’s probably less ridiculous than it was in ’99). Suffice to say, the best British sitcom work is built on playing absurdity straight and then shrugging when things go off the rails, fast.

There’s even an example or two of this working in America – although sometimes things tend to go overboard. The Office and its American rehash both take a regular office environment and implant some surreal elements, like a near-sociopathic boss and a 3-year-long engagement, and then they play things entirely straight. This worked perfectly for the British version, and it worked for the American version too until it started straying too far from the realms of banality into total nonsense.

Anything by Dan Harmon tends to have a similar vibe of bants told banal – it was only really when he was taken off Community that it strayed totally into the realm of the absurd.

The same can be said for The Good Place; a ridiculous plot with a deadpan lead and a supporting cast that take their stereotypes to a tee. However, The Good Place’s obligation to philosophically dissect its own narrative made it too easy for things to become convoluted: the show became a ridiculous narrative, told ridiculously, otherwise known as The Noel Fielding Luxury Comedy Supercategory. That could never happen on Defending The Guilty, a show entirely about, well, lawyers (losers) (lawyers).

For the record: part of the reason I fell in love with Defending The Guilty was because the way it handled its breakup really resonated with me. But it’s also what the show does afterwards: an almost theatrical climax that brings all the ensemble cast together to try and work things through. And, beautifully, in the end, no one really gets what they want, but that almost makes it more effective: it makes the ending believable. Bants told banal. Take note, tenants; and here’s to a second series.