“Kath & Kim” Makes American TV Look…Awful
While watching the news last night on a friend’s couch, an ad came on for the season premiere of Kath & Kim. I’d read a little about the show and knew Molly Shannon and Selma Blair played the leads, and although the review I’d perused from the SF Chronicle’s Tim Goodman had been negative, I was still curious to see just how bad the show really was.
Goodman called the original show “a fantastically funny Australian comedy,” but that the Americanized copy “goes into the record books on these shores as a contender for worst remake ever.” That may be putting it too lightly considering I thought the show absolutely bombed. My Australian flatmate had to leave the room after only two minutes of mother-daughter conversation, and he’s actually a fan of Blair.
What really kills the pilot is the script - which isn’t at all funny - and the characters, who are downright annoying from the start. Kath, the mother figure played by Shannon, is introduced in the first scene wearing a full aerobic getup (thong leotard and all) and running around like a hyper Yorkie as she begs and whinges for her daughter, Kim (Blair) to give her new boyfriend, a sandwich maker at the mall (where a good portion of the episode takes place) a chance. She needn’t have bothered with Kim’s stamp of approval: Kim is the epitome of the kind of spoiled person I cannot stand, and Kath puts up with way too much shit from her. I cringed when Kim invited herself on Kath’s dinner date and then tried to order dumplings for the cute guy on a date at another table, but aside from making a face at Kim from across the table, Kath hardly reacted.
Kim is married to a guy who is clearly whipped (though in his wedding vows he claims his love for her is, like, unbelievable), but she tries to divorce him because she “didn’t sign up for making dinner and caring about how anyone’s day was.” Okay, that was kinda funny…until he convinces her to take him back when he buys her a singlet that says “Trophy Wife” across the front. Gag me with a spoon, this might be worse than My Super Sweet 16.
America should just stick with mother-daughter winners like Gilmore Girls, where the mothers are witty and the daughters are actually likeable. I feel like I owe my mom a hug just to remind myself that not everyone’s like this.
Who at Seven thought this was a good idea, showing 30 minutes of unfunny, 90210 America that seems to mock a fun-loving Australian classic? And more importantly, why did I put myself through the agony of watching it? LiveNews’ Jesse Perez answers:
“…someone really should be testing the water over at Seven - the choice to run a filtered down American version of a hugely popular, and culturally relevant program, and not expect it to crash and burn with ferocious intensity can only be described as madness.
Although, having said that, it’s a certainty people will tune in to see just how bad it is.
Perhaps that was the grand plan from the beginning.” Worked for me.
