Office politics American style

The Office
Herald rating: * * * *
Universal DVD

Scranton, Pennsylvania, is new Slough as The Office crosses the Atlantic with equally cringe-inducing results. Starring: Steve Carell, Rainn Wilson.

Caption2: BRIT PACK: Ricky Gervais, as cringe-inducing manager David Brent, and his team.

In an office in Scranton, Pennsylvania, the same cringe-inducing drama and comedy is taking place as that in Slough.

And cynics said it couldn't be done: a successful American adaptation of the British telly series The Office.

The Brit-humour written by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant was too layered and wry; the cringe-inducing self-belief of Gervais as David Brent - the chilled-out entertainer-cum-manager - was too dark and uncomfortable; it was too subtle for the America audience ... Of course, with last week's Emmy for best comedy, The Office has not only exported well, it has proven to be a winner.

The American version isn't being screened here but the first series has just been released on DVD - and you cringe at the self-delusion of Michael Scott (Steve Carell from The 40-Year Old Virgin) who, like Brent, thinks he's a comedian.

But Scott isn't chilled-out, he's hyper and anxious.

He's desperate to please and impress, but in a less controlled way than Brent who wanted to be liked more than Scott. It makes for a different and edgy kind of Office.

Unfortunately the first episode relies too heavily on the English version, so a casual glance will have the cynics howling with delight.

But, thereafter, storylines vary completely and Jim (the Tim character), Pam (Dawn) and Dwight (Gareth, played here by Rainn Wilson from Six Feet Under who is scarily intense) take their own shape.

The broad strokes are similar: a smalltown office selling paper; a nascent relationship between Jim and Pam (who has a jock fiance); an accounts department which includes an enormous bovine character (in the British version, Keith); lingering shots of people at computer screens capturing the boredom of office work; and silences or glances to camera which are telling.

But when the storylines differ, the US series becomes a sharp parody.

Adapted by Greg Daniels (The Simpsons), it skewers American racial sensitivities in the episode Diversity Day.

A black counsellor is brought in to talk the staff through acceptance of diversity, prompted by Scott doing a Chris Rock routine.

In another episode, a basketball game between the office and the warehouse is as much about race and class as it is about the confrontation between Jim and Pam's macho fiance.

The American Office is extremely funny - and if the British version had never been made, you'd be hailing it as innovative and special.

But deleted scenes show where the American writers pulled punches, notably about sex: Michael adjusting himself and telling Pam about his testicular cancer scare (as Brent did with Dawn) is cut; so is his acronym for self-improvement which spells "incest".

The Americans exercised a caution Gervais and Merchant waded right through.

But accept the different cultural and comedic contexts - aside about ballplayers, Hogan's Heroes and the like - and get past that disappointing first episode and the Americans come into their own.

The second series has just been released in the United States on DVD.

I've ordered it.