TV Comedy: The Brittas Empire – #24 – S04 E05 – “Playing with Fire” – Chris Barrie, Pippa Haywood,
Helen and the children have gone on holiday, leaving Brittas home alone. An ex-girlfriend of Gavin’s returns, intent on reconciling, which causes a rift in Gavin and Tim’s relationship. However, they soon realise that Jenny has escaped from a mental home, along with a caseful of explosives. Meanwhile, it’s energy saving week, and to participate, Colin has created a generator powered by the centre’s “waste material”.
The Brittas Empire is a British sitcom created and originally written by Andrew Norriss and Richard Fegen. Chris Barrie played Gordon Brittas, the well-meaning but incompetent manager of Whitbury New Town Leisure Centre.
The show ran for seven series and 52 episodes — including two Christmas specials — from 1991 to 1997 on BBC1. Norriss and Fegen wrote the first five series, after which they left the show.
The Brittas Empire enjoyed a long and successful run throughout the 1990s, and gained large mainstream audiences. In 2004 the show came 47th on the BBC’s Britain’s Best Sitcom poll,and all series have been released on DVD.
The creators Andrew Norriss and Richard Fegen often combined farce with either surreal or dramatic elements in episodes. For example, in the first series, the leisure centre prepares for a royal visit, only for the doors to seal, the boiler room to flood and a visitor to become electrocuted. Unlike the traditional sitcom, deaths were quite common in The Brittas Empire. MORE AT LINK
