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Originally Posted by Nosferatu@Cult Labs  I've been watching Yes Minister for the first time in a decade. It's superbly written and it's amazing how much of it is still relevant.
Although MPs and civil servants will receive most of their updates from Twitter rather than the radio and do a lot of communicating by social media, they still leak information to journalists for favourable press.
Some things never change – a storyline in which Jim Hacker is horrified to find he is the subject of an unflattering story in Private Eye could have been in The Thick of It or a documentary about a real minister.
The scripts are incredibly clever; Antony Jay and Jonathan Lynn highlight how a minister is constantly being pulled in several directions – they have a duty to their constituents, must toe the party line, obey collective cabinet responsibility, and have their own political beliefs and ambitions.
Furthermore, the civil servants have their own opinions on how the governmental machine can run most efficiently (probably without ministers getting in the way!) and the best way to 'moderate' a minister whose ambitions may be 'unwise'.
It's these tensions which allow the terrific interplay between Jim Hacker MP (Paul Eddington), his Permanent Secretary, Sir Humphrey Appleby (Nigel Hawthorne) and Principal Private Secretary, Bernard Woolley (Derek Fowlds).
I'm midway through the third series and have the two series of Yes, Prime Minister to watch when I've finished this disc. |
I've just finished a run through of
Yes Minister and
Yes Prime Minister.
It genuinely is comedy that doesn't date. If you think
Yes Minister is still relevant then
Yes Prime Minister could have been written today.