The best of British humor. Dry satire delivered with a straight face. Brilliant Improv. Diane Morgan as Philomena Cunk. A mockumentary that is guaranteed to leave you in splits. Totally unmissable this one.
#CunkonEarth on #Netflix has #DianeMorgan playing the clueless journalist Philomena Cunk exploring art, history, religion, war and historical characters in a five part series that has potential to become a cult classic. The character first made her appearance in short cameos on the Screenwipe / Newswipe show made by #CharlieBooker. The impeccable quality of writing makes the character very impactful as she regales us with her mispronunciations and malapropisms. Her questions and observations range from downright silly to blatantly obfuscatory. Talking about the Olympics during the initial years when athletes competed in the buff, she contemplates that they could see “right up each other’s bumholes”
Cunk travels to the most exotic of places in her quest for answers on the history of ‘human man’. It takes her to Pompeii, Russia, Egypt and beyond. It gets even more hilarious when she takes on the subject matter experts who take her questions seriously and attempt to provide factually correct answers. “It’s comforting, isn't it to realize we don't have nuclear weapons these days?” she asks Ashley Jackson, Professor of military history at King’s college, London. When told that she is wrong, she breaks down on camera and after a pause, asks him “Do you like ABBA?”. In another interview, she tries to coerce an expert to agree that Jesus was the first victim of cancel culture !
The madness continues as she asks another expert which event is more culturally significant - the Renaissance or ‘Single Ladies’ by Beyonce ! To a Russian history expert, she asks him to expound on the Soviet Onion and then goes to accuse him of mansplaining! At the halfway mark of each episode, the writing cleverly contextualizes the playing of the 1989 technotronic Belgian song “Pump Up the Jam” with its inexplicable lyrics. It is weird in the beginning but gets you laughing as the show progresses!
The experts are clearly in on the silly questions but their polite and studied responses only goes to frustrate Cunk. The satire and the humour is simply sublime most times. #CunkonEarth is definitely worth a watch; you come away from the show thinking that even amidst the most stupid of questions, you got to learn something deeply intellectual or intelligent. And that is why this is cult classic material!
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