I'm Alan Partridge is a British sitcom created by Steve Coogan, Peter Baynham and Armando Iannucci. Coogan stars as Alan Partridge, a tactless and inept broadcaster. The first series, broadcast in 1997, has Partridge living in a roadside hotel after having been left by his wife and dropped by the BBC. The second, broadcast in 2002, sees Partridge living in a static caravan after recovering from a mental breakdown. Iannucci said the writers used the sitcom as "a kind of social X-ray of male middle-aged Middle England". On the Hour transferred to television as The Day Today in 1994, The series ends with Partridge accidentally shooting a guest. By then he has moved to the late night "Norfolk Nights" slot and also hosts Skirmish, a military-based general knowledge quiz show on digital cable channel UK Conquest, which Partridge says has "the largest audience share for a digital channel at that time of day in the Norfolk area".

Iannucci said that while researching the first series at a motorway service station hotel with Coogan and Patrick Marber, they found that there was "some depth to this situation – a kind of social X-ray of male middle-aged Middle England".

Episodes

Series 1 (1997)

Series 2 (2002)

Reception

I'm Alan Partridge won the 1998 BAFTA awards for Comedy Performance and Comedy Programme or Series. Digital Spy wrote: "the character of Partridge hit his comic peak" in I'm Alan Partridge. Entertainment Weekly described the show as "bleakly hilarious". The Telegraph named I'm Alan Partridge as one of the 10 best TV sitcoms of all time. In a poll of British comedians conducted by the TV channel Gold, it was named as the second-best British sitcom of all time. In a 2017 poll of over 100 comedians, a scene from I'm Alan Partridge in which Partridge goes to the home of an obsessive fan was voted best comedy scene.

Awards and nominations

{| class="wikitable"

|+ Awards and nominations for I'm Alan Partridge

|-

! Year

! Award

! Category

! Recipient

! Result

|-

| rowspan="5" | 1998

| rowspan="2" | British Academy Television Awards

| Best Comedy (Programme or Series)

| Armando Iannucci, Dominic Brigstocke, Peter Baynham, Steve Coogan

|

|-

| Best Comedy Performance

| Steve Coogan

|

|-

| rowspan="2" | British Comedy Awards

| Best TV Comedy Actor

| Steve Coogan

|

|-

| Best TV Sitcom

| I'm Alan Partridge

|

|-

| Royal Television Society Awards

| Best Situation Comedy or Comedy Drama

| Talkback Productions

|

|-

| rowspan="5" | 2003

| British Academy Television Awards

| Best Comedy Performance

| Steve Coogan

|

|-

| rowspan="3" | British Comedy Awards

| Best TV Comedy

| I'm Alan Partridge

|

|-

| Best TV Comedy Actor

| Steve Coogan

|

|-

| Best TV Comedy Actress

| Felicity Montagu

|

|-

| Royal Television Society Awards

| Best Comedy Performance

| Steve Coogan

|

|}

References

  • Unofficial Linton Travel Tavern website
  • Filming locations from I'm Alan Partridge