Reception
Immediately following the commission of the series, reviewers compared it to Curb Your Enthusiasm; a story in The Independent ran with the headline "Dee writes BBC's answer to Curb Your Enthusiasm". The Stage's Mark Wright called it "a curious oddity" and called comparisons to Curb "inevitable". Ian Johns of The Times "obsessed" over the similarities to Curb, though singled out Crilly and Gardner for their performances, and described Dee's characterisation of Rick as "turning childish pettiness into something almost endearing".
A. A. Gill, in The Sunday Times, wryly praised the style of humour and the reaction it provoked in viewers. Hermione Eyre of The Independent on Sunday called it "a delectable comedy of everyday embarrassment", but "unfortunately, Lead Balloon shows awkward joints where Curb Your Enthusiasm has invisible seams"; the reviewer cited Larry David as being a good man driven to obnoxious behaviour, whereas Spleen is just obnoxious. Thomas Sutcliffe of The Independent named the series the best new comedy of 2006.
When appearing on a panel of comedy judges at the 2007 Edinburgh International Television Festival, Frank Skinner, in response to The Vicar of Dibley and The Catherine Tate Show being voted the best comedies in a public poll, called it "the best sitcom that anyone from the comedy circuit has done Obviously I was hoping it would be shit" (Skinner starred in his own failed sitcom, Shane in 2004).
The first episode broke BBC Four's audience record for a comedy series, with 383,000 viewers. Despite dropping to 199,000 by the third episode, it still won a multi-channel slot. "Rubbish"'s BBC Two repeat received 2.1 million viewers, with 122,000 seeing "Allergic" afterwards on BBC Four. The final episode of the first series, "Fatty", received 2.3 million for its BBC Two repeat.
The first series was nominated for a British Comedy Award in 2007, with Dee also nominated for best comedy actor.
Read more about this topic: Lead Balloon
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