The Kumars at No. 42
BBC America
10:40 tonight
There are the TV comedies that are deliciously perverse and twisted (Arrested Development, Wonder Showzen, The O'Reilly Factor), the TV comedies that are smart and ironic (The Colbert Report, The Office, Mayberry R.F.D.), and the TV comedies that are cute and mildly amusing (Scrubs, My Name is Earl, Two and a Half Hookers). I'd put The Kumars in the latter category. It's the kind of show that you don't have to put on pause with your TiVo should you need a bathroom break; you won't miss anything you simply must see, and you won't be lost once you return to the couch (after first washing your hands, sicko!). Thirtysomething Indian-Brit Sanjeev Kumar wants to host a chat show, so he's set up a TV studio in the back of his parents' Wembley home. But the arrangement foists meddlesome Mr. and Mrs. Kumar and horny ol' granny Sushila in the co-host chairs to interrupt Sanjeev and hurl questions at real-life guests who have ranged from Jennifer Saunders to Boy George. Tonight brings hunka-hunka burning man meat Tom Jones and not-nearly-as-hunka Squeeze piano man Jools Holland. This season five—or, as the BBC calls it, series five—episode has Jones talking about his vacuum salesman days, Holland defining boogie woogie and Sanjeev joining the two musical performers for a rock N roll classic. Sit back, relax and don't forget to put the seat back up.
OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.