Father Ted - Series 2 - Part 2

Starring: Ardal Ohanlon, Dermot Morgan Director: Andy DeEmmony, Declan Lowney Original UK Premiere: 1995 Dvd Release: 25th February, 2002 Number Of Discs: 1 Format: PAL, Region 2 Encoding

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Father Ted is a 1990s television situation comedy set on the extremely remote fictional Craggy Island off the west coast of Ireland. The scripts were written by Arthur Mathews & Graham Linehan, who also co-created Big Train. All the interior scenes were shot in London, while all of the location footage was shot in Ireland. Father Ted Crilly, the simple-minded Father Dougal McGuire & the perpetually drunken, lecherous & foul-mouthed elderly priest, Father Jack Hackett. They have a housekeeper Mrs Doyle, who is hell-bent on serving tea to all & sundry. Ted, a bon vivant, for misappropriating church funds. There has been some mention of a gambling trip to Las Vegas while a poor child was supposed to be in Lourdes, but Ted has frequently claimed that the money was merely resting in his account. Dougal points out it had been resting there for a very long time. Dougal for a mysterious incident in Blackrock involving a group of nuns, presumably caused by incompetence. Jack for some unspecified offence at a wedding he conducted in Athlone where he apparently ran off with the blue nun..

DVD Extras: an interactive menu allows the selection of individual episodes, & segments within those episodes. The only extra feature is the option of watching the episodes with the dialogue replaced with a commentary by co-writer Graham Linehan & actor Ardal O'Hanlon, who plays Father Dougal Maguire. Occasionally interesting & revealing though this is, it gets rapidly wearing in this form, & would have worked much better if transcribed in an accompanying booklet. The disc is presented in 4:3 aspect ratio with English subtitles available.--

Among the five episodes collected here are two of Father Teds finest half-hours. Rock-A-Hula Ted was one of the few episodes in which the writers of the show abandoned any concern for their largely British audience & stacked the script with explicitly Irish references: Craggy Islands Lovely Girls festival is a burlesque of the all-too-genuine Rose Of Tralee pageant, & fire-breathing pop singer Niamh Connolly, played with aplomb by Clare Grogan, an obvious enough Sinead OConnor manqué.

New Jack City, meanwhile is the classic episode in which the choleric Father Jack is finally despatched to an old folks loony bin only to be replaced by the mesmerisingly appalling ragga-fixated chain-smoker Father Fintan Stack. As one of the high points of the Father Ted series this episode is also one of the high points of television comedy. There isnt much wrong with the other three episodes here, either.

Ardal OHanlon is a comedian & actor, best known for his role as Father Dougal McGuire in the comedy television series Father Ted. His father is Rory OHanlon, an Irish politician & doctor. Ardal OHanlon graduated from the National Institute for Higher Education, Dublin in Communications Studies in 1987. He started out as a stand-up comedian & was spotted by Graham Linehan, who was to cast him in Father Ted. He has also had his own television series, My Hero, in which he plays a superhero juggling the duties of his heroic role with the ordinary day-to-day crises of life in the suburbs.

Editors Choice: My Hero, Father Ted, Robbie The Reindeer In Hooves Of Fire, Part 1, View DVDology

Dermot Morgan was an Irish school-teacher turned comedian & actor who achieved international renoun as Father Ted Crilly in the Channel 4 sit-com Father Ted. The Dublin-born Morgan first came to prominence as part of the team of the highly successful RTÉ television show The Live Mike, presented by Mike Murphy. Between 1979 & 1984 Morgan, previously a full-time teacher at St. Michaels, Ailesbury Road, played a range of comic characters, who would appear between segments, including Father Trendy, an unxious trying to be cool Roman Catholic priest given to drawing ludicrous parallels with non-religious life in two minute chats to camera, to the hilarity of the audience. He also played among other characters an intolerant GAA bigot, who would wave his hurley stick around aggressively while verbally attacking his pet hates. Morgans success, which made him an instant hit the viewers, led him to quit teaching & become a full-time comedian.

Editors Choice: Father Ted, Part 1, View DVDology

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