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No. 1130: Ahaafield

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Ahaafield

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Permanent URL: https://mezzacotta.net/garfield/?comic=1130

Strip by: Manyhills

TV: Welcome to the all-opera channel.
{Garfield changes the channel}
TV: Welcome to "Great Works of Literature".
{Garfield changes the channel}
TV: Welcome to "Professional Monkey Tennis".
Garfield: At last!

The author writes:

The sitcom I'm Alan Partridge chronicles the life of dismal TV host Alan Partridge, played by Steve Coogan, after his awful chat show Knowing Me, Knowing You is cancelled. It is from this show that the concept of "monkey tennis" originates:

In one scene [Partridge] desperately attempts to pitch programme ideas to uninterested fictional BBC executive Tony Hayers (David Schneider), who cancelled his first series. After failing to interest him in ideas plucked from thin air such as Arm Wrestling with Chas and Dave, Youth Hostelling with Chris Eubank, Inner-City Sumo and Cooking in Prison, Partridge comes up with a final spur-of-the-moment suggestion, "...Monkey Tennis?"

The particularly ridiculous nature of this image, combined with the lingering suspicion that if it could somehow be made it would probably be a hit, has led to it being used to mock any particularly lowbrow or nonsensical TV format, especially with the growth of reality television.

[[Original strip: 2000-05-30.]]

Original strip: 2000-05-30.