The Wedge (Australian TV series)

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Cast

*¹The 20th episode of season one was repeated in the " 'That's Valid' " and " 'Thanks For Coming' " DVDs.

Episode guide

Critical reception

"The Wedge" had mixed success with audiences and critics during its first season. The ratings for the first season were initially strong, with the first episode receiving 1.5 million viewers [ [http://www.tencorporate.com.au/library/documents/The%20Early%20News%205%20June%202006.pdf "The Early News - 5 June 06"] , Network TEN Corporate, 2006-06-05, URL last accessed on 2006-11-24.] and later episodes averaging over one million viewers. [ [http://www.tencorporate.com.au/library/documents/The%20Early%20News%2013%20June%202006.pdf "The Early News - 13 June 06"] , Network TEN Corporate, 2006-06-13, URL last accessed on 2006-11-24.] [ [http://www.tencorporate.com.au/library/documents/The%20Early%20News%2019%20June%202006.pdf "The Early News - 19 June 06"] , Network TEN Corporate, 2006-06-19, URL last accessed on 2006-11-24.] The shows recent popularity waned nearer the end of the first season, with episodes reaching a much smaller audience (681,000 viewers for the episode that aired on 2006-11-21 [David Dale, [http://blogs.smh.com.au/sit/archives/2006/11/the_tribal_mind_5.html "The Tribal Mind: Slow bowling"] , The Sydney Morning Herald Blogs, 2006-11-24, URL last accessed on 2006-11-24.] ). Despite the show's first season initially receiving high ratings, it was criticised by some TV reviewers. Issue was taken with the perceived over-use of canned laughter [David Dale, [http://blogs.smh.com.au/entertainment/archives/the_tribal_mind/005142.html "The freedom not to laugh"] , smh.com.au, 2006-07-18, URL last accessed 2006-11-18.] and what they considered to be poorly written, dated, cheap humour that attacked easy targets and propagated offensive stereotypes. [Craig Platt, [http://blogs.theage.com.au/entertainment/archives/2006/05/last_laugh_sock_1.html "Last Laugh: Sockin' the suburbs"] , smh.com.au, 2006-05-31, URL last accessed on 2006-11-18.] [ [http://www.theblurb.com.au/Issue66/TheWedge.htm "Wedge Politics"] , The Blurb, URL last accessed on 2006-11-18.] Shortly after the series debuted, Catherine Deveny, one of the writers, wrote an article for The Age in which she revealed that the producers had insisted on re-writing and blanding out the scripts in the hope of appealing to a wider audience, [The Age, June 24 2006 [http://chilled.cream.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=511273&sid=c5523cd07907742294d141b4442cda89 reproduced here] : "I did a few weeks' writing for The Wedge but you will be pushed to find a word of my stuff on screen. This is because when they said, "What we are after is new, fresh and young", I didn't realise that what they actually meant was "boring, safe and dumbed down". Most of the scripts have been rewritten so many times that the guts of the joke has been diluted severely or obliterated entirely." ] but maintained that the writers and performers were themselves talented comics.

Although the show had its share of negative reviews, critics from Famous magazine quoted that it had "Some of the most outrageous, loopy, and colourful residents God ever put on this world", [ The Wedge: Lucky DVD cover] while Sean Fewster from the Adelaide Advertiser remarked that "This could well be the first truly great ensemble of the 21st Century" and "The Wedge is a near perfect blending of The Comedy Company's family-friendly, occasionally bizarre jokes and Fast Forward's nasty, satirical edge.... Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to Australian sketch comedy". [ The Wedge: We're Moving DVD cover] Sean Lynch remarked that "We may very well look back on this...as the beginning of one of Australia's greatest comedy shows of the new millennium", Neil Mitchell from 3AW remarked that the show was "one of the freshest things on TV" and a writer from newspaper The Age said "Such a rich vein of comedy, you can't help wonder why someone hasn't mined it sooner". Memorable TV remarked "At last we have a comedy sketch show worthy of the mantle of Fast Forward and Full Frontal. Very funny." shortly after the release of the DVDs. [ [http://www.longshot.tv/thewedge.html "Long Shot Film Entertainment's 'The Wedge' page"] ] The show's second season had a much more popular feedback from audiences during its second season, hence reflecting from its consistent ratings at its 'dead-zone' timeslot. The Age, who had panned the show's previous season remarked, "... (The Wedge) delivers enough flashes of brilliance to confirm it's on the right track".

ide Projects

* Karingal Park Secondary College won a competition called "Art Cooney Comes to Your School" that was first advertised on the "The Wedge" website. As a part of the prize, the school received a visit from Adam Zwar, portraying the character Art Cooney. Another competition to get on set of 'The Wedge' was set, winners were invited onto the set for a tour. [" [http://www.australiantelevision.net/wedge_episodes.html The Wedge: episode guide] ", "Australian Television", URL last accessed on 2006-11-29.]
* "The Wedge" characters Mark Wary (Jason Gann) and his manager (Dailan Evans) made an appearance on the "50 Years of Comic Relief" show broadcast on Seven Network. In addition to this, Russell Gilbert, Kate Jenkinson and Rebel Wilson also made an appearance on the show.
* Cal Wilson, Dailan Evans and Kate Jenkinson have made an appearance on Australia's improvisation show, "Thank God You're Here" during its second season. [" [http://www.australiantelevision.net/thank_god/series2.html Thank God You're Here's Episode Guide] ", "Australia Television", URL last accessed on 2006-11-29] . Rebel Wilson has also made appearances on the third season of Thank God You're Here (as well as Kate Jenkinson's second appearance).

References

External links

* [http://www.thewedge.com.au "The Wedge"]
* [http://www.ten.com.au/ten/tv_thewedge.html "The Wedge"] on Network Ten
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* [http://www.australiantelevision.net/wedge.html "The Wedge"] on Australian Television