Coupling (U.S. TV series)

Coupling is a 2003 American remake of the British television sitcom of the same title, which aired on NBC.

Production

By 2003, three series of Coupling had been broadcast on BBC Two, all written by the show's creator, Steven Moffat. The show was loosely based on the beginnings of Moffat's real-life relationship with Sue Vertue.^[1]

NBC commissioned a remake of the show for the American market, reportedly as a replacement for Friends, which was nearing the end of its run.^[2] Moffat and original producers from Hartswood Films, Sue and Beryl Vertue, served as executive producers on the NBC adaptation, alongside Phoef Sutton and Ben Silverman.^[3]

Unlike most adaptations, the NBC adaptation would reuse Moffat's original scripts, although these were adapted by Sutton and were shortened to comply with the reduced running time (NBC has multiple advertisement breaks compared to the original broadcaster, BBC Two, which has none).^[4] Other writers, such as Danny Zuker and Paul Corrigan worked on episodes later in the series.

The original unaired pilot starred Breckin Meyer as Jeff, Melissa George as Susan and Emily Rutherfurd as Sally. NBC then fired the writers and replaced Meyer, George and Rutherford with Christopher Moynihan, Rena Sofer and Sonya Walger, respectively.^[5][6] George later commented that she "dodged a bullet" by being replaced before the show aired.^[7]

Thirteen episodes were commissioned. However, due to poor critical reception, NBC announced the show's cancellation on October 31st, after only four episodes had been broadcast. The final three planned episodes were not filmed, with the remaining six episodes unbroadcast.^[3]

Reception

It failed to perform in the ratings and was canceled before the November sweeps, with six episodes remaining unaired despite heavy publicity by the network.^[3] It was immediately panned as a poor imitation of the original UK series by viewers and critics. BBC America even ran commercials noting that they would play the original British versions on their station just after the American equivalent episodes on NBC aired, so that viewers could see instantly just how superior the original was. Miscasting and stilted delivery of a nearly identical script were believed to be the reasons for the failure, though creator Moffat blamed the show's failure on NBC's intervention during the creative and production processes. In 2007, he said: "The network fucked it up because they intervened endlessly."^[8]

The American adaptation came at a time when NBC was having success with remakes of BBC shows, such as The Weakest Link and Dog Eat Dog. NBC would find success in 2005 with a remake of another BBC series, The Office, which aired for nine seasons.

Because of what was deemed to be indecent content, two affiliates of NBC refused to air the program; KSL-TV (Channel 5) in Salt Lake City, and WNDU-TV (Channel 16) in South Bend, Indiana. Both stations were owned by religious organizations, as KSL is owned by the Bonneville International division of the LDS Church, while WNDU was at the time owned by a subsidiary of The University of Notre Dame. In those markets, WB affiliate KUWB (Channel 30) and a UPN digital subchannel of CBS affiliate WSBT-TV (Channel 22), respectively, aired the series after their network's primetime lineups.

Jeff Zucker, former President and CEO of NBCUniversal, later said of Coupling that it "just sucked".^[9]

Cast

• Colin Ferguson as Patrick Maitland
• Jay Harrington as Steve Taylor
• Christopher Moynihan as Jeff Clancy
• Lindsay Price as Jane Honda
• Rena Sofer as Susan Freeman
• Sonya Walger as Sally Harper

Episodes

References

Bibliography

• Griffin, Jeffrey (2008). "Coupling Crosses the Atlantic: A Case Study in the Format Adaptation of a Fictional Series". Warsaw Journal for the Study of the United States. 24. 

External links

• Coupling at the Internet Movie Database
• Coupling at TV.com