There are comedy series with a clear and easy to understand concept. “Friends” is a series about some friends, “Seinfeld” is a series about a comedian named Seinfeld. Gareth Marenghi’s Darkplace is not one of those series. It’s supposedly a British horror series from the 1980s, the brainchild of legendary horror writer Gareth Marangi, that never aired and is now shown for the first time with behind-the-scenes interviews from Marangi, Dean Lerner, Marangi’s publisher who got a starring role in the series, and actor Todd Rivers. In reality, It’s a comedy series created by Matthew Hollens and Richard Ioadi, who play Marenghi and Lerner, and it’s one of the funniest things you’ll ever see.
Each of the six episodes of the British Channel 4’s “Darkplace” is an extraordinary experience. Something between “A Pleasant Flight” and a Christopher Guest comedy, but with dry British humor throughout. Hollens and Ioadi have created a perfect parody of television of the past, full of intentionally bad writing, continuity errors, cheap effects and sloppily edited dialogue.
The character of Gareth Marenghi, a kind of Stephen King for the poor who boasts that he has “written more books than he has read” is brilliant. His megalomania fills every part of the series-within-a-series and behind-the-scenes interviews with him are full of memorable quotes like “I know writers who use subtext, and they’re all cowards.”
In addition to Hollens, who you may recognize from his role in Ricky Jarvis’ “Smaller Than Life”, and Iodie, who starred in the sitcom “The IT Team” and wonderfully portrays Lerner (either in the pathos-filled interviews behind the scenes, or in the series itself where he plays so badly With the intention that it’s already genius), you may also recognize Matt Berry in the cast, who recently starred as Lazello the vampire in “What Happens in the Shadows”. Berry plays Todd Rivers, the fictitious actor who plays the surgeon Dr. Sanchez, all of whose lines seem to be dubbed afterwards in Berry’s beloved low voice. They are joined by Alice Law who plays Madeline Wall, the fictitious actress who plays Dr. Liz, and in the world The fictitious of the series has disappeared and is likely dead.
“Darkplace” is also the name of the hospital in the center of the series, which, unfortunately, opens a gate to hell, and in various episodes falls under the attack of apes, Scottish fog or giant eye creatures. The series is really candy for comedy fans, but also for horror fans who will enjoy the mind-blowing effects and hallucinatory plots.
The series only survived one season of six episodes, because apparently even for the connoisseur Brits it was too weird. But Hollens and Ioadi continued to have fun with the characters they created: two years after the cancellation of the series, Ioadi starred in a spin-off called “Man to Man with Dean Lerner”, in which he again plays the arrogant publisher, this time hosting a talk show and hosting various figures from the world of culture – all of them embodied by Hollens.
Among the guests are Marangi himself, and also a parody of Uri Geller called Amir Hanan. Hollens continues to appear occasionally on British television as Marangi, and even recently released the book Terrortome, which he is currently on tour to promote. As Marangi, of course.
“Darkplace” is a strange, smart, silly and very funny series that I recommend everyone to watch in its entirety. It is available on YouTube, where you can also find several other performances by Marenghi. In many ways, this is a series ahead of its time, Marangy’s smart-but-stupid speech has a resemblance to that of Philomena Canuck from the British Netflix series Worldview. But I’m not sure if she would be successful if she came out now. We may still have to wait until our world reaches the level of Gareth Marenghi.