Like anyone who has grown up in the shadow of Alan Partridge’s three-decade dominion over British comedy, I want only the very best for Norwich’s most relentless broadcaster. By which I mean the absolute worst. For me, Partridge is at his finest when he’s scrabbling around the media’s outer fringes, rebranding past humiliations as glories and furiously name-dropping 1980s television personalities to the nonplussed acquaintances he genuinely believes to be his closest friends.
Sadly, Alan has been riding (relatively) high in recent years. In 2022, Steve Coogan’s creation – now co-written by Rob and Neil Gibbons – embarked on a UK arena tour as a motivational speaker, imparting dubious advice to tens of thousands of adoring fans. Before that, he landed the job of a lifetime: a presenting gig on the BBC’s daily tea-time magazine show This Time. Obviously, he was disastrous – but was still invited to return for a second series.
