Alan Partridge has always favoured the sports casual blazer so beloved of Nigel Farage. The similarity of Partridge’s political leanings to the ex-Ukip leader were confirmed this week after Steve Coogan revealed his creation is firmly in the leave camp, telling the Radio Times that, as a remainer himself, he was conflicted. However, he said: “Having a fool praise something is a far more powerful indictment than just criticising it.”
So, that’s Partridge. But how would other TV characters adjust to the Brexit age?
Let’s go back to the 80s when Bread captured the giro-to-giro existence of the Boswells and right now the family would be tearing their hair out at the prospect of universal credit and sticking Jeremy Corbyn’s face at the top of their “borrowed” Christmas tree. (Lilo Lill, as ever, would be a one-woman swingometer with an access-all-areas pass to the backdoor of the food bank.) Further south in the same time period, it would be safe to assume that Del Boy was proud to vote leave in the hope of bringing back the pre-EU days when Britain stood as proud as Nelson Mandela House and you could flog imported blowup dolls down the market without regulation. Cushty.
Dinner parties with the Blairite poster boys and girls of This Life crew are uncomplicated affairs these days as the former housemates agree on their remoaner stance. Except Miles, of course, who is still so Tory he’s practically plotting to oust Theresa May.
One thing’s for sure: a Ukip-led charge out of the EU would have been the thing the New Statesman’s Alan B’Stard was waiting for all his career. If they had existed in the 80s, he would have been all over them. As he once said: “Why should Britain kowtow to the continent that produced Hitler, Napoleon, the Mafia and the Smurfs?”
