The Guardian‘s Cable Girl blog has a great review of Frasier today. Love the screencap too!
When life is getting a bit much – when you are surrounded by electricians gouging holes in your walls and filling your house with plaster and rubble in the name of rewiring, three weeks after they said they would be nothing more than a dusty, biscuit-munching memory, for not completely random example; when your cat is ill, your neighbour has been burgled and your husband’s idea of helping is to tear recipes out of magazines and suggest that you cook him something called crab linguine – there is always one place you can turn to soothe the troubled soul. And that place is 1901 Elliott Bay Towers. It’s where Frasier (Comedy Central, daily) lives.
You know, of course, the setup. The shrink from Cheers returns to his hometown of Seattle to start a new life and job as a radio therapist after his divorce. His ex-cop father Martin moves in with him, along with Martin’s physiotherapist Daphne. His brother Niles is a frequent visitor, especially after he falls in secret, unrequited love with Daphne. Roz, Frasier’s abrasive producer, completes the mix. But what a mix.
Kelsey Grammer as Frasier is a master of the art of taking his character as far out as possible – whether he’s being unbearably pompous, pretentious, insecure or heartbreaking – and bringing him home to land safely. David Hyde Pierce’s Niles is a piece of precision engineering – physical and verbal comedy played to equal perfection and hitting their marks every time. And between them, John Mahoney plays the wise-and-wiseacre dad, who has to do nothing but be “normal”, the hardest comedy job of all.
It doesn’t matter how many times you have seen any episode. The grace of the plotting, the shining rigour of the script and the immaculate playing of it all by a cast that – if you discount Daphne’s “Manchester” accent – doesn’t have a weak link in it (even the unseen Maris is more fully and subtly drawn than most “real” characters in any other sitcom), mean it remains a thing of beauty and a joy forever. Thank you, Seattle, we love you.
Excellent review.
The first paragraph could be my life – apart from the cat.
I’d like to have seen more about the genius of David Hyde Pierce of course, but apart from that I agree with all she says. ‘A thing of beauty and a joy forever’.
I couldn’t agree more with this great review!
“David Hyde Pierce’s Niles is a piece of precision engineering – physical and verbal comedy played to equal perfection and hitting their marks every time.”
Something like that is written in just about every review of ‘Frasier’.
They are absolutely right!
Frasier is my favourite programme of all time! It doesn’t matter how many times I have been an episode I still laugh and enjoy it just as much as the first time. My husband and I are going to see DHP in La Bete this evening for a 3rd wedding anniversary. We have seen in previously in Curtains on Broadway and are looking forward to the show tonight.
i totally agree…just bought the 11 series box set of Frasier and am up to series 8 now….actually cried last night watching Daphne and Niles getting together and running off from Daphnes wedding LOL!!
the whole series is pure comic genius and i will be so sad when i reach the end of series 11 and i know theres no more to watch
still i do have them with me to watch all over again 
Like you Aisha I too have just been given the box set and have not opened the 11 series, as I know the end. I watched from 1994 when it started, until the end. It was the first comedy/drama that was actually directed at an audience with brain cells; the first ‘up market’ series aimed at intelligent people, there hasn’t been another since. As you said: comic genius. Although we have to remember that although the actors were superb – the writers were the real genius. After David Angell died in 9/11 the series did have a decline, then picked up, but sadly ended 3 years later. Perhaps we should remember David Angell!!