Yes, Prime Minister

 

You said:

I just have to get this down. I love "Yes Minister" and "Yes, Prime Minister," not because I have any fantasy it has anything to do with reality, but because those lesser known British actors in the past, especially the ones playing civil servants, are so unbelievably deadpan serious and really good at it.

ChatGPT said:

Oh, I’m completely with you on that.

Yes Minister and Yes, Prime Minister are masterclasses in controlled absurdity. The joke isn’t slapstick, it isn’t even really situational—it’s tonal. That absolute granite-faced seriousness while saying something utterly preposterous.

And you’re right about the actors. Nigel Hawthorne as Sir Humphrey—what a performance. The way he could produce a paragraph-long sentence that means nothing while sounding like the embodiment of constitutional stability. And Paul Eddington—that slightly wounded, hopeful decency of Jim Hacker. The civil servants in the background, too: immaculate suits, expressions like they’ve just swallowed a regulation manual.

It’s the stillness that makes it lethal. No mugging, no winking. The more serious they are, the funnier it gets.

And I suspect part of the pleasure—especially for someone who’s spent time in structured institutions—is recognizing the logic of it. Not the events, perhaps, but the procedural self-protection, the language gymnastics, the way “consultation” can mean “delay,” and “review” can mean “bury.”

It’s a very British kind of comedy: bureaucratic fencing conducted as if it were high theology.

Do you have a favorite recurring bit? The “courageous decision” definition always gets me.

You said:

Oh probably when Sir Humphrey is found to have been negligent and let a spy off easy because he was one of the boys, the Prime Minister's delight at it all, and then the decision that one does not investigate incompetence, as who knows where that would lead.

ChatGPT said:

Ah yes — that deliciously improper relief.

You’re thinking of the episode “A Victory for Democracy” in Yes, Prime Minister. Sir Humphrey’s school-tie tribalism lets a Soviet agent glide through because he was “one of us,” and Hacker suddenly realizes — with barely concealed glee — that Humphrey is compromised. For once, the mandarin isn’t gliding above events; he’s in them.

And then comes the truly perfect turn: the solemn conclusion that investigating incompetence would be… most unwise. Because if you start examining incompetence at senior levels, who knows how far up it might go?

That’s the genius of the writing. The moral logic is inverted but airtight. The decision is presented not as cynical but as prudent. Stability must be preserved. Confidence in institutions must not be undermined. Therefore, we must not look too closely.

It’s almost ecclesiastical in tone — like declaring that certain mysteries are better left unexamined for the health of the faithful.

And Hacker’s delight — that little spark in the eye — is so human. For one fleeting moment he thinks, “Ah! I have him.” Only to discover that the system protects itself, and therefore protects Sir Humphrey.

The show never shouts its satire. It just lets these very serious men calmly explain why accountability would be deeply irresponsible.

I love that you enjoy it not because it’s “realistic” but because of the craft — the deadpan discipline. There’s something almost musical about it. Long, carefully modulated sentences, like a Bach fugue made of evasion.

You must have watched it more than once? It’s one of those series where the lines get sharper on repetition.