Note:
Gimme Gimme Gimme centres on loudmouthed Londoner Linda La Hughes (played by comedian and director Kathy Burke) and her gay flatmate, actor Tom Farrell (played by James Dreyfus). A modern twist on the traditional odd couple format, much of Gimme Gimme Gimme’s humour springs from its lubricious innuendo subplot, which comes from the mouths of both Tom and Linda.
Linda is characterised by her red perm, white glasses, and plump, lycra-clad figure. Boorish, unattractive Linda is convinced she is a stunner; in series three she is finally diagnosed with reversed body dysmorphic disorder. It is suggested that Linda and Tom first met at a nightclub, bonded instantly (due to both being on ecstasy), and decided to live together. What follows is, as writer Jonathan Harvey describes, one long comedown. Linda often tells humorous anecdotes about her family and childhood which suggest abuse or neglect (such as how she apparently slept on a doormat as a baby, lived in a kennel as a child, and was left in a car-boot for the two weeks her aunt went on holiday), but she always thinks of these as positive experiences. She also claims that her Daddy now lives in an iron lung, although the only proof she has is a photo of a sideboard. Linda also lived in a convent and was sent to a borstal as a teenager. She has crushes on Liam Gallagher (in whom she lost interest after series one as she couldn’t bring up another bird’s child), Robbie Williams, and both male members of Hear’Say. She also imagines having sex with Dale Winton in a toilet cubicle. |
