Fussy, uptight, snobbish! Frasier’s hardly changed – the return of iconic sitcom

What I mean is that the brand-new ones feel reassuringly familiar, in one respect at least.

Little about the man has changed in the 19 years he’s been away.

Which is good news. Former radio shrink Dr Frasier Crane is still the same pompous, pretentious yet curiously loveable soul that he was when we watched him sign off back in May 2004, with one last: “Good night, Seattle.”

That’s not to say he hasn’t moved on.

For one thing, he’s back in Boston, where he first propped up the bar in Cheers a lifetime ago. So there are details on which we’re swiftly brought up to speed, plus new things we learn about his past.

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Who knew, for instance, that Frasier was pals with Rodney from Only Fools And Horses?

Yes, our very own Nicholas Lyndhurst plays a key character in this likeable reboot, the first two episodes of which arrive today on the Paramount+ streaming service.

He helps make up for the somewhat glaring absence of all the old ones – most notably, Niles, Daphne and Frasier’s dad Martin (the late John Mahoney, touchingly referenced here).

Lyndhurst’s character, bone-idle Harvard professor Alan, is an old chum of Frasier, as we learn, from his Oxford days.

And we’ll be seeing plenty of him, because it’s to Harvard that Dr Crane will now be persuaded to turn his attention.

Doing that persuading is departmental head Olivia (Toks Olagundoye). Not that she needs to do much. Frasier rather fancies the idea of being taken seriously at last.

Other new faces include Jack Cutmore-Scott as his son Freddy – who, to his father’s horror, has dropped out of Harvard to become a fireman.

There’s also nephew David (Anders Keith), a young man with amusingly similar neuroses to his dad Niles, a fact the writers revel in.

So is this new Frasier as good as the original? Of course not. That old show set a high bar.

But it’s still a thoroughly enjoyable sitcom with a comfortingly traditional feel.

It hasn’t come to preach, pontificate or ram a right-on message down our throats.

It’s come to lift the spirits and bring joy to our day. Lord knows we need that right now.

Also, rather importantly, it has good jokes.

Remember jokes?

At its heart sits a character who clearly still has plenty of comedy mileage in him: a fussy, uptight, snobbish individual, but one in whose company you’d gladly while away a few more leisurely half-hours.

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