Pizza (TV series)
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Pizza is an Australian comedy television series on the Australian television network, SBS. It has also spun off a feature length movie (Fat Pizza) in 2003, and in 2004 released a highlights video/DVD which also included previously unshown footage and a schoolies exposé theatre show entitled "Fat Pizza" starring several characters from the show also tours the eastern coast of Australia.
Pizza relies heavily on the ironic and self-conscious use of ethnic stereotypes, sex, drugs and violence to produce its humour. It is also famous for its consistent cameo appearances of (mostly B-Grade) Australian celebrities (actors, comedians, and professional athletes etc.)
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[edit] History of the show
The show is written and directed by Paul Fenech who also plays the main protagonist of the series Pauly, a pizza deliveryman. In certain special episodes Pauly will break the fourth wall and as himself (the "fil-um maker" ) present featurettes revealing the history of the series, often tongue-in-cheek.
It first started as a project of Fenech's in the early 1990s, starring himself and shot in black and white. In 1995 his short film Pizza Man won him third place in the Tropfest film festival.
The show was first shown on SBS in 2000 and as of 2004 is up to its 5th season. The half hour program is usually shown in the Monday night 8:30-9:30pm time slot — common for offbeat comedy shows such as South Park, John Safran and Quads!.
[edit] The premise
The show centers on the activities of Pauly and his fellow co-workers as they deliver pizzas for the Sydney-based small business of Fat Pizza, whose motto is "they're big and they're cheesy". True to the business' motto, the humour in the show is often repetitive with sometimes entire scenes previously shot being recut to give the illusion of new material. According to Pauly, in the first episode, Pizza delivery is one of the most dangerous jobs in the world, a fact reiterated by a news reporter on a nearby television. In the suburbs of Sydney, this appears to be true as during the series the men have dealt with aliens, killer kangaroos, bikies, drug dealers, dominatrixes, the FBI, and even evil Satanic forces conspiring to fulfill Armageddon. Despite all this, no one seems quite surprised at any of this happening, and they persist in the dead end job which pays AU $3.00 an hour.
[edit] Special deliveries
In certain special episodes (called "special deliveries") Paul Fenech will sometimes break the fourth wall and act as "himself" (or a stylised version of himself, still much like the character he plays) and introduce the segments. These special deliveries are usually clip shows or mockumentaries on the show. In 2004 the series was a live-studio broadcast of auditions for the next series of pizza (interspersed with stunts, music and nudity), series finales had previously adopted a similar format with the crew "hijacking" the SBS television studio. In the latter half of 2004, a mock-u-mentary entitled "World Pizza" was broadcast which featured Pauly, Rocky and Toula travelling from Sydney to Napoli, Italy – "the birthplace of pizza". According to the show, they could only afford stopover flights, and had to stop in Japan, Los Angeles, and Las Vegas before reaching Rome. Bobo and Habib (who along with Davo had been arrested by Customs for drug possession in the airport prior to departure) appeared as talking heads through this series.
"Special Delivieries" include:
- Pizza Does Sexpo
- Pizza Live
- The History of Pizza
- The Beginnings of Pizza
- World Pizza
- Pizza Goes To Nimbin
- The Da Vinci Cup
[edit] The cast
[edit] Employees of Fat Pizza
- Paul Fenech as Pauly Falzoni – main protagonist, pizza delivery man, boxer, and aspiring "filum maker". His favourite derogatory comment for people is "stooge", originating from a comment a teacher once made to him. Pauly has been one of Bobo's longest serving employees at Fat Pizza and has provided Bobo with some good ideas over the years. During the 2005 series of Pizza, Pauly's parents and relatives were shown with Pauly having a cousin named Luigi who lives in Italy as well as one episode taking a look at Pauly's parents.
- Paul Nakad as Sleek the Elite – so named because he is "sleeker than slick", an aspiring rapper, ladies' man and a pizza delivery man who self-titled himself the "Lebanese Lover". He was the main co-star in the first three series and the movie. While having superior luck with the ladies, it was suggested several times Sleek was in fact gay, or at least bisexual. In the third series (2003, after the movie) it was revealed Sleek had been kidnapped by Islamic terrorists while holidaying in his homeland of Lebanon for "rooting all their women".
- Tahir Bilgic as Habib – meaning "friend" or "mate" in Arabic. Habib featured as a supporting character in the earlier series of Pizza, a friend of Sleek's; a stereotyped young Lebanese (Bilgic is actually Turkish) drug-dealer and fence of stolen goods (typically mobile phones). He played a larger role in the theatric version of Pizza. In 2003 after the loss of Sleek, he was employed at the shop as a deliveryman, a position he regularly utilizes as a front. He is socially inept, and used to be unlucky with women, but has hitched up with Toula.
- Rob Shehadie as Rocky – self stylised "Lebanese Rambo". A tall muscular homophobic egotistical Lebanese friend/second cousin of Habib (often role of enforcer), seems to be able to score with any number of young (and likely underage) women.
- Jabba as Davo Dinkum – a stereotyped bong-smoking Aussie. Being the only non-"chocko" at Fat Pizza sometimes leaves him at the end of discrimination, but he gets on well with the drug-dealing Habib. Introduced in the movie and has appeared since. Since 2005, Davo was sacked from Fat Pizza and now he is unemployed, spending most of his time smoking his bong and getting drunk.
- John Boxer as Bobo Gigliotti – the psychotic pizza chef who is the "boss" of Fat Pizza. He has little patience and those that cross him usually end up on the wrong end of his chainsaw. He is a horrible boss imposing dreadful working conditions and abuse. Additionally, he is consistently docking the delivery-boys' $3/hr pay for any deviation from schedule. The only thing Bobo likes is his Mama and his new mail-order bride Ling Chow (and making pizzas).
[edit] Supporting cast
- Annalise Braakensiek as supermodel Claudia MacPherson – though pronounced "Clow-dia", the name is an obvious play on models Claudia Schiffer and Elle Macpherson. She is dimwitted, rich, blonde, bulimic and attractive.
- Maria Venuti as Bobo's Mama – Bobo's overbearing Italian mother who actually owns Fat Pizza. Despite being quite physically abusive Bobo still loves his Mama and still lives with her.
- Jo Jo Yee as Lin Chow Bang – Bobo's diminutive mail-order bride from China. The Fat Pizza movie partly dealt with the arrival of Lin Chow (and her family), and as such she only appears since 2003. She has not been seen since 2003 after the Department of Immigration deported her back to China due to Habib and Rocky tipping off both the police and Immigration so they can avoid drug charges and time in jail.
- Rebel Wilson as Toula – an obese Greek girl who was Habib's (first?) girlfriend and now wife, whom she refers to as her "Habibi". She is a voracious eater, and she accompanied Pauly and Rocky in the "Pizza World" mock-umentary. In Los Angeles she asks a tourist center if they have star map, but one that marks all the fast food places rather than celebrity residences. In the recent series of Pizza, it is revealed that Toula has a gang of obese girls called the "Fat Chick 12" (because although there are only 6 girls in the gang, they are as large as two people). It is also revealed in the recent series of Pizza that Toula is an obsessive control freak, domineering and controlling over every aspect of Habib's life, especially in the later stages of their engagement and after Habib married her. Before the wedding, Toula used the members of the Fat Chick 12 to spy and stop Habib from enjoying his last days of bachelorhood by preventing erotic dancers to Habib's bachelor party as well as spying on Habib and preventing him from having his own private bachelor party with a bunch of strippers. After the wedding, Toula's control over Habib has become more extreme with Toula preventing Habib from returning to work and Toula forcing Habib to wear pink tracksuit pants.
- Katrina Spadone as Katrina or Kat for short – a best friend of the obese Toula and girlfriend to Rocky. In the recent series of Pizza, Katrina started to develop a crush on Pauly since Rocky was not treating her right. She has broken up and re-united with Rocky a few times (much to the torture and torment of Pauly who is keen on having Katrina as his girlfriend).
[edit] New Employees at Fat Pizza
In the 2005 series of Pizza, there have been a number of new employees to accompany Pauly and Habib in delivering pizzas after Bobo decided to turn Fat Pizza into a franchsie.
The new employees at Fat Pizza are...
- Kevin Taumata as Kev the Kiwi
- Andrew Ausage as Junior
- Alex Romano as DJ BJ ("BJ" standing for Big Jams)
- Anh Do as Chen Chong Fat
[edit] Guest appearances
Pizza has an extremely long list of guest appearances of many Australian media personalities (hence this list is incomplete). Many have reoccurring roles, or reappear in later episodes as entirely new characters. They also show a high degree of retroactive continuity
- Angry Anderson - as a bikie, other roles as well
- Carl Barron
- Nick Barker
- Tony Bonner
- Bessie Bardot - as Pussy Galore, a female British assassin who worked with Pauly's dad in one episode of Pizza
- Richard Carter - as a police detective
- Bob Ellis - as Premier of NSW
- Dr Karl
- Jon English - as a (washed-up) actor (i.e. himself)
- Peter Everitt - trying to steal money from Pauly for cigarettes, already has a cigarette on his ear.
- Jeff Fenech - as himself
- Mario Fenech - as Pauly's Uncle Shiba
- Tim Ferguson - as magician David Cockerfield
- Cornelia Frances
- Frenzal Rhomb - as bong-smoking rock band Marilyn's Regurgitator
- Nick Giannopoulos - as a Greek taxi driver in/from Melbourne who scuffled with Pauly and Sleek when they were in Melbourne.
- Kym Gyngell
- Elliot Goblet - as a driving instructor, fishing dude and shop inspector
- Tottie Goldsmith
- Nathan Harvey - as Dougie, one-time Pizza Hut mascot
- Merv Hughes
- Bill Hunter - as a police detective
- Kamahl - as manager of rival Pizza shop Phat Pizza. Other roles as well.
- George Kapiniaris - as Ronnie McDoggle
- Maggie Kirkpatrick
- Bernard King
- Jack Levi - as a Health Inspector and Driving Instructor
- Lex Marinos - as Sleek's lawyer
- Ryan Milne - as an amateur pornstar
- Anthony Mundine
- Pip Mushin
- Ada Nicodemou - plays a female police officer in one episode of the first season
- Margaret Pomeranz - as herself
- David Stratton- as himself
- Shane Porteous - as a doctor
- Guy Sebastian - as himself playing "The Fugitive"
- Gary Sweet
- Red Symons
- Michael Veitch
- Tania Zaetta - as herself
- Bruno Xavier - as Gandhi during many flashbacks throughout the series
In the "Sexpo" episode, Pauly interviews porn stars Ron Jeremy and Serenity
