So you may know Rowan Atkinson from Blackadder (s1 so so, hit its stride s2 onwards) as well as Mr Bean and John Cleeese's Fawlty Towers as well as Monty Python, and perhaps you've discovered Yes Minister / Yes Prime Minister, or "Only Fools and Horses" as well as Are You Being Served ...
But here are some more lesser known or otherwise significant Britcoms before Fleabag
Nightingales - (13 eps) surreal adventures of three overnight security guards - top cast, small set,
The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin (21 eps) - seminal subversive 1970s comedy for any Brit of my age - disillusioned with his career Reggie has a mid-life crisis, fakes his own death, tries to find happiness and returns in disguise, A reboot was attempted in 2009.
Ideal - (54 eps) - a stoner drug dealer and the oddballs who come and go from his flat also slightly surreal
Dinnerladies - (16 eps) by the doyen of british comedy, Victoria Wood, gentle incredibly well crafted gentle comedy set in factory canteen - very strong cast - many famous already (including Victoria's old friend Julie Walters), others at the start of their careers - showing VW's talent to pick the best. A lightness of touch worthy of Nora Ephron.
Nighty Night (12 eps ) - a very black sitcom about a narcissistic sociopath Jill and her husband Terry diagnosed with cancer. So Jill sets her sights on the next door neighbour, Don. And torments his wife, who suffers from MS.
Father Ted (25 eps ) A surreal view of the life of three misfit priests on an isolated off Western Ireland. Seminal as opposed to seminary - it needed the repressed Ireland of the end of the last century and the freedom of articustc expression on the UK channel 4.
The Good Life (30 eps) - massively popular 1970's sitcom about a middle-aged suburban couple (living in Surbiton - a real London suburb) who "drop out of the rat race" and turn their garden onto a small holding. Four top actors as the Good and their friends and neighbours the Leadbetters.
Gimme Gimme Gimme (19 eps) two looser London flatmatesm a gay unemployed actor a boorish, unattractive woman both have delusions of romantic love in a modern Odd Couple with added inuendo
The Young Ones (12 eps) surreal and violent adventures of four mismatched students in Thatcher's Britain - a major hit of alternative comedy in the 80s - plus musical band guests per episode
Waiting for God (47 eps) two spirited residents of a retirement home who spend their time running rings around the home's oppressive management and their own families - apparently runs on PBS
The Royle Family (25 eps) - groundbreaking and award winning sitcom about an ordinary working class family set mainly in their telly-centric living room, In some ways an All In The Family/'Till Death Do Us Part for the 2000s.
Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps (81 eps) - irreverent tales of the life and sex lives of soem northern British 20 somethings - "driven by sex and alcohol" and the show is known for its adult and sometimes scatological humour, :-)
To the Manor Born (22 eps) Aristocratic widow Audrey has to sell to nouveau riche Richard and move into her estate's gatekeeper's cottage. Also very popular, with a slow will they won't they thread.
Drop the Dead Donkey (66 eps) - anarchic and sarcastic view inside a 24 hour satellite news channel news room - well and written (and aimed to be to be very topical to the week) and with an exceedingly strong cast.
The Vicar of Dibley (26 eps) - a much loved main stream hit about a female vicar in a small village
The IT Crowd (25 eps) a rag-tag team of IT support workers at a large corporation headed by a hotheaded yuppie -
Black Books (18 eps) award winning tale of a cynical and misanthropic shopkeeper and two friends - with two top comics in the cast
The Thick of It (24 eps) - British forerunner to Veep .. set in the corridors of UK power and spin, The show employs a "swearing consultant"; one of his roles is to pen the complex and creative insults used in the show.
Last of the Summer Wine (294 eps) - mainsteam and a slow burn but might amuse .. "the story of three elderly men who carry on like teenagers" - officially declared the world's longest-running television sitcom
Peep Show - two twenty-something odd coup;e roommates but filmed in character POV and inner monologue - critically acclaimed cult favourte
Men Behaving Badly (UK) - (45 eps) - switched network and co star after the first series - and picked up to be a major hit -
Brass - (32 eps) - historical Catherine Cookson
Hot Metal (13 eps) - set in a new muck-raking tabloid newspaper in 1980s London
Whoops Apocalypse - when nuclear war had to be laughed about - later also a feature film but the series is better
The New Statesman (29 eps) - an arch right wing Tory MP - imagine it as Steve Bannonm Congressman
Newer/Current
Man Down (26 eps) - deadbeat drama teacher gets a wake-up call when his girlfriend leaves him.
The Windsors - Royal family pisstake
Upstart Crow - Shakespeare pisstake
Bad Education - teaching pisstake
The Inbetweeners - male teenagers coming of age pisstake
Some Girls - female teenagers coming of age pisstake
Derry Girls - irish school girls during the end of the Troubles
Some other more mainstream classics or hits I can't be bothered to summarise: Dad's Army, Open All Hours, Porridge, Gavin and Stacey, Citizen Smith, Outnumbered, 2point4 Children,
