In Britain, the biannual charity extravaganza that is Comic Relief has a great track record for creating one-off comedy sketches, many based around established British shows and comedy characters. Past classics have included skits based around the likes of “Doctor Who,” “Blackadder,” “Gavin and Stacey,” “One Foot in the Grave,” “Da Ali G Show,” “I’m Alan Partridge” and “Father Ted.” Ricky Gervais has been involved many times before, perhaps most notably for the time he created an extremely funny sketch in which he appeared to be recording an appeal for aid from Africa. Well, Gervais returned with a new sketch at this year’s Comic Relief, and this time he brought back David Brent.
Aside from a couple of cameos on the U.S. version of “The Office,” the last time that we’d seen Brent was when “The Office” Christmas specials aired back on December 26th and 27th of 2003, making this year a decade since the character finally stood up to Chris Finch and got as happy an ending as that character could possibly have. It’s probably particularly apt that Gervais has decided to revive Brent for Comic Relief, considering it was while in fancy dress for the event that he was made redundant from Wernham Hogg back during the second season. The entire 10-minute short, entitled “The Office Revisited,” is now available to watch online, and you can watch the new slimline version of David Brent below.
The short sees Brent now as a traveling salesman, and given the character’s fondness for music — with past hits including “Freelove Freeway” and a cover of “If You Don’t Know Me By Now” — it should come as no surprise that the impetus in this short is the recording of a new song. In addition to the short, the entire music video for “Equality Street” is available to watch, so you can hear all of Brent’s reggae-inflected Biddly Biddly Bongs alongside the extremely game British rapper and comedian Doc Brown. The consensus seems to be that it was the highlight of this year’s Comic Relief, but it’s up for debate whether this is as funny as the character in his prime.
Give the short a watch below, followed by the music video for “Equality Street” and the aforementioned African aid spot right after.