The borrowers: 16-plus American adaptations of British television shows

1. The Office
Greg Daniels' American adaptation of Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant's cult Brit phenomenon The Office creaked out of the gate with a shaky pilot episode that leaned far too heavily on gags from its British cousin. Dark rumblings claimed that the show would be a quickly cancelled disaster, but The Office quickly found its feet with a more likeable, attractive, and considerably less pale cast, plus a rich assortment of new characters, like Paul Lieberstein's bashful human-resources guy, Mindy Kaling's hyper, flighty flibbertigibbet, and Creed Bratton's unpredictable space cadet. The Office boasts perhaps the deepest bench of ace supporting players in sitcom history. Sixty-six episodes in, it's still going strong, and expectations are high for its recently announced, shrouded-in-secrecy spin-off. The Office has managed to lighten the tone and expand the show's comic universe while retaining the undertone of despair and existential frustration that made the original so resonant for wage slaves everywhere.
2. Sanford And Son
In the '60s and '70s, lefty television kingpin Norman Lear hit paydirt adapting class-conscious British sitcoms about endearing blowhards and their families, first with the zeitgeist-friendly All In The Family, an adaptation of Til Death Do Us Part, and later with Sanford And Son, which re-imagined the early-'60s English smash Steptoe And Son and wound up using it as a vehicle for popular comedian Redd Foxx. Steptoe And Son starred Wilfrid Brambell—best known to American audiences as Paul McCartney's irascible grandfather in A Hard Day's Night—as a junk dealer who uncomfortably cohabitates with his upwardly mobile son, a moony Labour supporter whose big dreams bring him into conflict with his cynical, reactionary father. Like Til Death Do Us Part, Steptoe & Son proved too big a phenomenon (at one point, it boasted a staggering 28 million viewers) to be contained by the small screen. It inspired a pair of feature-film adaptations, 1972's Steptoe And Son and 1973's Steptoe And Son Ride Again.
3. All In The Family
Archie Bunker and his dingbat wife Edith are beloved staples of American culture; the U.S. Postal Service gave All In The Family its own stamp, and Archie and Edith's chairs now occupy a place of pride in the Smithsonian. But our country's most adorable racist misogynist has disturbingly Limey origins rooted in Till Death Us Do Part, a long-running sitcom about the culture clash between working-class bigot Warren Mitchell and lazy, no-good Socialist son Anthony Booth, who was downgraded to a well-intentioned hippie nicknamed Meathead (played by Rob Reiner) for the American version. As with its iconic American adaptation, the show's loudmouthed anti-hero was held up as a truth-telling hero by fans who missed the show's satire of blustery proletariat boorishness. Also like All In The Family, Till Death Us Do Part was popular enough to prompt sequels: Till Death, which took place in a retirement home, and later In Sickness And Health. It also inspired a pair of feature-film adaptations, 1969's Till Death Us Do Part and 1972's The Alf Garnett Saga, which featured its ornery protagonists embarking on an LSD trip.
4-6. Payne, Amanda's and Snavely
American networks weren't able to replicate the acidic brilliance and pitch-black humor (not to mention international popularity) of John Cleese and Connie Booth's classic hotel farce Fawlty Towers—but not for lack of trying. Star power clearly wasn't a problem either, since the show's ill-fated three American adaptations boasted star power up the wazoo, with lead performances from some of the most popular television stars of all time. First came 1978's short-lived Snavely, which cast Carol Burnett Show standout (and voice of The Great Gazoo) Harvey Korman in the Cleese role, and the equally popular Betty White as his wife. Five years later, it was Bea Arthur's turn to bomb in 13 episodes of a gender-switched Fawlty Towers adaptation called Amanda's, which unwisely excised the marital combat of the original by making Arthur's cantankerous hotel owner a widow. 1999's aptly named Payne found another overmatched sitcom all-star (John Larroquette) fumbling around in John Cleese's outsized shoes as the proprietor of the Whispering Pines, opposite JoBeth Williams. The show lasted a mere nine episodes, making Amanda's look like a smash by comparison.