Mrs. Brown's Boys

Mrs. Brown's Boys is a Dom Com about an Irish Catholic housewife with a dirty mind and equally dirty mouth and little shame about using it. She is the matriarch of her family, having four sons and one daughter (many of whom live in her small working class house as they aren't able to afford to move out yet) as well as with her senile father-in-law. The show was created and written by Irish comedian Brendan O'Carroll... who also plays Mrs. Agnes Brown herself by dressing in drag.

Originally airing on RTÉ One in Ireland, and broadcast shortly after on BBC One it has had very mixed reception on either side of the Irish Sea, with criticism about its cliché plots and the fact that the idea of a man pretending to be a dirty-mouthed old lady is considered outdated humour. However it has received high ratings on both channels, and aside from the predictable plots there is a certain irreverence to the series which centres on how harsh Mrs. Brown can act towards her family and friends as well as having fair amount of "meta" humour and jokes which break the fourth wall, with Brendan O'Carroll occasionally going wildly off-script just to see what the rest of the cast will do.

"Studio Audience: Awwwwww.... (at a sad situation which upsets Mrs. Brown) Brendan O'Carroll / Mrs. Brown: It's a feckin man in a dress!"
 * Adult Child
 * Animated Credits Opening: A very brief one of Agnes Brown hanging Polaroid photographs of her relatives out on her washing line
 * Bad Job, Worse Uniform: Dermot Brown has a string of these for all the different crappy jobs he's held over the course of the series, including a giant penguin when he was selling Penguin Biscuits and a giant cigarette butt when he was part of a stop smoking campaign.
 * Breaking the Fourth Wall: Pretty much every episode, Mrs. Brown talks to the audience, but at other times has been known to drop character and comment on the surreality of the situation, or point out that they are on a studio set.

"Agnes Brown: FUCK OFF THE LOT OF YEA!"
 * Camp Gay: Rory Brown and even more so his boyfriend Dino Doyle.
 * Crosscast Role: Mrs. Agnes Brown, played by series creator and writer Brendan O'Carroll.
 * Cluster F-Bomb: Though not continuously swearing, she has no shame in doing so if she feels the situation requires it.
 * Dirty Old Woman: Both Agnes Brown and her best friend Winnie McGoogan.
 * Dom Com
 * Left the Background Music On: Mrs. Brown says something ominous and shocking. Cue the Psycho Strings... until she darts out into the garden to yell at the random string quartet standing there.


 * Medium Awareness: They know they're in a TV show and will often interact with the cameras, crew or mention the fact it's a TV show. If any characters corpse, as they frequently do, it is left in.
 * Meta Fiction: See above.
 * Psycho Strings: Appears to appear after Mrs. Brown says something shocking and ominous in one episode in one episode, but is subverted (see Left the Background Music On).
 * Script Breaking: Constantly. Brendan O'Carroll usually says/does things that the other actors don't expect. One particular example causes one of the actors to burst out laughing
 * Why Do You Keep Changing Jobs?: Dermot can only seem to get different short-lived jobs, all of which seem to involve him being required to wear god-awful costumes. Not that we ever see him at these jobs, just hanging out in the house before or after his shifts.
 * X Meets Y: It's The Cosby Show meets The Young Ones by way of Shameless in Ireland.