All the characters from Britcom Friday Night Dinner.
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The Goodman Family
Jackie Goodman
Jackie Goodman
Played by: Tamsin Grieg
Martin!
- Affectionate Nickname: For reasons unknown, Jackie calls Adam "Bobble".
- Jewish Mother: Infrequent, but it's there. In "The Girlfriend", Adam and Jonny reveal they both have girlfriends and she showers them with love and praise, much to their annoyance.
- Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: She hates rats, and refuses to make dinner in one episode until Martin catches it.
Martin Goodman
Martin Goodman
Played by: Paul Ritter
Shit on it!
- Character Catchphrase: "Hello Bambino's", "Shit on it!", and "It's boiling", which are often said in every episode.
- Fan Disservice: Martin is shirtless, frequently, often because he's "boiling".
- All Jews Are Cheapskates: Martin eats out of the bin, spoons unused ketchup back into the bottle and saves back-copies of New Scientist Magazine on the grounds that they'll be worth something someday as "collectibles". Even his Shed is usually filled with junk he's kept over the years.
Adam "Pusface" Goodman
Adam Goodman
Played by: Simon Bird
"Fantastic"
- Character Catchphrase: Has a habit of saying "Brilliant" or "Fantastic" in a sarcastic manner, not unlike Will McKenzie from The Inbetweeners, Simon Birds' most famous role. Also, "Alright Pissface!" toward Jonny.
- Deadpan Snarker: Easily the snarkiest person in the family; almost any time he speaks to someone, a snarky deadpan comment will often follow.
- Expy: Personality-wise, Adam is basically Will from The Inbetweeners five years later.
- Sibling Rivalry: With Jonny, though most of the time, it's usually Played for Laughs and the boys do appear to have some standards (they try to ruin their life in the moment, not when it would have lasting consequences).
Jonny "Pissface" Goodman
Adam Goodman
Played by: Tom Rosenthal
"Alright Pusface!"
- Character Catchphrase: "Alright Pusface!" toward Adam.
- Deadpan Snarker: Frequently trades blows with Adam in this regard, though in Jonny's case, it's most used when frustrated at someone's antics.
- Once an Episode: Jonny frequently takes some squirty cream out of the cupboard to put in his mouth (see above), and Jackie almost always tells him off for it.
- Sibling Rivalry: With Adam, and frequently tries to pull pranks on Adam like salt in water or spaghetti as a christmas present.
Cynthia "Horrible Grandma" Goodman
Cynthia Goodman
Played by: Rosalind Knight
"This tea is too hot!"
- Hate Sink: Cynthia is called "Horrible Grandma", and is loathed by everyone, insulting their looks, and she keeps pointing out flaws that either don't exist, or are exaggerated, such as making tea "badly" because it was too hot. Even as early as Series 2's "Christmas", the rest of the Goodman family say they're waiting for her death. They don't seem hugely bothered when it actually happens, as Martins' tears of sorrow very quickly turn in tears of joy.
- Only Known by Their Nickname: Cynthia is known as "Horrible Grandma" because she's...well.. horrible to everyone, often picking apart everything she see's for no reason other than because she can. Even her own son, Martin, isn't good enough for her. In "Dad's Birthday", she mentions that she is quite aware of this nickname, though as they all point out, her behaviour is the reason why, and she's never tried to change it..
Other Characters
Jim
Jim
Played by: Mark Heap
"Hello all!"
- Animal Lover: Jim likes Wilson and other animals... but all the animals he's come into contact with don't like him.
- Character Development: At the beginning of the series, Jim is genuinely creepy, coming off as a stalker, but as the series progresses, his Stalker with a Crush tendencies are downplayed and made more innocent, and he becomes merely eccentric (most of the time, at least). In the later episodes, he will still try and kiss Jackie (the target of said crush), but usually in an awkward No Social Skills way, more than anything.
- Character Catchphrase: "Hello All!" and "Shalom!", the former is what he says when greeting the Goodmans, the latter when he tries to be respectful of Jewish culture.
- Cloudcuckoolander: Jim has a habit of throwing non-sequiturs into conversation. In one episode, he decides to pop round to their house to tell them that their doorbell is broken (he knows because there's a sign on it), and when his dog runs away, he panics "What if someone's raped him?"
- Drop-In Character: Jim serves at this, as he knocks on the door of the family Once an Episode for increasingly specific and bizarre reasons.
- Expy: Personality-wise, he's essentially the same twitchy, asocial pervert that Mark Heap played in Green Wing, Dr Alan Statham, though minus the ego that came with being a consulting radiologist. Both characters also has some kind of social disorder.
- Hidden Depths: Jim apparently knows Chinese, which he learned while in ...Japan. He is also quite a good singer, as he demonstrates by singing Christmas carols in "Christmas". He's such a nice singer everyone in the room is in tears by the end of it (even "Horrible Grandma!").
- Idiot Houdini: Jim's eccentric tendencies allow him a fair amount of leeway with the Goodman family. Although they don't consider him a friend, they are generally too nice to outright throw him out or shoo him away, and sometimes him showing up is due to a genuine issue.
- Innocently Insensitive: Jim pretty much always acts like this, especially in the later series' where he was made to be less creepy and stalker-ish.
- Love at First Sight: Jim was madly in love with Gibby, to the point of barging into the Goodmans' residence just to see her, something he notably never does with Jackie. When Gibby frisks Jim's legs, Jackie is horrified to learn that they are in love.
- No Social Skills: He has a habit of knocking on the Goodman's home in the middle of a kerfuffle, and frequently shows odd quirks, such as his tone of voice frequently changing and his inflections on words come off as bizarre.
- Seinfeldian Conversation: Many of his scenes turn into this, as they frequently jump topics due to Jims' social quirks.
Mr Morris
Mr Lou Morris
Played by: Harry Landis
- Cloudcuckoolander: He is as mad as a hatter, and even in his second episode, his attempts at trying to keep calm are fruitless.
- Hated by All: Nobody really likes him, and even Grandma Nelly, who is the only one to tolerate his behaviour (and even she tries changing it to be more reasonable) eventually leaves him at the alter by pretending to faint.
- Let's You and Him Fight: In "Mr Morris" it was with Martin, and in "Mr Morris Returns" it was with Jim.
- Never My Fault: Blames everyone but himself for any bad luck that comes his way, such as blaming a faulty bowling ball that misses less than a metre away!
