Only Fools and Horses - Reception

Reception

See also: List of awards and nominations received by Only Fools and Horses

Only Fools and Horses was relatively unsuccessful at first. It gradually built up a following and became one of the UK's most popular sitcoms. It was among the ten most-watched television shows of the year in the UK in 1986, 1989, 1990, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1996, 2001, 2002 and 2003. The 1996 Christmas trilogy of "Heroes and Villains", "Modern Men" and "Time On Our Hands" saw the show's peak. The first two attracted 21.3 million viewers, while the third episode – at the time believed to be the final one – got 24.3 million, a record audience for a British sit-com. Repeat episodes also attract millions of viewers, and the BBC has received criticism for repeating the show too often.

Only Fools and Horses won the BAFTA award for best comedy series in 1985, 1988 and 1996, was nominated in 1983, 1986, 1989, 1990 and 1991, and won the audience award in 2004. David Jason received individual BAFTAs for his portrayal of Del Boy in 1990 and 1996. The series won a National Television Award in 1997 for most popular comedy series; Jason won two individual awards, in 1997 and 2002. At the British Comedy Awards, the show was named best BBC sitcom for 1990, and received the People's Choice award in 1997. It also won the Royal Television Society best comedy award in 1997 and two Television and Radio Industries Club Awards for comedy programme of the year, in 1984 and 1997. John Sullivan received the Writers' Guild of Great Britain comedy award for the 1996 Christmas trilogy and another from the Heritage Foundation in 2001.

The show regularly features in polls to find the most popular comedy series, moments and characters. It was voted Britain's Best Sitcom in a 2004 BBC viewer's poll, and came 45th in the British Film Institute's list of the 100 Greatest British Television Programmes. It was 3rd on a subsequent viewers' poll on the BFI website. Empire magazine ranked Only Fools and Horses #42 on their list of the 50 greatest television shows of all time. It was also named the funniest British sit-com of all time through a scientific formula, in a study by Gold. Scenes such as Del Boy's fall through a bar flap in "Yuppy Love" and the Trotters accidentally smashing a priceless chandelier in "A Touch of Glass" have become iconic British comedy moments, invariably topping polls of comedy viewers. Del Boy was voted the most popular British television character of all time in a survey by Open.... and came fourth in a Channel 4 list of Britain's best-loved television characters. A Onepoll survey found that Only Fools and Horses was the television series Britons would most like to see return.

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