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"Ricky Gervais has explained how Derek contrasts from his previous sitcoms. The 50-year-old comedian said that his character Derek Noakes in the new Channel 4 comedy is more self-aware than his Office alter ego David Brent.  &amp;gt; Ricky Gervais&amp;#039;s Derek Noakes sitcom pilot to air on Channel 4 in April &amp;gt; Ricky Gervais on &amp;#039;mong&amp;#039; scandal: &amp;#039;I never meant to insult anyone&amp;#039; &amp;quot;The difference is that there&amp;#039;s no real veil of irony and people are saying exactly what they mean, however crazy that is,&amp;quot; he told TV &amp;amp; Satellite Week magazine &amp;quot;The talking heads in The Office were in juxtaposition to what you actually saw them do. So there was a certain irony to David Brent saying, &amp;#039;They love me out there&amp;#039;. &amp;quot;Derek is self-aware because he&amp;#039;s just honest. He says what&amp;#039;s on his mind. He&amp;#039;s better than us. He&amp;#039;s lovely and he&amp;#039;s kind. Whatever he thinks and does is the nice way to go, whether that&amp;#039;s right or wrong.&amp;quot;      Gervais, who penned and directed the upcoming pilot without writing partner Stephen Merchant, hopes the level of raw emotion in the piece will strike a chord with viewers. &amp;quot;Real life is like that. It&amp;#039;s a comedy-drama, but then everything that&amp;#039;s real and done with a bit of compassion is,&amp;quot; the star continued. &amp;quot;I like getting close to real emotions. I&amp;#039;ve never been scared of that.  &amp;quot;It&amp;#039;s just that people don&amp;#039;t expect that sometimes when they&amp;#039;ve been having a laugh. An old people&amp;#039;s home is already quite a melancholy place. Someone dies and Derek has to deal with it.&amp;quot; Explaining why he pursued the project, Gervais added: &amp;quot;It&amp;#039;s an antidote to fame. I just want to do something about normal people again. It&amp;#039;s time to do that, and it seems like recession is the norm now, like the 1980s was a blip.&amp;quot; Channel 4 airs Derek, which also stars Karl Pilkington, on Thursday, April 12 at 10pm. &amp;gt; What is Ricky Gervais&amp;#039;s new comedy pilot Derek like? - Preview "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.digitalspy.com/tv/news/a374883/ricky-gervais-says-derek-differs-from-office-theres-no-irony/>