I saw that the American version of The Office was on tonight, and I could not resist watching it.

I know this might be an unfashionable opinion in the UK, but I thought it was not too bad. Obviously we have an attachment to the actors in the Brit version and a great familiarity with their mannerisms, but the Yanks didn’t do too bad a job.

It started badly, with a very up-beat theme tune instead of the old Handbags & Gladrags, but from then on I was just amazed at how true to the original it all was. The style was the same, with no laughter track, plenty of embarrassed silences, and a set which was uncannily like the Slough one. It did lack the spark of the British version, which is only to be expected: having the main character played by someone who is just another actor instead of the writer and creator is going to give it a different feel.

I thought that the chap playing the Tim character was excellent, and the one playing the Gareth character looked to have some potential. The series will live or die by the David Brent character, and he is certainly annoying, even if he is no Ricky Gervais.

It was not as good as ours, but a lot better than I would have expected. I just can’t help wondering why they bothered re-making it if they were going to keep it so true to the original: are the Americans really that unable to cope with a different accent and a few unfamiliar terms? I would have thought that the hardest thing to cope with would have been the documentary style and lack of canned laughter, and yet they kept that. Actually, on reflection, there is a subtle difference – the whole thing did seem less believable than the Brit version. I can’t put my finger on exactly why, but I think a casual viewer would be less inclined to mistake this for a real documentary. Of course the Americans don’t have the luxury of a state broadcaster who can afford to hide the show in the schedules where it could easily pass for a reality programme, let word of mouth do the advertising, and wait for the repeats before getting decent viewing figures.

When I first heard about the remake, there was one thing I wondered about. The Office did have a definite and finite story arc across two short series and two Christmas specials. Series one was about the merger, and series two about Brent getting the boot. One bit of received wisdom about American TV is that they can’t cope with shows with a short run – they have to last a season, which means 12 or 13 episodes, I think. If they stick to the script they will use up both our series and the specials in one season, and have nowhere to go. The other thing we are told about American TV is that they like things to be open-ended if they are popular.

I was half expecting them to abandon the story arc and end up with a normal sitcom which could run and run if they wanted – with the option to use our later episodes to close it down if they needed to. That is something I will be interested to see if they do.

That is if I can bear to watch it, because although it is OK and not a total disgrace, it is frustrating to watch, when they do scenes and fail to make them as funny or as cringeworthy as we are used to. One or two little bits are an improvement on Gervais’ Office, but mostly I just felt an urge to dig out the DVD box set to clear my mind.

The writers, actors, director, and even set designers have all done a great job – its just whoever decided to ‘localise’ the show who has slipped up. But then I am obviously not the target audience. I wonder what any Americans who have seen both versions think?