I'm hesitating about raining on Parade's End. I've watched two episodes and have not become enamoured with it, but I realise that this may, just possibly, have something to do with me rather than with any real flaws in the series.
I was wrong to assess Parade's End as a trying-to-catch-the-Downton-crowd project. Not that I ever thought it would be anything like Downton: the Beeb bragged so much about its braininess and classiness, it was pretty clear we would not be seeing heroes bounding out of wheelchairs in this drama any time soon. The script is by Tom Stoppard, which means the chances that any character would get away with using clichés like "revenge is sweet" in full earnest are nil (Mr Bates, in case you were wondering). I did think, though - or hope at least - that there would be enough epic period drama to reconcile the Downton crowd, of which I'm one, to the relentless high-browness of it all. Maybe Parade's End would be the new Bridehead Revisited, and relate to Downton the same way Jane Austen does to Georgette Heyer. Two completely different things when it comes to quality and ambition, yet if you like the one you will probably like the other.
But Parade's End has practically no costume drama vibes at all. Yes, its hero is upper-class and heir to an estate and consequently the costumes and scenery on show are exquisite enough. But they are inconsequential. The theme of the story is the hero's honourable but hidebound world-view and how it clashes with the changes taking place in early 20th-century England. Not surprisingly, you feel the realities of World War One are going to depress him a lot. But Tietjens, the hero, isn't some dim-but-nice lordling stopping his ears to what is going on around him (if he had been, I might actually have liked him better). He is very bright and well-read - something of a genius, we're meant to believe. He is fond of arguing that everything has been goint to pot since the end of the 18th century. What we've got on our hands here is a more-Burkian-than-Burke, pre-Peel, pre-Disraeli - in fact, pre-everything - conservative. It's not a question of "we have to do the decent thing, what, what" either. Tietjens doesn't found his world-view on sentiment. He thinks rejecting the Enlightenment and the changes brought about by the French Revolution makes sense.
Needless to say, I find him a bore of the first order. I may not be a barricade-stormer, but nor am I prepared to grant for a second that we would have been better off without the French Revolution and its ideas. It was the bourgeois revolution, all right, and I'm a member of the bourgeoisie. Worryingly, though, I wonder if it's supposed to matter whether we like Tietjens or not. The two women in his life - nervy socialite wife Sylvia and luminous suffragette Valentine - are richly characterised and extremely well acted by Rebecca Hall and Adelaide Clemens respectively. But otherwise, the characters are thin, and I believe consciously so. This is not the kind of drama where we are supposed to care overmuch about plot and character: instead, we should care about language and ideas. After all, the novel Parade's End is written by the Modernist author Ford Madox Ford. And though apparently dab hands at poetry, Modernists are not known for their epic story-telling.
It's embarrassing when you watch something high-brow and don't much fancy it. Of course, there is always the option of dismissing it as pretentious and the Emperor's new clothes. But what if it isn't? What if you're just too much of a simple soul to enjoy it? This is the uneasy suspicion I have about Parade's End. Of course Tom Stoppard writes beautifully, but language and ideas are simply not primarily what I watch a TV series for. It's depressing, because I suspect like many fans of middle-brow drama I'd like to think that I'm quite brainy and sophisticated enough to enjoy something really high-brow when it comes along. I'm just not too snobbish to enjoy a good yarn as well, even if it happens to be a bit soapy. Dramas like Parade's End - and The Lost Prince, which I tried and gave up on some weeks back - force me to consider if soapy yarns aren't in fact my natural habitat, and whether I may be just as hopelessly middle-brow as I'm middle-class.
At the same time - are plot and characters really so unimportant? They were important enough for Dickens, Shakespeare, Austen and George Eliot. I should try watching The Hollow Crown soon to cheer me up, but if I don't like that either, then I suppose I can never lay claim to being a first-rate culture vulture.
Sunday, 10 March 2013
Sunday, 3 March 2013
The Sarah Jane Adventures - Doctor Who surrogate™
It's time for objectifying again. While watching a singer in one of Sweden's many Eurovision Song Contest heats (the Swedish final is next week - let's hope we don't send the joker with the diaper), I caught myself murmuring appreciatingly "what a complete muffin". Sadly, he didn't qualify for the final. Never mind - the view was nice while it lasted, and the song was quite catchy too.
The expression "complete muffin" for good-looking male is one I've learned from the Doctor Who spin-off The Sarah Jane Adventures. After having waited for months for the DVD release of the 2012 Doctor Who Christmas special (for pity's sake, we're in March now!), I finally gave up, overcame my shame in trying on something that has been so clearly labelled as a kids' programme, and ordered the first series of Sarah Jane. I needn't have waited so long. Yes, the storylines are simpler, the setting is earthbound - no leaps in time or space - and the aliens somewhat naffer than in the original, plus Sarah Jane has kid sidekicks rather than adult companions like the Doctor. But the writing is still good, and the spirit is the same as in the original series. No need for a Doctor fan to be ashamed of watching this.
That the spirit of the original is preserved is especially important. This is where the "adult" Torchwood, with its pessimism (even the exuberant Captain Jack seemed down in the mouth), misanthropy and bickering characters failed so miserably. Yes, true, I only saw half a season of Torchwood, but what I've read about it since seems to confirm that this is a series for doom-mongers. Now, Sarah Jane, like Doctor Who, touches on serious issues occasionally, but never lets them spoil your evening. The total impression is life-, earth- and human-affirming. The kid sidekicks are good and bring different skills to the team. Sarah Jane, the ex-companion turned investigative journalist, is an endearing heroine. On the whole, what's not to like?
I've always had a soft spot for the "meet the companion" Doctor Who episodes, and Sarah Jane exploits the same mechanisms in highlighting everyday phenomena that, somewhere in our unconscious, we find a bit weird, if not downright scary. In the first episode - still the best I've seen after the first three adventures - the aliens du jour try to bring humankind down by way of a soft drink, "Bubble Shock". From the first time we see one of the kid sidekicks watching a bright and cheerful commercial for the drink, we get an eerie sense that something isn't right. It pinpoints just how, well, spacey soft-drink commercials can be. All those bouncing, wide-awake youngsters. In the right context, definitely scary, as is the special "Bubble Shock" bus. It's free but requires its passengers to a tour of the soft-drink factory, where they are enticed into drinking free samples by a teenage-heartthrob guide (that's where the "muffin" comes in). Yep, it's a kids' adventure - a bit "Five defeat the aliens" - but a well-thought-out one with shades of the Pied Piper and Hansel and Gretel. I wondered if the bus was an over-the-top detail - would no-one really question a bus that's for free? - but then I read about the Google bus, so, well, I guess it happens.
The other two adventures I've seen so far don't quite measure up to the first one, but are enjoyable just the same, though one contained my least favourite Doctor Who aliens of all time, the Slitheen. The third adventure gave me a slight déjà-vu feeling as it reminded me of the Doctor Who episode "Tooth and Claw", which isn't one of my favourites anyway. Substitute scary monks with scary nuns, werewolf alien for Gorgon alien, Victorian Scotland for modern-day England, and there you are. As a Protestant, I do see how nuns and monks can be perceived as scary - even, sometimes, by Catholics - but one thing I would not accuse them of is switching their allegiances easily. Even in a sci-fi context, it's a bit of a big ask to see them as protecters of a hostile alien entity once, never mind twice. However, Phyllida Law is watchable as the confused old woman in an old people's home who holds the key to the mystery, and let's face it: an old people's home is another vaguely unsettling everyday phenomenon. Think By the Pricking of my Thumbs by Agatha Christie.
The next episode promises to involve laser domes. Again, something just a bit anxiety-inducing - great fun, I'm sure, but I wouldn't be that surprised if aliens were involved in them somehow.
The expression "complete muffin" for good-looking male is one I've learned from the Doctor Who spin-off The Sarah Jane Adventures. After having waited for months for the DVD release of the 2012 Doctor Who Christmas special (for pity's sake, we're in March now!), I finally gave up, overcame my shame in trying on something that has been so clearly labelled as a kids' programme, and ordered the first series of Sarah Jane. I needn't have waited so long. Yes, the storylines are simpler, the setting is earthbound - no leaps in time or space - and the aliens somewhat naffer than in the original, plus Sarah Jane has kid sidekicks rather than adult companions like the Doctor. But the writing is still good, and the spirit is the same as in the original series. No need for a Doctor fan to be ashamed of watching this.
That the spirit of the original is preserved is especially important. This is where the "adult" Torchwood, with its pessimism (even the exuberant Captain Jack seemed down in the mouth), misanthropy and bickering characters failed so miserably. Yes, true, I only saw half a season of Torchwood, but what I've read about it since seems to confirm that this is a series for doom-mongers. Now, Sarah Jane, like Doctor Who, touches on serious issues occasionally, but never lets them spoil your evening. The total impression is life-, earth- and human-affirming. The kid sidekicks are good and bring different skills to the team. Sarah Jane, the ex-companion turned investigative journalist, is an endearing heroine. On the whole, what's not to like?
I've always had a soft spot for the "meet the companion" Doctor Who episodes, and Sarah Jane exploits the same mechanisms in highlighting everyday phenomena that, somewhere in our unconscious, we find a bit weird, if not downright scary. In the first episode - still the best I've seen after the first three adventures - the aliens du jour try to bring humankind down by way of a soft drink, "Bubble Shock". From the first time we see one of the kid sidekicks watching a bright and cheerful commercial for the drink, we get an eerie sense that something isn't right. It pinpoints just how, well, spacey soft-drink commercials can be. All those bouncing, wide-awake youngsters. In the right context, definitely scary, as is the special "Bubble Shock" bus. It's free but requires its passengers to a tour of the soft-drink factory, where they are enticed into drinking free samples by a teenage-heartthrob guide (that's where the "muffin" comes in). Yep, it's a kids' adventure - a bit "Five defeat the aliens" - but a well-thought-out one with shades of the Pied Piper and Hansel and Gretel. I wondered if the bus was an over-the-top detail - would no-one really question a bus that's for free? - but then I read about the Google bus, so, well, I guess it happens.
The other two adventures I've seen so far don't quite measure up to the first one, but are enjoyable just the same, though one contained my least favourite Doctor Who aliens of all time, the Slitheen. The third adventure gave me a slight déjà-vu feeling as it reminded me of the Doctor Who episode "Tooth and Claw", which isn't one of my favourites anyway. Substitute scary monks with scary nuns, werewolf alien for Gorgon alien, Victorian Scotland for modern-day England, and there you are. As a Protestant, I do see how nuns and monks can be perceived as scary - even, sometimes, by Catholics - but one thing I would not accuse them of is switching their allegiances easily. Even in a sci-fi context, it's a bit of a big ask to see them as protecters of a hostile alien entity once, never mind twice. However, Phyllida Law is watchable as the confused old woman in an old people's home who holds the key to the mystery, and let's face it: an old people's home is another vaguely unsettling everyday phenomenon. Think By the Pricking of my Thumbs by Agatha Christie.
The next episode promises to involve laser domes. Again, something just a bit anxiety-inducing - great fun, I'm sure, but I wouldn't be that surprised if aliens were involved in them somehow.
Sunday, 24 February 2013
Battle of the department stores
Well, what do you know. There isn't only one costume drama out there set in a department store with a bearded and supposedly charismatic store owner as main male protagonist. There are two of them. BBC got in first with The Paradise, which should normally have meant that they won the battle, because, come on, how much department-store costume drama can people take? Against the odds, though, I'm starting to think that ITV's Mr Selfridge has the edge, after all. A second series is commissioned for both dramas, so viewer-wise it seems to be a draw. But Auntie had better look out - they can't really afford to lose any more costume drama face-offs to ITV.
I've watched the whole first series of The Paradise now, and it did get better after a doubtful beginning. But it's still far from being costume drama heaven. It reminds me of From Lark Rise to Candleford with added suspicious deaths. Its protagonists live through a series of little dramas, and sometimes surprising facts emerge about the characters. Miss Audrey - not a dragon after all but more of a fussy spinster in the Misses Pratt mould - freely confesses her admiration for the heroine's salesmanship and her professional jealousy in one and the same scene. The envious shop-girl rival turns out to have an illegitimate daughter in an orphanage to whom she sends money: hence the venom displayed towards a more successful colleague. The conniving heiress, Miss Glendenning, is actually genuinely in love with the hopeless hero Mr Moray. The sinister employee Jonas, whose loyalty to the store is limitless, has a back story to die for (yes, but to kill for?). Here's the rum thing, though - these attempts to give the characters added depth don't quite work. I wish I knew the magic formula which can make a back story stick and become part how one views a character, but sometimes they just seem to get away like Peter Pan's shadow. The characters in The Paradise, like the ones in Lark Rise, are nice enough, but they remain stubbornly shallow. The heroine Denise is a plus, though. That Denise, who is so good at her job, should succeed and advance professionally becomes much more important than if she bags Moray or not. This is the first drama, as far as I remember, where I have witnessed a love scene between the hero and heroine and wished that they would not get together - for their own sakes, not because there is a sexy villain waiting in the wings (there isn't). "Are you crazy, girl?" I was thinking. "Are you going to risk your whole career for that? And as for you, Moray, how can you even think of ditching the heiress when her daddy's got you and your store in his pocket? Get a grip!"
The Paradise is supposedly based on a novel by Emile Zola. I doubt Zola would own it, though (not necessarily a bad thing). I'd guess it is as much based on Zola as Mr Selfridge is based on a true story. The difference between the dramas can be illustrated by the accompanying music - good in both cases. The Paradise's elegant signature tune wouldn't sound out of place in a regency ball-room. Mr Selfridge's signature tune is swirling and excitable, promising high drama to come. It reminded me of the brass band hired by Selfridge to kick up a show when his store was no more than a hole in the ground. The problem is, there's a limit to how long you can simply make promises. Sooner or later you have to deliver.
Maybe it's because my expectations were so very low regarding Mr Selfridge that I am, after all, pleasantly surprised by it. And perhaps it is a bit unfair to rate it above The Paradise. But apparently Swedish Television did the same thing: Mr Selfridge is showing now, whereas The Paradise wasn't shown at all (I had to buy the DVD). I have just seen the fourth episode of Mr Selfridge, and yes, it does seem like it's going places.
Granted, Mr Selfridge is as problematic a hero as Mr Moray. I see little point in both of them. What do women see in them? Why are their staff so convinced about their genius? Search me. And granted, there are stock characters in Mr Selfridge - the pouting variety-girl mistress, the constantly worried accountant etc. - but there are other characters about whom you're not sure at first, and it makes something of a refreshing change not to have them labelled like jam jars from the word go. Is the shop girl Agnes Towler really a "fresh and natural" heroine or a bit of a minx, forced to be tough because of her troubled family background? Is Victor the waiter good news for her, or a chancer? Maybe it's the handsome store decorator Henri Leclair who is her true match, or is his interest in her purely professional? Are head of personnel Mr Grove and his secret mistress Miss Mardle store tyrants or decent sorts? And what will Lady Mae, former chorus girl and now a society dame who refuses herself nothing, ask as return favour from Mr Selfridge for having found a him a financer and saved his bacon?
Mr Selfridge takes its time answering these questions, and sometimes I wonder whether the price for not pigeon-holing the characters is that they become a bit colourless. But I live in hope - plot strands left vague at first are beginning to pay off. I can see myself warming to this show rather more than to The Paradise. More v for villain factor is needed, though. Mr Perez, Victor's shady boss, should start taking a larger part in proceedings. The lad's not putting out for the company's good - it's high time, surely, to add a bit of pressure?
I've watched the whole first series of The Paradise now, and it did get better after a doubtful beginning. But it's still far from being costume drama heaven. It reminds me of From Lark Rise to Candleford with added suspicious deaths. Its protagonists live through a series of little dramas, and sometimes surprising facts emerge about the characters. Miss Audrey - not a dragon after all but more of a fussy spinster in the Misses Pratt mould - freely confesses her admiration for the heroine's salesmanship and her professional jealousy in one and the same scene. The envious shop-girl rival turns out to have an illegitimate daughter in an orphanage to whom she sends money: hence the venom displayed towards a more successful colleague. The conniving heiress, Miss Glendenning, is actually genuinely in love with the hopeless hero Mr Moray. The sinister employee Jonas, whose loyalty to the store is limitless, has a back story to die for (yes, but to kill for?). Here's the rum thing, though - these attempts to give the characters added depth don't quite work. I wish I knew the magic formula which can make a back story stick and become part how one views a character, but sometimes they just seem to get away like Peter Pan's shadow. The characters in The Paradise, like the ones in Lark Rise, are nice enough, but they remain stubbornly shallow. The heroine Denise is a plus, though. That Denise, who is so good at her job, should succeed and advance professionally becomes much more important than if she bags Moray or not. This is the first drama, as far as I remember, where I have witnessed a love scene between the hero and heroine and wished that they would not get together - for their own sakes, not because there is a sexy villain waiting in the wings (there isn't). "Are you crazy, girl?" I was thinking. "Are you going to risk your whole career for that? And as for you, Moray, how can you even think of ditching the heiress when her daddy's got you and your store in his pocket? Get a grip!"
The Paradise is supposedly based on a novel by Emile Zola. I doubt Zola would own it, though (not necessarily a bad thing). I'd guess it is as much based on Zola as Mr Selfridge is based on a true story. The difference between the dramas can be illustrated by the accompanying music - good in both cases. The Paradise's elegant signature tune wouldn't sound out of place in a regency ball-room. Mr Selfridge's signature tune is swirling and excitable, promising high drama to come. It reminded me of the brass band hired by Selfridge to kick up a show when his store was no more than a hole in the ground. The problem is, there's a limit to how long you can simply make promises. Sooner or later you have to deliver.
Maybe it's because my expectations were so very low regarding Mr Selfridge that I am, after all, pleasantly surprised by it. And perhaps it is a bit unfair to rate it above The Paradise. But apparently Swedish Television did the same thing: Mr Selfridge is showing now, whereas The Paradise wasn't shown at all (I had to buy the DVD). I have just seen the fourth episode of Mr Selfridge, and yes, it does seem like it's going places.
Granted, Mr Selfridge is as problematic a hero as Mr Moray. I see little point in both of them. What do women see in them? Why are their staff so convinced about their genius? Search me. And granted, there are stock characters in Mr Selfridge - the pouting variety-girl mistress, the constantly worried accountant etc. - but there are other characters about whom you're not sure at first, and it makes something of a refreshing change not to have them labelled like jam jars from the word go. Is the shop girl Agnes Towler really a "fresh and natural" heroine or a bit of a minx, forced to be tough because of her troubled family background? Is Victor the waiter good news for her, or a chancer? Maybe it's the handsome store decorator Henri Leclair who is her true match, or is his interest in her purely professional? Are head of personnel Mr Grove and his secret mistress Miss Mardle store tyrants or decent sorts? And what will Lady Mae, former chorus girl and now a society dame who refuses herself nothing, ask as return favour from Mr Selfridge for having found a him a financer and saved his bacon?
Mr Selfridge takes its time answering these questions, and sometimes I wonder whether the price for not pigeon-holing the characters is that they become a bit colourless. But I live in hope - plot strands left vague at first are beginning to pay off. I can see myself warming to this show rather more than to The Paradise. More v for villain factor is needed, though. Mr Perez, Victor's shady boss, should start taking a larger part in proceedings. The lad's not putting out for the company's good - it's high time, surely, to add a bit of pressure?
Tuesday, 12 February 2013
Tried and tested book plots - lords and students
All right, enough with the livery-ogling already. It's high time for some book blogging. The trouble is, I have yet to come across this year's first great read. I've devoted much of my reading time on two huge books which are entertaining enough, but which have proved strangely blog-resistant.
The problem with the first, Tana French's The Likeness, may be the genre itself, the psychological thriller. I still can't make up my mind whether this genre is something for me or not, but I'm starting to suspect not. I like being thrilled and I like characters being given the psychological treatment (as long as it's not too Freudian). I'm also sadist enough to mildly enjoy watching characters falling apart and cracks beginning to show in relationships - which is much of what the psychological thriller is all about. But only up to a point. At the end of the day, I crave the tidy resolution and the happy or at least acceptable ending of the conventional whodunnit. In a psychological thriller, there are no guarantees that the story will end happily, even for the main protagonist. In fact, it's more probable that he/she will end up emotionally scarred for life, or at least for the best part of several thrillers to come. I have to face it: I'm probably just too wet for psychological thrillers. Few DVDs have made it to the second-hand shop faster than the chilling Secret Smile - even though it ended sort of all right.
I read The Likeness because I'd seen it mentioned by Swedish book bloggers as a sort of The Secret History light. Which is exactly what it is. The book's cop heroine goes undercover in order to find out who killed one of a group of close-knit student friends. The murdered girl happens to be her double, so she pretends to be the victim and to have survived the attack with a few broken ribs and selective amnesia. The unlikeliness of the premise is not really irksome: on the contrary, I almost wished for the characters themselves to accept it sooner. Girl, the victim looks like you. You'd love to hang out with her cool Eng.Lit.Phd-writing friends. What are you waiting for, just do it! Does it really have to take 160 pages to plant the heroine in the students' idyllic lair, an old Georgian house inherited by their ring-leader (the off-shoot of an old Anglo-Irish family: the story is set in Ireland)?
So, glamorous student friends forming an alliance against - or at least excluding - the rest of the world: check. Educated, show-offy banter: check. Home-made food, plenty of drink, intense studying and enjoyment of picturesque surroundings, all with your pals close by: check. Smitten protagonist who thinks it's all lovely and really, really wants to belong: check. Add to this that the student ring-leader, Daniel, clearly seems to think he is Henry the swot from The Secret History, though without being quite up to his standard, I'd say. You accepted - just - that Henry the swot was a genius, whereas Daniel is more pretentious, in a believably student-like way. On the plus side, there is nothing so gruelling as the funeral scenes in The Secret History, where the guilty group had to live through the funeral celebrations for their victim while living in the same house as his grieving family. The intrusion of the "real world", as good-looking Rafe's mean old dad tends to call it (er... that's because it is) and the falling apart of the group's academic Neverland is less brutal, too. Nevertheless, The Likeness can still be pretty bleak. In sum, if you loved The Secret History, chances are you'll like this quite a lot, but maybe find it a bit ersatz. If you thought The Secret History was OK, you'll probably find this OK as well, and perhaps even be a little relieved at the ersatz feel. But, well, P.G. Wodehouse it ain't. Plus there's no Foxy Francis.
I have no problems whatsoever with the genre of huge book number two, Claire Lorrimer's The Chatelaine. It's a lush family saga of the well-known, American-heiress-marries-uptight-English-Lord variety. There are younger sons, balls, family secrets and unfortunate love affairs galore. But somehow, it doesn't engage. It's not as well written as My Last Duchess, Daisy Goodwin's novel on the same theme, and the references to real historical personages seem forced. Nevertheless, I'm not looking a gift family saga in the mouth: there are surprisingly few of them about. It's not as easy as it seems, thinking up a suitably large family and putting epic adventure their way. Though it shouldn't be that much more difficult than shattering peoples' lives in a hundred different ways in grim thrillers.
The problem with the first, Tana French's The Likeness, may be the genre itself, the psychological thriller. I still can't make up my mind whether this genre is something for me or not, but I'm starting to suspect not. I like being thrilled and I like characters being given the psychological treatment (as long as it's not too Freudian). I'm also sadist enough to mildly enjoy watching characters falling apart and cracks beginning to show in relationships - which is much of what the psychological thriller is all about. But only up to a point. At the end of the day, I crave the tidy resolution and the happy or at least acceptable ending of the conventional whodunnit. In a psychological thriller, there are no guarantees that the story will end happily, even for the main protagonist. In fact, it's more probable that he/she will end up emotionally scarred for life, or at least for the best part of several thrillers to come. I have to face it: I'm probably just too wet for psychological thrillers. Few DVDs have made it to the second-hand shop faster than the chilling Secret Smile - even though it ended sort of all right.
I read The Likeness because I'd seen it mentioned by Swedish book bloggers as a sort of The Secret History light. Which is exactly what it is. The book's cop heroine goes undercover in order to find out who killed one of a group of close-knit student friends. The murdered girl happens to be her double, so she pretends to be the victim and to have survived the attack with a few broken ribs and selective amnesia. The unlikeliness of the premise is not really irksome: on the contrary, I almost wished for the characters themselves to accept it sooner. Girl, the victim looks like you. You'd love to hang out with her cool Eng.Lit.Phd-writing friends. What are you waiting for, just do it! Does it really have to take 160 pages to plant the heroine in the students' idyllic lair, an old Georgian house inherited by their ring-leader (the off-shoot of an old Anglo-Irish family: the story is set in Ireland)?
So, glamorous student friends forming an alliance against - or at least excluding - the rest of the world: check. Educated, show-offy banter: check. Home-made food, plenty of drink, intense studying and enjoyment of picturesque surroundings, all with your pals close by: check. Smitten protagonist who thinks it's all lovely and really, really wants to belong: check. Add to this that the student ring-leader, Daniel, clearly seems to think he is Henry the swot from The Secret History, though without being quite up to his standard, I'd say. You accepted - just - that Henry the swot was a genius, whereas Daniel is more pretentious, in a believably student-like way. On the plus side, there is nothing so gruelling as the funeral scenes in The Secret History, where the guilty group had to live through the funeral celebrations for their victim while living in the same house as his grieving family. The intrusion of the "real world", as good-looking Rafe's mean old dad tends to call it (er... that's because it is) and the falling apart of the group's academic Neverland is less brutal, too. Nevertheless, The Likeness can still be pretty bleak. In sum, if you loved The Secret History, chances are you'll like this quite a lot, but maybe find it a bit ersatz. If you thought The Secret History was OK, you'll probably find this OK as well, and perhaps even be a little relieved at the ersatz feel. But, well, P.G. Wodehouse it ain't. Plus there's no Foxy Francis.
I have no problems whatsoever with the genre of huge book number two, Claire Lorrimer's The Chatelaine. It's a lush family saga of the well-known, American-heiress-marries-uptight-English-Lord variety. There are younger sons, balls, family secrets and unfortunate love affairs galore. But somehow, it doesn't engage. It's not as well written as My Last Duchess, Daisy Goodwin's novel on the same theme, and the references to real historical personages seem forced. Nevertheless, I'm not looking a gift family saga in the mouth: there are surprisingly few of them about. It's not as easy as it seems, thinking up a suitably large family and putting epic adventure their way. Though it shouldn't be that much more difficult than shattering peoples' lives in a hundred different ways in grim thrillers.
Thursday, 31 January 2013
Predictions (i.e. wild guesses) for Downton Abbey series four
Yes, I know, there's been a great deal of Downton-blogging lately. But as they are starting to film the new series soon, I thought I might as well air my predictions before there are any leaks about what actually will happen in it. Well, that is my excuse, anyway. After this, I'll try to save the Downton topic - barring the odd coy reference - until the series starts again, but I can't promise success.
So here are some possible plot lines which might lie in wait for us in series four:
Close but no cigar for Lady Mary and Branson: They are both bereaved, both single parents, both have a vested interest in modernising Downton and both have fond memories of Matthew. It would seem a perfect match and nicely ironic, considering how Mary tried to dissuade Sybil from having anything to do with "the chauffeur". And yet... Emergency update: I originally claimed that Branson and Mary wouldn't get together because it was forbidden by law to marry your dead wife's sister, but I've since checked, and it appears this law was repealed in 1906. Nevertheless, I don't believe they'll become an item: it would be too much frowned upon by the family. However, they will grow closer and become firm friends.
Thoroughly modern Edith: It was made pretty clear in the Christmas special that Lady Edith will become her newspaper editor's mistress. Unlike Mary, she has no reason to harbour any warm feelings for the institution of marriage. The affair will probably be conducted from the Crawley family's London residence, and possibly Edith will become pally with the bohemian crowd, like Elizabeth in the original Upstairs Downstairs. A Bloomsbury connection could come in handy for later plot developments. I'm not sure the newspaper editor will turn out to be Edith's one true love, though: she'd better double-check that "mad wife" story.
Jimmy gets entangled with Lady Rose: There's nothing inevitable about heartbreaker Jimmy ending up crossed in love himself: one of the refreshing things about Downton is that it's no cautionary tale. Surely, though, this storyline is too good to miss, what with a ditzy young well-born woman looking for adventure in the house. I doubt if Jimmy would fall in love with Rose in earnest, but he might fancy himself as the new Branson, and be severely shaken when she lets him drop. She's no Sybil, and will not sacrifice her future for a cute manservant. Callous Jimmy-handling will lead her into more manservant-trouble, though, as the jealous and protective Thomas is bound to launch a nasty anti-Rose campaign. He may find a surprising ally in Ivy.
Rose's suitors generate drama: The Earl and his lady will do their best to get Lady Rose married, as they have more or less promised her parents. Consequently, Downton will be teeming with her suitors. At least one of them will most likely end up falling for Mary. Also, I shouldn't be surprised if one of the suitors turned out to be a really bad lot: it's been a while since we had an upstairs Downton villain.
Anna and Bates start a family and this time there will be no birth trauma. Downton viewers are in dire need of some family bliss, so Anna will deliver a baby without anything bad happening to the child, the mother or for that matter the father. But there will be some smaller problems: she will have to stop working, and the family must live on Bates's pay alone. Will they leave Downton and buy a small hotel, as Bates imagined so lyrically they would in series two? Will they heck. This couple will only leave Downton feet first and are, let's face it, a shoo-in for the positions of butler and housekeeper once Carson and Mrs Hughes retire (if Anna can find help with the children). But let's not get ahead of ourselves: this won't happen until the very last Downton series, which hopefully is a long way off.
Alfred leaves - but may possibly fall for Daisy first There's a Swedish schoolgirl rhyme that goes "I'm in love with a guy who's in love with a girl who's in love with a guy who loves me" (it rhymes in Swedish, but that doesn't make it poetic). The footman-kitchen maid crushes of series three roughly followed this pattern, except Jimmy didn't fall in love with Daisy (that would really have brought things full circle, considering her infatuation with Thomas in series one). These love intrigues came across as a little tepid compared to Thomas's doomed passion for Jimmy, and possibly nothing will come of any of them. Then again, if Daisy hangs in there, even thick Alfred might realise she's a better catch than feather-brained Ivy. For one thing, she will eventually take over her father-in-law's farm. That's a "career in food" waiting right there, and if Alfred himself can't see it, his loving auntie will and may push him in the right direction.
A housemaid and/or a nursery maid make their mark: Since Anna became a lady's maid, we haven't seen a lot of the Downton housemaids, excepting bolshie Edna in the Christmas special. It's time one of them moved to the foreground again. Also, with two babies in the house, it would be surprising if we were to see nothing of what goes on in the nursery. The nanny might emerge as a new lead character among the servants, but my money's on the nursery maid.
Thomas and Miss O'Brien are reconciled and once again become the perfect double act: Well, a girl can dream, can't she? With bone of contention Alfred leaving, why should they go on fighting? Neither is very "popular downstairs", and they need every ally they can get. Besides, they wrote to each other during the war, for pity's sake. Surely a friendship like that can't just die? I realise, though, that everything hinges on how Miss O'Brien tackles any danger that might be heading Jimmy's way. If she harms Thomas's precious Goldilocks, then the bridges are truly burned.
So here are some possible plot lines which might lie in wait for us in series four:
Close but no cigar for Lady Mary and Branson: They are both bereaved, both single parents, both have a vested interest in modernising Downton and both have fond memories of Matthew. It would seem a perfect match and nicely ironic, considering how Mary tried to dissuade Sybil from having anything to do with "the chauffeur". And yet... Emergency update: I originally claimed that Branson and Mary wouldn't get together because it was forbidden by law to marry your dead wife's sister, but I've since checked, and it appears this law was repealed in 1906. Nevertheless, I don't believe they'll become an item: it would be too much frowned upon by the family. However, they will grow closer and become firm friends.
Thoroughly modern Edith: It was made pretty clear in the Christmas special that Lady Edith will become her newspaper editor's mistress. Unlike Mary, she has no reason to harbour any warm feelings for the institution of marriage. The affair will probably be conducted from the Crawley family's London residence, and possibly Edith will become pally with the bohemian crowd, like Elizabeth in the original Upstairs Downstairs. A Bloomsbury connection could come in handy for later plot developments. I'm not sure the newspaper editor will turn out to be Edith's one true love, though: she'd better double-check that "mad wife" story.
Jimmy gets entangled with Lady Rose: There's nothing inevitable about heartbreaker Jimmy ending up crossed in love himself: one of the refreshing things about Downton is that it's no cautionary tale. Surely, though, this storyline is too good to miss, what with a ditzy young well-born woman looking for adventure in the house. I doubt if Jimmy would fall in love with Rose in earnest, but he might fancy himself as the new Branson, and be severely shaken when she lets him drop. She's no Sybil, and will not sacrifice her future for a cute manservant. Callous Jimmy-handling will lead her into more manservant-trouble, though, as the jealous and protective Thomas is bound to launch a nasty anti-Rose campaign. He may find a surprising ally in Ivy.
Rose's suitors generate drama: The Earl and his lady will do their best to get Lady Rose married, as they have more or less promised her parents. Consequently, Downton will be teeming with her suitors. At least one of them will most likely end up falling for Mary. Also, I shouldn't be surprised if one of the suitors turned out to be a really bad lot: it's been a while since we had an upstairs Downton villain.
Anna and Bates start a family and this time there will be no birth trauma. Downton viewers are in dire need of some family bliss, so Anna will deliver a baby without anything bad happening to the child, the mother or for that matter the father. But there will be some smaller problems: she will have to stop working, and the family must live on Bates's pay alone. Will they leave Downton and buy a small hotel, as Bates imagined so lyrically they would in series two? Will they heck. This couple will only leave Downton feet first and are, let's face it, a shoo-in for the positions of butler and housekeeper once Carson and Mrs Hughes retire (if Anna can find help with the children). But let's not get ahead of ourselves: this won't happen until the very last Downton series, which hopefully is a long way off.
Alfred leaves - but may possibly fall for Daisy first There's a Swedish schoolgirl rhyme that goes "I'm in love with a guy who's in love with a girl who's in love with a guy who loves me" (it rhymes in Swedish, but that doesn't make it poetic). The footman-kitchen maid crushes of series three roughly followed this pattern, except Jimmy didn't fall in love with Daisy (that would really have brought things full circle, considering her infatuation with Thomas in series one). These love intrigues came across as a little tepid compared to Thomas's doomed passion for Jimmy, and possibly nothing will come of any of them. Then again, if Daisy hangs in there, even thick Alfred might realise she's a better catch than feather-brained Ivy. For one thing, she will eventually take over her father-in-law's farm. That's a "career in food" waiting right there, and if Alfred himself can't see it, his loving auntie will and may push him in the right direction.
A housemaid and/or a nursery maid make their mark: Since Anna became a lady's maid, we haven't seen a lot of the Downton housemaids, excepting bolshie Edna in the Christmas special. It's time one of them moved to the foreground again. Also, with two babies in the house, it would be surprising if we were to see nothing of what goes on in the nursery. The nanny might emerge as a new lead character among the servants, but my money's on the nursery maid.
Thomas and Miss O'Brien are reconciled and once again become the perfect double act: Well, a girl can dream, can't she? With bone of contention Alfred leaving, why should they go on fighting? Neither is very "popular downstairs", and they need every ally they can get. Besides, they wrote to each other during the war, for pity's sake. Surely a friendship like that can't just die? I realise, though, that everything hinges on how Miss O'Brien tackles any danger that might be heading Jimmy's way. If she harms Thomas's precious Goldilocks, then the bridges are truly burned.
Wednesday, 23 January 2013
Don't let's be nasty to the Victorians (part three, approximately)
Is it all right to give up on a book that is actually well-written and cannot be accused of being boring? I've asked myself the question since laying aside Sleep, Pale Sister by Joanne Harris after 70 pages, and not feeling any great urge to pick it up again. Joanne Harris is a good writer, no doubt about it, and she can draw you into a plot with great skill. I enjoyed both Gentlemen and Players and the historical yarn Holy Fools, which came with the added bonus of a charismatic villain. In Sleep, Pale Sister, Harris sets her story in Victorian England, which should be a great match. Or maybe not, because Harris doesn't seem to "get" the Victorian mindset, or want to. Her male protagonist is full of complexes of - you guessed it - a sexual kind which he has picked up during a - you guessed it again - cold and loveless childhood as the son of a clergyman. He is a painter of fierce tigers in the jungle and a forerunner of impressionism. No, I jest. He is a painter of sentimental pictures of fair maidens, likes to be compared to the Pre-Raphaelites and is a member of the Royal Academy, and consequently, it is hinted, is Not Much Good. He marries one of his models, whom he has watched over and groomed since her childhood to be the perfect woman, but shrinks when she shows a streak of sensuality and fails to make her happy. And for this he must needs be punished.
So, that is quite a lot of prejudices about Victorian gentlemen rolled into one, then. As with Mr Timothy, I hesitated to buy Sleep, Pale Sister because of the blurb text, which this time states that the heroine (called Effie, just like Ruskin's wife - hmmm) "must finally plan her revenge". Why? Why must she? Isn't hubbles wretched enough as it is, without his wife going all vindictive on him? In the circumstances, you could understand an elopement. But revenge, as if the poor sap had wilfully done her wrong and had to be paid in kind? The pursuit of happiness is one thing, malevolence surely another.
I realise that I've become far too sensitive to anything close to Victorian-bashing after reading too many boo-those-uptight-but-secretly-perverse-Victorians novels. Here, again, is why we should be less sanctimonious about the poor Victorians:
They weren't half as uptight as we think: Yes, their sexual morals were stricter. And there were Victorians with strange hang-ups: Dickens was obsessed with virtuous young maidens; Gladstone became somewhat over-enthusiastic about saving prostitutes; poor old Ruskin was freaked out by the whole marriage-consummation thing. But they were not representative of the whole age: their quirks were their own, and no worse than individual neuroses and obsessions which we encounter today. We need go no further than to Queen Victoria herself to see another side of the Victorians' supposedly "inhibited" love life. She and Prince Albert were not the world's greatest parents, but as for marriage consummation? Not a problem.
We're no better: The main accusation against Victorians is that they were killjoys who put a ban on innocent pleasures and, as a consequence, got hooked on less innocent ones. Well, we're nice ones to talk. Self-abnegation in the name of virtue may be out, but other reasons for hankering after a hair shirt have popped up in its place: health, environment, good parenting, even (bizarrely) political causes. The simple truth is that no-one is likely to be better off just because you deny yourself a little, or even a lot, of what you fancy. But mankind is strangely reluctant to get its head round this. Remember those boycotts of French wine because of France's nuclear tests somewhere in the Pacific? I recall meeting someone who still boycotted French wine a long time after the tests had stopped and who expected us to be impressed by her steadfastness. When it comes to pointless self-denial, we offer the Victorians a pretty good match.
Sensualism can be tyrannical too: I admit it reluctantly, I who often find myself warbling "I belong to the earth, I belong to the wind, and the rain, and the hills, and the heeeatheeer". Indulging one's creature comforts is one of life's great pleasures, but it is not all of life. The wish to find a spiritual side of life as well is part of what makes us human, and not to be dismissed out of hand. Harris is clearly an advocate of sensual pleasures: good for her. But the heroine in Holy Fools couldn't understand why anyone would wish for more from a convent life than companionship and planting potatoes, or why it mattered if the convent saint never existed as long as she constituted a suitably life-affirming figurehead. It is this blank incomprehension of non-earthbound matters that makes me feel ill at ease and less than hopeful that Sleep, Pale Sister will give its neurotic anti-hero a fair shake. Enjoy the good things in life, by all means, but let's not force French wine down anyone's throat.
Perhaps I'm being colossally unfair. I've not even read a hundred pages of Sleep, Pale Sister. It may turn out to be a subversion of all the usual stereotypes belonging to novels set in Victorian times: maybe the wife will get the comeuppance she deserves, maybe there will be mercy for the husband. But somehow, I think not, and I'm not wild about finding out.
So, that is quite a lot of prejudices about Victorian gentlemen rolled into one, then. As with Mr Timothy, I hesitated to buy Sleep, Pale Sister because of the blurb text, which this time states that the heroine (called Effie, just like Ruskin's wife - hmmm) "must finally plan her revenge". Why? Why must she? Isn't hubbles wretched enough as it is, without his wife going all vindictive on him? In the circumstances, you could understand an elopement. But revenge, as if the poor sap had wilfully done her wrong and had to be paid in kind? The pursuit of happiness is one thing, malevolence surely another.
I realise that I've become far too sensitive to anything close to Victorian-bashing after reading too many boo-those-uptight-but-secretly-perverse-Victorians novels. Here, again, is why we should be less sanctimonious about the poor Victorians:
They weren't half as uptight as we think: Yes, their sexual morals were stricter. And there were Victorians with strange hang-ups: Dickens was obsessed with virtuous young maidens; Gladstone became somewhat over-enthusiastic about saving prostitutes; poor old Ruskin was freaked out by the whole marriage-consummation thing. But they were not representative of the whole age: their quirks were their own, and no worse than individual neuroses and obsessions which we encounter today. We need go no further than to Queen Victoria herself to see another side of the Victorians' supposedly "inhibited" love life. She and Prince Albert were not the world's greatest parents, but as for marriage consummation? Not a problem.
We're no better: The main accusation against Victorians is that they were killjoys who put a ban on innocent pleasures and, as a consequence, got hooked on less innocent ones. Well, we're nice ones to talk. Self-abnegation in the name of virtue may be out, but other reasons for hankering after a hair shirt have popped up in its place: health, environment, good parenting, even (bizarrely) political causes. The simple truth is that no-one is likely to be better off just because you deny yourself a little, or even a lot, of what you fancy. But mankind is strangely reluctant to get its head round this. Remember those boycotts of French wine because of France's nuclear tests somewhere in the Pacific? I recall meeting someone who still boycotted French wine a long time after the tests had stopped and who expected us to be impressed by her steadfastness. When it comes to pointless self-denial, we offer the Victorians a pretty good match.
Sensualism can be tyrannical too: I admit it reluctantly, I who often find myself warbling "I belong to the earth, I belong to the wind, and the rain, and the hills, and the heeeatheeer". Indulging one's creature comforts is one of life's great pleasures, but it is not all of life. The wish to find a spiritual side of life as well is part of what makes us human, and not to be dismissed out of hand. Harris is clearly an advocate of sensual pleasures: good for her. But the heroine in Holy Fools couldn't understand why anyone would wish for more from a convent life than companionship and planting potatoes, or why it mattered if the convent saint never existed as long as she constituted a suitably life-affirming figurehead. It is this blank incomprehension of non-earthbound matters that makes me feel ill at ease and less than hopeful that Sleep, Pale Sister will give its neurotic anti-hero a fair shake. Enjoy the good things in life, by all means, but let's not force French wine down anyone's throat.
Perhaps I'm being colossally unfair. I've not even read a hundred pages of Sleep, Pale Sister. It may turn out to be a subversion of all the usual stereotypes belonging to novels set in Victorian times: maybe the wife will get the comeuppance she deserves, maybe there will be mercy for the husband. But somehow, I think not, and I'm not wild about finding out.
Wednesday, 9 January 2013
All that glitters is not high-quality costume drama
I know it is unfair to pour sarcasm over a series after only having watched the first episode. Firstly, few series get in their stride until the second episode at least - anything can happen. Secondly, the series in question - the BBC's The Paradise - is so clearly made with an audience like myself in mind. This is not one of those period dramas - unlike The Bletchley Circle, another BBC drama I trudged through recently courtesy of Swedish Television - which carries a whiff of disdain with it for what the genre usually has on offer. Instead, like the eager sellers of its department store, The Paradise really wants to give the customers what they want. Glitter, dresses, romance, a large cast of characters involved in more or less epic plots, a hero and heroine who have to overcome obstacles to end up together, that is if we really want them to? Oh, yes, Madam, I'm sure we can manage that. In view of this unashamed courting of the costume drama vote, I really should let the series find its feet before commenting on it.
Except commenting is irresistible. Partly, it's because I have very little else to blog about. I started the new year with repeats, rereading a Jude Morgan novel, which was faintly self-indulgent, and rewatching Downton Abbey from the very beginning of series one, which was and is downright unhealthy in my current frame of mind. (Is the gobbiness of Bates just a tiny bit annoying, or is it just me? It's just me, isn't it?) The only other alternative I could see would have been to have a good grumble about the aforementioned dreary Bletchley Circle, which looked from the description as if it could have been a sort of combination of Sherlock and Call the Midwife with a bit of Foyle's War thrown in - Fifties setting, clever women with lipstick solving crime by being incredibly brainy - but which turned out to be a gloomy tale of a serial killer of the worst kind. It didn't really seem tempting. Another reason for blogging about The Paradise - and the main one - is that it promises to be such complete codswallop.
Where to begin? Maybe with the hero, or main male protagonist or whatever one should call him. The story is set in late-Victorian London, and a lot of the plot hinges on the supposed charisma of the owner of the department store where the fresh-faced heroine, newly arrived from Scotland, finds employment. The department store is the eponymous The Paradise, the owner is called Mr Moray, and just about every woman in the series lusts after him. "If there is a more attractive man within a hundred miles, I'll kiss my husband", coos the friend of the conniving heiress who wants to bag him. Well, sweetheart, you can start kissing your hubby right now. It was always going to be tricky to convince contrary viewers like myself that a man over whom such a fuss is made is really that attractive. And, true enough, I don't understand Mr Moray's charm at all. He seems to me to be an oily, self-fancying mountebank with a ghastly beard. Not that I always disapprove of oiliness, or mountebanks, or self-fancying for that matter. Maybe it's the beard that clinches it. I wouldn't buy so much as a handkerchief from him. His worried partner is somewhat cuter, but then he doesn't have much competition: menfolk are, understandably considering the setting, thin on the ground.
As to the other characters, I wonder if one can even call them that. Yes, here things may improve. There is not much room for in-depth characterisation in a first episode. Still, the worrying thing is not only that there seem to be only function characters about, but that they fulfil their functions so badly. The Ladieswear department in the store is run by a Miss Audrey, who is meant to be the Dragon of the piece. But she is not given any withering put-downs, nor any real authority. All she does is witter on about this and that being "a sin", reminding one of Miss Lane in Lark Rise and her "one weakness". I felt tempted to tell her, in my best Downton-baddie accent, "give it a rest, luv, you're clearly not up to this kind of thing". The Jealous Rival is little better, and as for the Pampered Heiress - good gracious. Patrick Malahide, as always, raises the tone as the doting heiress-dad, and there is a perfectly serviceable minor villain in the form of a snooping old employee on the sidelines, but otherwise it is a stilted and unconvincing affair. I'll not dwell on how it's not a patch on Downton - who would have thought otherwise? But The Paradise also suffers by comparison to the BBC's own costume dramas. For instance, the new Upstairs Downstairs, though not as good as the old one, was still a very good effort and a great deal better than this tripe. I must say this much for The Paradise, though: the settings are sumptuous. I'll keep watching, just for the pleasure of being sarky about it. At the end, though, I'll be very surprised if there is one single character I will care a smidgen for.
Except commenting is irresistible. Partly, it's because I have very little else to blog about. I started the new year with repeats, rereading a Jude Morgan novel, which was faintly self-indulgent, and rewatching Downton Abbey from the very beginning of series one, which was and is downright unhealthy in my current frame of mind. (Is the gobbiness of Bates just a tiny bit annoying, or is it just me? It's just me, isn't it?) The only other alternative I could see would have been to have a good grumble about the aforementioned dreary Bletchley Circle, which looked from the description as if it could have been a sort of combination of Sherlock and Call the Midwife with a bit of Foyle's War thrown in - Fifties setting, clever women with lipstick solving crime by being incredibly brainy - but which turned out to be a gloomy tale of a serial killer of the worst kind. It didn't really seem tempting. Another reason for blogging about The Paradise - and the main one - is that it promises to be such complete codswallop.
Where to begin? Maybe with the hero, or main male protagonist or whatever one should call him. The story is set in late-Victorian London, and a lot of the plot hinges on the supposed charisma of the owner of the department store where the fresh-faced heroine, newly arrived from Scotland, finds employment. The department store is the eponymous The Paradise, the owner is called Mr Moray, and just about every woman in the series lusts after him. "If there is a more attractive man within a hundred miles, I'll kiss my husband", coos the friend of the conniving heiress who wants to bag him. Well, sweetheart, you can start kissing your hubby right now. It was always going to be tricky to convince contrary viewers like myself that a man over whom such a fuss is made is really that attractive. And, true enough, I don't understand Mr Moray's charm at all. He seems to me to be an oily, self-fancying mountebank with a ghastly beard. Not that I always disapprove of oiliness, or mountebanks, or self-fancying for that matter. Maybe it's the beard that clinches it. I wouldn't buy so much as a handkerchief from him. His worried partner is somewhat cuter, but then he doesn't have much competition: menfolk are, understandably considering the setting, thin on the ground.
As to the other characters, I wonder if one can even call them that. Yes, here things may improve. There is not much room for in-depth characterisation in a first episode. Still, the worrying thing is not only that there seem to be only function characters about, but that they fulfil their functions so badly. The Ladieswear department in the store is run by a Miss Audrey, who is meant to be the Dragon of the piece. But she is not given any withering put-downs, nor any real authority. All she does is witter on about this and that being "a sin", reminding one of Miss Lane in Lark Rise and her "one weakness". I felt tempted to tell her, in my best Downton-baddie accent, "give it a rest, luv, you're clearly not up to this kind of thing". The Jealous Rival is little better, and as for the Pampered Heiress - good gracious. Patrick Malahide, as always, raises the tone as the doting heiress-dad, and there is a perfectly serviceable minor villain in the form of a snooping old employee on the sidelines, but otherwise it is a stilted and unconvincing affair. I'll not dwell on how it's not a patch on Downton - who would have thought otherwise? But The Paradise also suffers by comparison to the BBC's own costume dramas. For instance, the new Upstairs Downstairs, though not as good as the old one, was still a very good effort and a great deal better than this tripe. I must say this much for The Paradise, though: the settings are sumptuous. I'll keep watching, just for the pleasure of being sarky about it. At the end, though, I'll be very surprised if there is one single character I will care a smidgen for.
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