THE BRITISH INVASION: Keeping Up Appearances

Greetings and hello to those under the yoke of THE BRITISH INVASION... Yes I have managed a bit of mileage out of this title. Would have been kilometers but we were never properly taught the metric system. Our series of the day involves a pretentious social climber with eccentric behavior and a snobbish standing with lower class. A woman that refuses to alter her own phone number and therefore receives countless phone calls for a Chinese take-out and delivery. This is Keeping Up Appearances.

Well? Was the pool boy dead when you found him??!!

Hyacinth Bucket (Patrica Routledge of To Sir, with Love, Sense and Sensibility, His and Hers, Girl Stroke Boy, David Copperfield, Hetty Wainthropp Investigates and In Search of the Brontes) who insists her surname be pronounced Bouquet is constantly attempting to gain good standing amongst the upper class and she is loathe to admit her lower class family. Often faking a Received Pronunciation accent as all her neighbors speak with such, when flustered or agitated she slips back to her Northern accent. Her husband Richard (Clive Swift of Excalibur, Doctor Who, The Pickwick Papers, The Famous Five, Peak Practice and The Old Guys) is both mentally and physically taxed by all the demands, ideas and suggestions on how they should appear to the neighbors but does such as he no doubt loves her in spite of the woman's absurd behavior.

Portrait of the extremely nervous...

 With a grain of salt her brother-in-law Onslow (Geoffrey Hughes of Yellow Submarine, Coronation Street, Keeping Up Appearances, Heartbeat and Skins) I believe lives off the dul quo because I have never seen him working at a job in all the episodes along with Hycinth's sisters Daisy (Two for the Road, The December Rose, Farrington of the F.O., Doctor Who, The Famous Five, Heartbeat and David Copperfield TV Movie) and Rose (Mary Millar of The Stanley Baxter Show, The Dick Emery Show, Rookery Nook and Keeping Up Appearances) got suckered into watching over their quite senile father (George Webb of The Wednesday Play, Mongul, Mr. Bean and Keeping Up Appearances) who has flashbacks of World War II and a pension to roaming about starkers or making advances to women abroad.

The only relatives that Hycinth would be more than happy to acknowledge is her sister Violet (Anna Dawson of Bloodbath at the House of Death, The New Statesman, Bad Boyes and The Benny Hill Show) who is referenced to her friends as, "The one with a Mercedes, swimming pool, sauna and room for a pony." and her never seen son Sheridan who seems to fancy needlepoint, lives with another lad name of Tarquin as they make curtains, decorate their flat and seem to get on famously. Oh nineties, how subtle you were about potentially gay young men in your humor.

With her constant bragging of expensive wallpaper, parkay floors, Royal Doulton china with the hand-painted periwinkles she feels this will clearly show without a doubt her taste and poise.

As an American I take a different view of this odious woman and would have dispensed with her in the means of an ax, six plastic waste-bags and a few trips in the Burroughs to drop her remains off but you know us bloodthirsty, gun lobbying, poorly educated loonies. My girlfriend feels she simply needs to be avoided or have a stern talking to. Clearly a more patient and decent human being than I.

As a sit-com this has all sorts of disasters to mock and have fun with. The characters are fun, varied in classes and that always opens for jabbing at one another. Highly pleasurable and welcome to introduction to BBC.

Oh dear, the tunnel of chili didn't sit well.