Not sure if this is the right page, but I just wanted to recommend a programme that Madeleine and I are currently watching, and which might find its way to you.
It's called Capital and it's a drama based on a street in Tooting (SW London - used to be quite shabby, but like everywhere else around there, on the up and up) and the people who live there, from the long-time residents who are now sitting on multi-million pound properties that their children can't wait to sell, but who have little disposable income, to the new influx of bankers and other financial types, to the Pakistanis running the local corner shop.
Toby Jones, who is a fantastic actor, plays a banker who lives in a very smartened up house with his avaricious wife, two small children and nanny. He is so gutted when he is told that his annual bonus (which of course his wife has already spent) amounts to only £30,000, when he was anticipating several million (quote 'you have no idea how little you can get for 1 million these days') that he actually throws up in the board room lavatory.
Meanwhile all of the residents of the street start receiving anonymous cards saying 'We want what you have', followed by DVDs showing that they have all been secretly filmed. A police officer starts to investigate.
There are many other characters, including Polish builders making a mint out of the endless renovations, an old lady's (Gemma Jones, also brilliant) grandson, who leads a mysterious double life, and the mother of the Pakistani shop keeper who flies over to sort her family out. One of the sons has an acquaintance who is a radicalised Muslim (whereas the son is laid back to the point of horizontal and very Westernised). It's all very topical.
There are three episodes and we've seen two so far; the plot is engrossing, as is the all too well known social phenomenon that underlies it. It is based on a novel by John Lanchester, who says he wanted to write about Londoners' total obsession with property prices. He lives there, and says that is almost literally all people ever talk about at social events.
Anyway, the acting is excellent so I thought you might want to look out for it. It's on BBC One.
Rosemary
