Barb - Yes, I like Ralf Little in Death in Paradise, though I do think the series has maybe run its course now. Little was in a British show, The Royle Family, for years. I don't know if it was shown in the US, or indeed whether anyone would understand it. It's about a very working class family, in Manchester I think (possibly Liverpool?) - it was written by the late, great Caroline Aherne, who starred in it as the adult (though not very adult) daughter of Jim (played by the excellent Ricky Tomlinson) and Barbara (Sue Johnston, also an outstanding actress). Little played their son, and Craig Cash, who co-wrote it with Aherne, played Denise's husband. The granny was played by the wonderful Liz Smith, who was still acting in her 90s. Nothing much ever happens in this show, almost the entire thing is filmed in the family sitting room or kitchen - it is just a beautifully observed and extremely funny observation of life, with some very dry humour, and a little bit of very crude humour from Tomlinson as the totally idle patriarch.
Line of Duty is being repeated right from the first series here at the moment. I watched the first series ages ago but something or other interrupted my viewing of the second (I think there are at least 6). It is about a police anti-corruption team, led by Adrian Dunbar. Martin Compston plays an officer who joins the group after an anti-terrorist operation that he was in charge of goes horribly wrong (though not through his fault). It is really exceptional TV, very complicated - you have to concentrate all the time as nothing is what it seems, and Jed Mercurio, who wrote it, is a master of holding back information and not explaining things - which makes for very satisfying viewing when the penny finally drops about a plot line. My husband had never seen it so we have started from the beginning, and although I'd seen this series, I of course could only remember small snippets of it - at the end of the second episode, for example, there is a very shocking scene, and when it actually happened I remembered it, but even a few seconds before I could not have told you what was coming. I was relieved to find that a friend is in a very similar position - watched it before and is rewatching now - she also can't remember most of it!
Dana - you've been a lot quicker than I have with A Place to Call Home, but i have to save watching that for when my husband is doing something else. I'm enjoying it a lot though. We do get The Brokenwood Mysteries, I will give them a try, thanks for the tip. And Ginny I really am going to look our for Seaside Hotel, I love the sound of that.
Ginny those resorts sound SO fascinating, I do wish I had been there. The Chinese cooks playing mah-jong in the dark - how immensely atmospheric. When I was younger Soho used to be a bit like that - many of the restaurants were still run by extended Chinese families, some did not translate their menus into English, and we felt very daring venturing inside. I haven't been over there for years, but I can imagine that it has all been smartened up now, like most of the older, more interesting, parts of the city.
I haven't seen Game of Thrones but it is immensely popular here. I don't think it would be my sort of thing. And I've not yet started A Suitable Boy, but the Radio Times says it's good. The head reviewer for RT is Alison Graham, who is a woman of a certain age, as they used to say - and that age is now mine, so I love her to bits. She is very tart and funny, calls a spade a spade, and yet always says when something really moves her. My friend and I were on a long walk around Dunecht House policies yesterday (it belongs to Lord Cowdray, one of the richest men in the country - the house is HUGE but I have never even seen the shutters opened. At least we are able to enjoy the grounds.) and as we got hopelessly lost (despite having two maps...) we had a lot of time to discuss things like this, and we agreed that as we get older we - like Alison Graham - have less and less patience with things that annoy us, and we are far readier to complain than we would have been in our youth - we just don't care what people think any more. Of course that means we are immediately labelled mad old ladies, but never mind. I recently persevered with a complaint to the company that insures my cat. They are usually quite good but they had been terrible of late. It took a lot of repeat emails and calls to get them to sort it, but they have just admitted their errors and refunded me £150. I'm sure most of these places just hope that if they mess about enough we'll just give up and go away.
Going completely off the point now, so I will stop! But I will look for that Portillo episode Ginny (do you know where it was located?) as I'd love to hear a good Eugenie accent. Portillo has just started a new series on TV here but I haven't seen it. The first programme took him to Spain, and the history of his own family. Apparently it was quite emotional for him.
Rosemary
