Proto version of My Family???
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Quote: paulted @ 13th January 2015, 11:05 AM GMTProto version of My Family???
Not exactly. It's one of many programmes over the decades that have been focused on families though, yes.
It was quite middle class though - but probably not quite as much so as My Family?
Watched the first 3 episodes and it's OK, not ground breaking or anything just typical English middle class comedy. An OK way to pass half an hour.
I did a search on IMDb and Wiki and found that the actress who plays Lorraine the 24 year old daughter was actually Canadian and was 38 at the time of the first series. Could Wiki be wrong?, not that it ever is 
It was one of the all too similar and middling famcoms that crammed the 80s sitcom schedules. All very middle class and middle brow and very inoffensive. Why? Aspirations/a marketing ploy.
These were aspirational family shows. ITV's advertisers wanted us to aspire to those standards to sell their fairy lemon liquid and the Beeb was still our auntie and wanted us to aspire to them for its own sense of importance, which was enormous then.
And all the while a very unaspirational sitcom about dodgy geezers in London wiped the floor with them all on ratings and awards. And that was the end of the aspirational sitcom. 
Good f**king riddance to the boring crap, no one's missed it.
Quote: Alfred J Kipper @ 19th January 2015, 12:06 PM GMTa very unaspirational sitcom about dodgy geezers in London
"This time next year, Rodney, we'll be millionaires."
Quote: Alfred J Kipper @ 19th January 2015, 12:06 PM GMTAnd that was the end of the aspirational sitcom.
Quote: Alfred J Kipper @ 19th January 2015, 12:06 PM GMTIt was one of the all too similar and middling famcoms that crammed the 80s sitcom schedules. All very middle class and middle brow and very inoffensive. Why? Aspirations/a marketing ploy.
These were aspirational family shows. ITV's advertisers wanted us to aspire to those standards to sell their fairy lemon liquid and the Beeb was still our auntie and wanted us to aspire to them for its own sense of importance, which was enormous then.
And all the while a very unaspirational sitcom about dodgy geezers in London wiped the floor with them all on ratings and awards. And that was the end of the aspirational sitcom.
Too damn right there. I don't think I ever watched it when first broadcast for that reason. I tried watching one episode on Drama but then I began losing the will to live and turned over before I reached for the whisky and paracetamol. It's utter, witless gash and no mistake. I pretty much loathe all famcoms - middle and working class - with stuff by the Queen of the Cosy Famcom, Carla Lane, top of the pile. Recently, the Drama channel has been awash with her unfunny dreck.
Quote: Alexei Q @ 21st January 2015, 10:33 AM GMTthe Queen of the Cosy Famcom, Carla Lane, top of the pile. Recently, the Drama channel has been awash with her unfunny dreck.
??? I can't think of a single Carla Lane show that could be described as "cosy".
(Aside from Bless This House, but she did not create it.)
I think the reason I like it was because it reminded me of my childhood (apart from the witch next door with the animals). Like anything though, you can't please everyone all the time.
Quote: Aaron @ 21st January 2015, 3:55 PM GMT??? I can't think of a single Carla Lane show that could be described as "cosy".
(Aside from Bless This House, but she did not create it.)
No? Well to me, as an expat scouser from Toxteth, Bread is a very sanitised and unrealistic depiction of dodgy benefits claimants in 80s Liverpool. Not exactly Boys From The Black Stuff. And The Liver Birds is hardly edgy. And where's the dark side to Butterflies?
Quote: Alexei Q @ 27th January 2015, 9:23 AM GMTAnd The Liver Birds is hardly edgy.
Not now. Hardly average family fare in its day, though.
Quote: Alexei Q @ 27th January 2015, 9:23 AM GMTAnd where's the dark side to Butterflies?
Where isn't it? A show based all around an unhappy woman flirting with an extra-marrital affair, questioning her entire relationship with her husband, children, and wider children?
Not sure what about that is considered cosy?
Quote: Aaron @ 27th January 2015, 6:06 PM GMTNot now. Hardly average family fare in its day, though.
Well actually it was family viewing. I remember it well.
Butterflies was family viewing, not a typical bland and safe famcom no but family viewing. The fact it had this 'realistic' edge made it so popular. Apart from the daring affair stuff it was very middle class aspirational which made it stock family viewing.
And how many of these famcoms have had the father as a dentist? It's a weird convention like a missing finger in cartoons. But back to NPLH ahem, er very safe and bland famcom no one misses. The title NPLH would make a better anti-famcom in the style of Shameless.
'aspirational' seems an odd word to use about the middle class sitcom; I had always assumed that the writers/producers were so insulated that they had no concept that this wasn't how viewers lived...
Anyhows, I remember this as amiable. Not sure if my memory is playing tricks, but I recall this being broadcast twice weekly, like a kind of sitcom soap.
Mind you my memory is clearly not all the reliable because I would have bet money that Ann Beach played Michael Sharvell-Martin's missus. Marcia Warren is not even vaguely similar!