McKenzie and Rodgers play a middle-aged couple whose grown children have flown the nest and left their parents on their own. While William is content to relax, Hester ventures out for new experiences. He is more than a bit reluctant in most of his wife’s exploits—appearing on TV when an antique show comes to town, attempting to write a scandalous novel about a local love affair, campaigning for a committee post and recruiting him as a waiter for her new catering service.
Ballard Berkeley, well known to British TV viewers as befuddled Major Gowen in Fawlty Towers with John Cleese, plays Guy Penrose, husband of Nancy (Fanny Rowe).
Scattered throughout the series—if you keep an eye open—are a number of single appearances by some well known actors: John Savident, who starred in A Clockwork Orange, The Remains of the Day and Gandhi; Catherine Rabett in The Living Daylights and the many episodes of You Rang, M’Lord?; and Aimée Delamain, a long-lived veteran of British TV, in such series as Upstairs, Downstairs, Armchair Thriller and also Fawlty Towers.
So, select your level of escapism. Follow two detectives around quaint English backwaters, solving murders. Or accompany a quite different pair, two ladies, doing much the same, except in the plusher environment of the well-to-do. Or avoid the distress of murder and share the lives of a middle-aged couple home alone.
Any choice—or all three—will bring hours of pleasure, and Acorn Media has done an excellent job in presenting these series, with many extras not mentioned here.
Review copy provided by Acorn Media. Thanks!