For those who are
visiting from another planet the Good Life, Written by John Esmonde and Bob Larbey was about a man who,
on reaching his fortieth birthday, decides to give up the rat race and becomes
self-sufficient.
The man having the
midlife crisis is Tom Good (Richard Briers), who with the help and support of
his long-suffering wife Barbara, (Felicity Kendal) turns his detached Surbiton
home, into an urban farm.
This doesn't go down too
well with their good friends and neighbours, Jerry Leadbetter (Paul Eddington)
and his snooty wife Margot, (Penelope Keith).
The Christmas episode, “Silly, But It's Fun”, first broadcast 26th December 1977 is in my
opinion the funniest Christmas sitcom ever made.
Most
Christmas sitcoms highlight the most negative aspects of the day creating a
kind of nightmarish microcosm of family life at Christmas.
The
Good Life was the story of contrasts, with the Good’s making the best of the
meagre resources they had, while the Leadbetter’s just bought the best of
everything and lots of it.
In
“ Silly, But It's Fun” Margo ordered Christmas to be delivered from Harrods on
Christmas Eve but refused delivery when the tree was six inches shorter than
the one, she had ordered.
As
she rejected the tree, she also rejected everything else, including Jerry’s gin,
under the impression that Harrods would redeliver Christmas including a tree of
the requisite height for her later that day.
She
was sadly mistaken and on Christmas Day she had to phone around cancelling all
their Christmas engagements under the pretext that Jerry has Chicken pox.
Jerry
was unperturbed at having political chicken pox but horrified when he
discovered that there was no more gin.
Enter
the Goods, who save the day by inviting the Leadbetter’s to their house for the
day and a good time was had by all, they all got plastered on pea pod burgundy
and played silly party games.
The
moral of the tale being that you can’t buy Christmas you have to make it
yourself.
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