Picture from Pinterest (yes, it is still there).
We have come to the end of the Keeping Up Appearances box set with what was a very poor episode hardly worthy of the end of the story. The final three episodes were Christmas specials, not Christmas themed but presumably shown on Christmas Eve, Day or Boxing Day as an extended edition. I'm not sure about whether they showed these at the end of the series or if they did what Only Fools and Horses did and only make these once the programme had finished regularly. Anyway, it is all over now and we have the difficult task of working out what to watch next.
I was sorry to see Keeping Up Appearances end with Richard still married to Hyacinth Bucket (pronounced 'Bouquet') and not having left her for being an overbearing, manipulative, cruel, self-centred cow of a woman. That's what I did after all. The longer the series went on, and it did overrun by at least two series in my opinion, the more I hated Hyacinth and wanted Richard to snap. Maybe she would have jolted him from his sleep once to often, or put him down in public, or he could have just got fed up of being her glorified butler and told her to fuck off and stick her candlelight supper up her arse - they might have had to show that one in a later timeslot than usual.
Some time ago I came up with alternative versions of popular television shows such as Come Dine With Me, and I often think about what happened to the stars of popular sitcoms once the cameras stop rolling. The sensible answer of course is nothing, they cease to exist at the precise moment the writer puts his pen down but I mean if the characters were allowed to carry on. Would Fonzie be on the sex offender register by now for having lured people into the toilet? After all, he would be Operation Yewtree age by now if he was still alive. Stan and Jack would have been sacked by now for crashing buses and smoking on the premises, if they hadn't been done for sexual harassment? Taking age into account of course, most of the characters from classic workplace sitcoms would have retired by now but then what? Grace Brothers would probably be a branch of Primark by now and there's no way that Rigsby's house would pass inspection to qualify as a rental property.
Of course we have a mountain of evidence to suggest that re-visiting sitcoms is never, that's never a good idea. Grace and Favour reunited the cast of Are You Being Served in contrived circumstances and Still Open All Hours is an unfortunate blot on David Jason's impressive CV. Actually, we might have been given an insight into life in the Butler household if this had actually happened. I just find it funny how this took up so much prime time television, it looks like Wogan had a couple of good guests ring in sick that night.
This train of thought occurred to me as the final credits rolled on the last episode of Keeping Up Appearances, what would become of the Buckets (Bouquets) in later life? Richard fought against early retirement because he knew that being alongside his overbearing wife 24 hours a day would be too much, so would he stay or go? Hyacinth lived beyond their income in her bid to impress and Richard kept warning her that they couldn't afford it, after all he wasn't a captain of industry he was a civil servant who no doubt got a generous early retirement package but it wouldn't last forever and Hyacinth didn't work. They lived in a modest house in a nice area and didn't seem to go on expensive holidays. Would the Buckets have gone bankrupt and now be forced to live in the same council estate that her sister Daisy (not the one with a Mercedes, sauna and room for a pony) lives on. Even better would be if Onslow and Daisy came into money and bought Hyacinth's house and reversed the roles. My favourite scenario of all is the possibility of Richard killing his wife in desperation for a bit of peace, and the neighbours keeping quiet about it in order to protect Richard and allow him to live out his final years able to relax.
The Sunday Alternative #47 is available from here.
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July Housekeeping
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