The Dinner Party (2007) (TV)

Director:

Tony Grounds

Writer:

Tony Grounds (writer)

Release Date:

9 September 2007 (UK)

Genre:

Comedy | Drama

Plot:

Young couple Jackie and Leo move from North London to a suburban home in the green belt paradise of Southern England. At the birthday party of a neighbor, they soon discover the strict social hierarchies of village life. |

Cast

Lee Evans	...	Leo
Jessie Wallace	...	Jackie
Agnieszka Liggett	...	Rose
Marek Oravec	...	Marek
George Cole	...	George
Alison Steadman	...	Juliet
Laura Greenwood	...	Lucy
Alun Armstrong	...	Jim
Jamie Campbell Bower	...	Douglas
Rupert Graves	...	Roger
Elizabeth Berrington	...	The Shrew

Also Known As:

People Like Us (UK) (working title)

Runtime:

60 min

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Company:

British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)

Quotes:

Leo: I work in computer support.
Roger: Computer support? Isn't that "turn it off and turn it on again"?
Leo: Well, "turn it off and wipe your knob across the screen and then turn it on again".
[stunned silence, then everyone laughs uproariously]

Wine, women and money

One could sum up this hour-long TV play as "Death Of A Salesman meets Six Chavs In Search Of A Fortune with a dash of Romeo and Juliet". The theme: meltdown of two marriages during one evening at a new house in the expensive street for the vulgar nouveaux riches of a garish new housing attached to what the characters refer to as a village.

Amusing? slightly. Any comedy is very dark, though not actually grim: the only deaths is those of the respect of others for the four main older characters and the happiness of those same four. Satirical? in a way; the whole is a bitter commentary on the people whose entire world is that of money, the acquisition of real estate, and obsession with imagined status as represented by cash, and with Keeping Up Appearances. The young couple are somewhat less dislikeable than the main four people; we don't really find out much about them, except his job. If one is generous of spirit, one feels only sorry for the four; if not, one feels mainly disgust. I watched till the end mainly to see how it ended.