Talking Heads

[lotusbell]

Anyone remember the original and will you be watching the new one? I studied it at A Level and still have my copy with all my notes in.

[Bloatedandconfused]

I also did this for A level. I loved it and was excited to see how it all panned out. I thought Imelda Staunton was mesmerising. The writing seemed even more brilliant this time around than it did the first time I read/saw it.
The Sarah Lancashire one was disturbing. I felt uncomfortable the whole time but isn't that the point of these monologues? We can see it unravelling where as they can't. Gwen seems to think her son is flirting with her. I think that's how she justifies it to herself. In "Playing Sandwiches" something similar happens. It's been a while since I read it but doesn't the little girl try and hold his hand so he sees that as some sort of green light?
I think the vicar was distracted by the jam when she told her to tell her son and that it was just a crush because she later said it was a sin. I do agree though that the daughter being called Maureen was a bit odd. Perhaps he had actually started writing it many years ago and didn't change the name.
The acting is superb though.

[Chienloup]

I love Alan Bennett, I really do, but I felt the Sarah Lancashire one (no matter how well-acted) was deliberately provocative for the sake of it. Usually the beauty of his writing comes from the bit of the characters we can all recognise, the everyday-ness of even remarkable situations, but this one seemed so far from that. There was nothing recognisable in any of the characters, and it just didn't ring true. I'm sure there are mothers who exist who have had sexual feelings for their sons, but I don't think her reactions and actions were likely or believable. It seemed very unlike the others in that respect.

[The80sweregreat]

Alan Bennett has an ear for dialogue ; he can write exactly how people speak in real life. I bet his a good listener rather than a chatter box. He can conjure up an image in a few words. He is a real national treasure of the literary world.
Victoria wood was the same ; people's quirks and use of language is so important to them. It is a real gift to have.
You could almost feel the distraction of that jam making in ' an ordinary woman'
When people are not listening to you properly it can really hurt and many people are not good at being quiet when it matters.
They just want to talk about themselves.

[southeastdweller]

but I don't think her reactions and actions were likely or believable.

Such as?

[Wingedharpy]

@The80sweregreat : You sum it up so, so well.

I was saw a documentary about AB and he did come across as quite introverted, despite his career.

It also showed a snapshot of him sitting in the Victoria shopping centre in Leeds and he said he went there just to sit and listen.

Also, AB is 86yrs old. He probably thinks Maureen is a dead trendy name compared to Bertha and Doreen!

[Wingedharpy]

Just as my expression, "dead trendy", gives away my age range😊

[The80sweregreat]

I'm a bit in love with writers in general and AB is just fab.
I admire anyone who can write a play or a novel. It must be such a hard thing to do really well and quite lonely too!

[SchadenfreudePersonified]

I think the whole point was, she was excruciatingly lonely, after the death of her Mother and her "friend" from the bus, that the companionship of the women's prison was a bit like a girls' boarding school for her.

That's what I thought, Harpy - same when Patricia Routledge did it. I felt she'd had a desperately lonely life, and one which she felt wasn't meaningful in any way. This was why she interfered in other people's lives in a "helpful" manner (which wasn't helpful at all, obviously!). I felt that her late mother had very much dominated her life.

Prison opened her horizons and gave her the opportunity to be an adult - and a "mother" to some of the more vulnerable women in there with her. It's one of my favourites.

Most of the stories are very poignant - but the old ones didn't have anything as disturbing as the Sarah Lancashire one.

[Chienloup]

@southeastdweller

but I don't think her reactions and actions were likely or believable.

Such as?

The telling the vicar, the telling her son, the lying on his bed covered in his clothes - that bit seemed like something a teenager might do, but despite her feelings towards a teenager, she was still an adult woman herself.

[eddiemairswife]

If you like his work get hold of 'Writing Home' and 'Untold Stories' which are extracts from his diaries and various observations.

[SchadenfreudePersonified]

I found the Sarah Lancashire monologue really disturbing. The reversal of an Oedipus complex storyline; I think it's called the Jocasta complex.
Theelectra complex, I think, Pralinette

[SchadenfreudePersonified]

*The ELECTRA complex

Sorry

[VanGoghsDog]

I don't think her reactions and actions were likely or believable

People having nervous breakdowns don't act in 'normal', likely or believable ways. That was the whole point.

[Patsypie]

@Captain yes the father was abusing the daughter.

[Walkingtheplank]

The Electra Complex is Daughter and Father I think.

[southeastdweller]

People having nervous breakdowns don't act in 'normal', likely or believable ways. That was the whole point.

Yes, exactly. Plus this very lonely woman was desperate to talk to someone about it, to relive the burden maybe, but she knew her feelings were wrong which is why she didn't mention the sexual side.

[letsgomaths]

I've just watched Imelda Staunton's A Lady of Letters: I'd memorised the Patricia Routledge one so much, with all its slightly comic inflections, that Imelda's one seemed very bland in comparison. Did anyone spot the line that was omitted in this version? "She [one of the social workers] says I'd be useful in India. You can earn a living writing letters there, they're all illiterate."

Thinking about Imelda Staunton taking Patricia Routledge's role, I remember Harry Potter fans discussing who might play Professor Umbridge, before it was known; many of them "suggested" Patricia Routledge, before Imelda Staunton was cast.

[SchadenfreudePersonified]

The Electra Complex is Daughter and Father I think.

Oh - sorry, Plank - you're right. I got mixed up.

[SchadenfreudePersonified]

I'd memorised the Patricia Routledge one so much, with all its slightly comic inflections, that Imelda's one seemed very bland in comparison. Did anyone spot the line that was omitted in this version? "She [one of the social workers] says I'd be useful in India. You can earn a living writing letters there, they're all illiterate."

I thought Patricia Routledge was much better - I didn't remember that particular line, but I did think that the couple of changes I noticed "Fck up" instead of "Pss up", and I think there was a mention of word processors - didn't improve it and they should have been left as original.

[MissFlite]

Loved the originals and know most of them almost by heart from the audiobooks and have just started watching these remakes. Loved the Tamsin Greig one, it was Penelope Wilton in the original, if I remember rightly.
There seems to be a dark undertone in a lot of ABs writing, right back to his early stuff. Lots of inappropriate relationships and abuse. Makes you wonder what has inspired it.
The one about the antique shop is light relief!

[ArgumentativeAardvaark]

Oof. Raquel from Coronation Street has come a long way....that was hard watching.

[ArgumentativeAardvaark]

Do you think that we were meant to believe that the son had actually had his girlfriend to stay over? Only it seems so unlikely that the parents would allow it, what with the girl likely being underage, and them seeming like a fairly traditional, conservative family. And that is without factoring in that by this point the son would have already been seriously freaked out by his mother’s behaviour. The character mentioned that she was already “on tablets” at that point, so the more I think of it the more I wonder if the teenagers having sex in the room next door was all meant to have been a figment of her imagination?

[polyhymnia]

Actually the classical original I think might possibly have inspired AB was Phaedra, who was gripped by an inappropriate love/lust for her stepson Hippolytus (and rejected by him). The basis for plays by Euripides and, 1,500+years later, Racine.
Of course this was a son, not a stepson, but I thought there were parallels while I was watching and I think I saw somewhere that AB had referred to this story.

[PoloNeckKnickers]

@5foot5

It was horrible, and made me wonder if Alan Bennett actually knows any mothers of teenage boys. Possibly not! The way her friend Louisa said about her own son: "Oh, I fancy him like mad," - this is not how mothers of sons talk

Minor point but wasn't the daughter called Maureen? I don't think anyone can have been christened that in the last 50 years. Just another little point where it felt AB was not quite on it.

I didn't care much for it either but I guess it was very well acted. Very Brave.

My thoughts exactly! No teenager these days would be called Maureen- that would be a form of abuse IMO! My favourite of all the originals is Julie Walters in My Big Chance. She is a phenomenal actress.

[notacooldad]

My thoughts exactly! No teenager these days would be called Maureen
Are you sure about that.
If so, you are wrong.