I’m struggling with the Maud character. She’s superbly written and acted, she’s fantastic.
However, she reminds me of a woman in my family who wouldn’t allow her daughter to have a life of her own. The daughter (my aunt by marriage, born in the 1940s like Maureen) was guilt-tripped constantly and my uncle (mum’s brother) was treated like an inconvenience, a nuisance. She refused to attend the wedding and made such a fuss about being “abandoned” afterwards, that they were forced to ask her to live with them, where she ruled the roost until her death in the 1990s. I was a kid in the 1980s and even I noticed how discourteous she was to him, often belittling him. If my aunt stood up for him she’d sulk or whinge. Poisonous woman.
Maureen and Reg should have married at 25ish when they first knew each other, and had children. They never stood a chance, really. He was wrong to cheat but he had no marriage to speak of. My uncle didn’t leave my aunt but he handled it by throwing himself into his career and his interests so was seldom home.
So, it’s a bit annoying watching Maud play “perfect mum” now. She wanted this!