Product Description

Starring Victoria Wood, Julie Walters, Celia Imrie, Duncan Preston, with the snobby continuity announcer played by Susie Blake, Acorn Antiques was a mini soap opera set in a shop on the outskirts of Manchesterford.

Viewers were gripped with the everyday dramas that beset Miss Babs (Celia Imrie), Berta (Victoria Wood) and the glamorous Mrs Overall (Julie Walters).

Now each thrilling episode is available together for the first time on DVD, including "Babs and the Cup of Coffee", "Mrs Overall and her Apron" and the memorable classic "Berta coming through the Doorway".

Re-live the drama as Mrs Overall serves up another batch of macaroons and Babs discusses the future of the shop. What will be this week's riveting cliff hanger? Will the set survive? Written by Victoria Wood, Acorn Antiques was Produced and Directed by Geoff Posner and first transmitted as part of Victoria Wood as Seen on TV… in January 1985.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #330 in DVD
• Released on: 2005-02-07
• Rating: Parental Guidance
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Format: PAL
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 65 minutes

Synopsis
A comedy which spoofed both the acting and the personalities of television soaps.

Customer Reviews

Ham roles, corn, and never a cross road spoken
This is quite a short little DVD, coming in at just over the hour, with no extras and quite an abrupt start ... which helps sustain the image of a low-budget, incompetent production. Victoria Woods' beautifully observed and scripted assassination of 'Crossroads' (and a few other, now moribund, television series) unfolds before you like an accident happening in your sitting room. A dozen episodes, with no pretence at continuity, are dealt for your delight, each opening with the wonderful Julie Walters lurking in shot, in a doorway, ready to deliver her line, her coffee, and the odd macaroon or two.

All the dreadful timing, the fluffed lines, the out-of-sequence entrances and exits, the perilous props, intrusive camera angles, bad hair days, and lethal technology are present, not to mention the pretentious scripts, ham acting, abrupt editing, lack of fading, and monotonous direction. It's a pastiche of bad television which can only be put together by a superb cast - and Victoria Woods assembled a magnificent ensemble for this classic. Julie Walters, of course, and Victoria Woods herself, but Celia Imrie, Duncan Preston, Kenny Ireland, and Rosie Collins play their ham roles magnificently. Their timing and professionalism is impeccable ... well, nearly.

Every mistake you can imagine is beautifully choreographed and scripted, and the dozen episodes of 'Acorn Antiques' are stitched together via the continuity of Susie Blake, playing the worst television announcer since ... well, I'll leave you to fill in that gap.

Short, sharp and witty, and a national treasure. Excellent.

This calls for some tonic wine and a sponge finger...
There aren't many DVDs that are so funny they can litterally make you wet yourself laughing the third time you watch them, but Acorn Antiques somehow manages it. Although the DVD doesn't have any "extras" (it would have been nice to have the Acorn Antiques spin-offs in the sushi bar and The Mall), it's well worth the price to be able to relive the "glory" of Acorn Antiques. It's a comedy that works on many levels, some people find it hysterically funny on its own, but those who remember the original "Crossroads" and the "Making of" for "Eastenders" will find this even funnier. It's a funny old show because there are no catchphrases as such and yet you'll find yourself mentioning having your macaroons on a low light since Wednesday or having just whipped your coconut buns out of the microwave for weeks, nay, even years. And if that's not enough, you'll be pinching insults from Susie Blake's excellent continuity announcer between the scenes, if you don't, then perhaps you suffer from frigidity. I know I do!

Made me laugh out loud
It's not often that a piece of comedy makes me laugh out loud these days - this certainly did. Wood and Walters at their very, very best!