Tuesday, April 4, 2017

Monday, April 3 - Wodehouse Playhouse: Portrait of a Disciplinarian & Unpleasantness at Bludleigh Court

Wodehouse Playhouse (1974–1978): Portrait of a Disciplinarian (Season 1 Episode 3 - aired 7 May 1975)

Reggie Mulliner is invited to Bingley On Sea by his brother, Dr. Joe Mulliner, to visit their old Nannie, Nurse Wilks who lives on in Reggie's memory as being 7 feet tall, with stevedore shoulders, beetling brows and steel teeth. Noblesse Oblige requires Reggie to visit Nurse Wilks for afternoon tea with boiled eggs and fruit-cake. Upon arriving at 'Wee Holme' in Marazine Road, Nannie's address, he finds that she is also entertaining Jane Oliphant, Reggie's ex-fiancee, a girl with a heart of stone whom Reggie has reason to believe visited some people by the name of Ponderby and became engaged to a man named Dillingwater, all in the space of a week. It is up to Nurse Wilks to bring the two star-crossed lovers together. Reggie is locked in a cupboard because he refuses to kiss Miss Jane, and Jane follows Reggie into the cupboard when she forgets where she is and lights up a cigarette. There can be no person on earth more likely to strike terror into the human heart and mind than the English Nannie, and Nurse Wilks is no exception.

Wodehouse Playhouse (1974–1978): Unpleasantness at Bludleigh Court (Season 1 Episode 4 - aired 14 May 1975)

Kindred spirits and fellow poets, Charlotte Mulliner (author of 'Vignettes in Verse') and Aubrey Trefusis (author of 'Pastels In Prose') meet at 'The Crushed Pansy' a club for the literati. It emerges that Charlotte Mulliner has been invited to stay at the home of Aubrey Trefusis' parents, Sir Alexander and Lady Bassinger. Bludleigh Court is a strange house - it exercises a ghastly spell that saps even the most humanitarian principles and turns the gentlest nature-lover into a monster of ravening bloodlust. At first Charlotte is inclined to scoff at Aubrey's warnings but upon arriving at the house, both young people soon fall under its spell. They find themselves pursuing Aubrey's Uncle Francis, whose sole topic of conversation is limited to gnus, and as far as Aubrey is concerned 'No gnus is good news'. Charlotte had never thought that she would be handy with an air rifle, but she turns out to be an excellent shot, pursuing Uncle Francis off the boathouse roof where he is sunbathing, but Uncle Francis is a good mover, having got that way by pursuing the nippier gnus. When both Aubrey and Charlotte come to themselves they leave Bludleigh Court for good, returning to London for a spot of tea and marriage.

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