Context for those unfamiliar with The Liver Birds
Beryl Hennessey, played by Polly James and Sandra Hutchinson, played by Nerys Hughes are two roommates in Liverpool who get caught up in wacky misadventures. Recurring characters are their mothers; Sheila Fay as Ethel Hennessey and Mollie Sugden as Mrs. Hutchinson.
“The Holiday Fund” is a quirky and effective bit of television which gives us more insight into its world. Its plot concerns our protagonists needing to get more money for a holiday fund. They decide to sell a chair (specifically called a commode) belonging to Beryl. Antics ensue. Some of my favorite jokes in the episode are, “Sell it [an apparently valueless object] to who?” “Americans.”, “Excuse me, I’m wanted.” “You’re not kidding.”, and a moment where Sandra pretends to be pregnant. A lot of British sitcoms can get you laughing, this one not being an exception.
The opening dialogue of Beryl and Sandra figuring out how much money they’ve spent goes on way too long. They remain in their apartment for nine minutes, out of a thirty minute runtime. It’d be nice to see other sets and characters, at least other subject matter. This scene should’ve been more like three minutes. Instead of them discussing various things they’ve bought, we’d instead start on them realizing they have too little money. The characters are also portrayed as vapid. They criticize the other for spending too much, then it’s revealed that they spent too much. This happens a few times. You’d think they’d realize that they are just as guilty as the other and wouldn’t be so hasty to judge. The scene paints them as too self centered and stupid to think about how much they’ve spent. Having flawed protagonists is fine, but we’re supposed to like these characters, so put a brain in their heads!
We get some quality character moments. Beryl calls the commode of her’s her thinking thrown. This nicely and briefly shows how she thinks about her possessions. She doesn’t just own something, it’s a part of her. Despite her buying the commode herself, she calls it a family heirloom, as she’d like to pass it down her family line. All of this not because of something of real significance. It’s just a cool chair.
SPOILERS
The chamber pot for the commode breaks, so the two leads go to a thrift store to find a new one. We see Sandra present as more seductive and needy than usual, because she wants the son of the shop’s owner, Wilf, to help her get a new chamber pot. His affection for her leads him to help her. It was a little weird seeing her act like that, as the character is somewhat conservative. It was good to see that new side of her. Wilf’s father walks in and in order to look like they’re random customers and not there to talk to Wilf, Sandra shows interest in an ugly pot for flowers (though I personally thought it looked nice) with an odd handle, because Sandra had portrayed herself as malleable to these men as “she just wants the chamber pot” or “I just want this plant pot”, she can be easily manipulated by the shop owner, who convinces her to buy it. I wonder if he knew that she didn’t actually want the pot and just wanted to get her “five bob”.
There’s then an uncharacteristic bit of slapstick where Sandra tries to throw away the pot in silly ways. There’s goofy music, no dialogue, and the rule of threes! Perhaps someone who wrote the episode wanted to homage silent comedy. This scene doesn’t reflect a lot of situational comedies, but it is nice to see it regardless, especially because it’s unexpected. Perhaps I’m biased to this scene, as a nice bit of slapstick without dialogue is often very good at making me laugh.
Wilf sees that an auction house is selling a chamber pot and the girls go in to see it. This scene is somewhat pointless, due to them not being able to get the chamber pot just yet. They got there early for that item, Wilf said he’d buy it, then they leave. The point of the scene was for Beryl to meet a handsome auctioneer, but that could’ve been done another way. It’s just weird that they went to the auction house to get the pot and then couldn’t get it.
The girl’s lack of contemplating their surroundings is shown when Sandra tries to get someone’s attention at the auction house, then the auctioneer mistakes her for putting a bid on an item. This seemed like an obvious possibility. It’s a little amusing that she likely had too much anxiety to say she wasn’t trying to bid, seeing as she just accepted it. A little later, Beryl raised her hand a little and is believed to be bidding, though Beryl was obviously not looking at the auctioneer, so clearly she wasn’t bidding. Maybe the auctioneer was just messing with them? If he believed Beryl to be bidding, that’d be quite foolish. Finally, Beryl says she’ll see someone at 6:00 and the auctioneer believes her to be bidding 6 pounds. Once again, she obviously wasn’t looking at the item and wasn’t bidding on it. Madness!
The new chamber pot doesn’t fit in the commode, due to being too small. In desperation, Beryl breaks the handle off of the plant pot and puts it in the hole that the chamber pot would go in. The point of breaking the handle is to have it fit in the hole, but it’d be obvious to the auctioneer that something was broken off and thus it’s less valuable. Why not take the flower bowl and try to slide it in carefully so the handle doesn’t need to be knocked off? In a twist that was somewhat predictable, the plant pot was actually quite valuable, but now isn’t due to missing the handle. This was foreshadowed earlier by Wilf’s father saying, “There’s a fortune in there [referring to the stuff in his shop] for someone who’s got an eye.” and saying that he was selling Sandra the pot at a bargain.
Wilf says he’ll sell the plant pot with the handle glued back on and the leads will get only a little less than what they would’ve received had the pot not been broken. If Wilf was willing to buy the chamber pot and go through all this trouble for Sandra, why not just give her the amount of money she wanted and no one has to go through any effort? The plot ends with everything well. It’s satisfying enough, other than some ol’ fashioned values dissonance. This episode has a tired old trope of a man doing something for a woman’s affection, then she has to do something, like go on a date, as she “owes him”. In this episode, and in a lot of media, the woman is obviously not actually interested in the man, she just wants something, and the man doesn’t seem to mind her lack of sincere affection. You’d think that if a woman wasn’t interested in you, you wouldn’t pursue her anymore, but that’s not the case in the world of fiction in the 70s and let’s hope not now. It’s just so slimy that Sandra had to basically manipulate this guy, who now won a date from her, like she’s an object.
OVERVIEW
The plot is an efficient sitcom plot. Not exceptional, but not poor. The ending is good, where things seem unfortunate, then it all ends on a happy note. It feels good to see the protagonists succeed, as one can’t help but root for them, even when they sometimes do idiotic things. The portrayal of modern social taboos isn’t too distracting, as they’re not focused on.
The Filme Diary 