Bread

Set in Liverpool in the 198o's at the time of high unemployment, Thatcherism and the miner strikes, through to the 1990's. The Boswell household was run by matriarch Nelly, a strict Roman Catholic family and Nelly always found salvation in the Church. Every mealtime she passed round a china hen in which they all put money. Sometimes we got to see Freddy, Nellie's ex-husband, who lives in a caravan with his girlfriend Lilo Lil, a big chested Irish woman with flame red hair, short skirts and a little fur jacket and high heel shoes and an equal fiery temperament to match.

Every episode had some crisis which the whole family would resolve around the dinner table, and a prayer or two would be said.

Money matters would be solved by going to the local DSS office, where they were met by the fiery, ice hearted DSS lady. The family claimed every single penny they were entitled and more if they could. And they worked on the side too to bring in extra cash

I love this show! I used to watch this when my family was stationed in England and it became a favorite for my whole family. The mother was one of the best; loud, dominant, and acid tongued. She keeps her five children at home with her, as her husband continues coming back and forth between his family and his Irish mistress. Some of the best scenes are between the mother (Nelly Boswell) and the mistress (Lillian, but known as Li Lo Lil or Tart). Joey was a hottie with his bleach blond hair and black leather clothing. Aveline was the cute, but bumbling model. Jack was the shy, overweight antiques dealer. Adrian was the sexually repressed poet. And Billy, the youngest, was a daddy at 16. This comedy was great when its original cast was present, but once the actors playing Joey and Aveline left, it lost its humor. I'll always remember Bread for Nelly standing on her doorstop screaming," SHE IS A TART!" and then crossing herself before she returns to her chaotic family. A British Married With Children, but funnier. If you see this show, watch it!

In its time, "Bread" was a bit of a cult show. Now it's being shown again on UK Gold (a UK 'classics' channel) I wonder what the source of its popularity was. The mother is domineering and has a nasty tongue in her head, her family are obsessed with 'the family' to the exclusion of normal social interaction with anyone else, the humour (such as it is) is laboured at best, and the dialogue is stilted and poorly-delivered.

This certainly hsn't stood the test of time.

In it's heydey Bread was a decent comedy about the Boswell family-a Catholic family living in Liverpool. Nellie Boswell held the largely unemployed family together during the series as they got up to all sorts.

Living down the road from the Boswells was Granddad who was an irascible old man who kept bothering them every five minutes. He added to the humour.

The only problem was that Bread ran longer than it should have. A lot of comedy shows outstay their welcome and Bread was one of them. It ran until the early 1990's but by that time most people-including myself-were fed up with it. Comedy shows should only have a limited run and Bread chose to go on for longer than it should have.

But in all fairness, the early episodes were very funny and do deserve a look.

It's so easy to survive poverty and economic depression. All you need is the wit and the nerve to outsmart Government bureaucracy. Then you can have a decent home with plenty of food on the table, you can even run a classic Jaguar!

At a time when Margaret Thatcher and her thugs were destroying UK manufacturing industry and throwing whole communities on the scrap heap of unemployment, 'Bread' came along to show working class people were lovable scallywags who could rake in pots of money from the Department of Social Security by running rings around the rules.

I can only assume no-one associated with this condescending garbage has ever been faced with actually trying to prove they are "genuinely seeking work" (which required a file of rejection letters as thick as a telephone directory) or making their remaining £5 (or $8) last until they are allowed more social security.

The alternative was to get a job as a 'security guard' being paid £1.95 (or $3.40) an hour. Oh, and you had to provide your own dog.

If you want to know what working class life was like in Liverpool in the 80's, watch 'Boys from the Blackstuff', not this rubbish.