Get Back

Get back was a BBC ½ hour sitcom that was a comedy based around a family having to come to terms with financial ruin due to high bank interest rates, a real estate crash and finally bankruptcy due to the bust of the late 1980's early 90's. Gone went the detached house with stables in Hertfordshire, the Porsche, holidays abroad and the kids public school education at Beniton.

After falling back down to earth with a thud,in came in a council flat in a depressed part of London that they had to share with their obnoxious granddad and an inner city school education for the girls. Just to rub salt into the wound and just to make series even funnier the older brother just managed to sell at the top of the market and consequently came through the property recession unscathed.

So, for laughs we had the elder brother sitting pretty coming out with insensitive and smart remarks towards his younger brother reminding him of his misfortune! As if he needed reminding because he was forced to become a door to door 'dog food' sales man just to support his family.

After, three or four weeks the joke wore thin and the series really had no direction and was eventually shelved. Most of the cast i.e. Larry Lamb, Ray Winstone and Kate Winslett all went on to better things

I watched this again recently for the first time in 30 years after it appeared on a local tv channel. I didn't remember it terribly well but its strange to see how young and thin Ray Winstone looks in it. If you compare him in the Sexy Beast made just 8 years later he had changed dramatically.

This show lasted just two series and was written by Marks & Gran, who are primarily remembered now for the inexplicably popular 'Birds of a feather' from the same time. It has a lot in common with that show in that it is set in the London suburbs, features the same kind of humour and features a working class family trying to break into the middle classes. 'Get Back does feature a half decent cast with some recognizable TV British actors from the time. It also had the amazing good fortune to feature a 17 year old future Hollywood A-lister and Oscar winner in Kate Winslet, right at the beginning of her career. To be fair to Winslet, she seems remarkably accomplished in this, despite only being 17. And whilst I strongly suspect some people reading this are only here because of her presence, Ray Winstone in a sit com does seem a strange fit on reflection.

As other people have mentioned there is a vague Beatles inspired link to this series. As in many UK sitcoms the basic theme evolves around class issues and Ray Winstones Cockney accent (especially in comparison to Winslets posh public school one) is a constant reminder of this but you do get used to it.

All in all this is a mixed bag and whilst not a classic it certainly isn't terrible either. The whole cast (including the late John Bardon who was only 53 when this was made but looks twenty years older) try really hard to make it work and for the most part it does and it does have some amusing moments. I certainly found it less grating than 'Birds of a Feather' (which was also made by Alamo productions for the BBC) but for whatever reason this didn't quite catch on and in some ways that is a good thing as it meant it didn't outstay its welcome. Compared to some of the garbage comedy that gets commissioned these days this is actually pretty good but back in the early 1990s when it would have been competing against 'Absolutely Fabulous', 'One Foot in the Grave' , 'Men Behaving Badly' amongst others, it seems to have been lost in the mix.

Why is this American writing about a 90s British sitcom? Simply because it was one of Kate Winslet's first regular acting roles. I'm a huge fan of hers and while she isn't the main character, she does play a fairly prominent role in several episodes, with the series finale showing off her acting chops the most. One thing to note, as I am an American, some of the British slang and fast mumbling (especially by the old man) was difficult for me to follow. At the moment (2022), all the episodes are on YouTube although a couple are a bit sketchy especially if you are watching on a TV or large monitor. It took awhile to gain sympathy for these characters because even though they lost everything, they were all pretty bratty in season one. Season two is much better in that regard and even though I think the series was starting to get better, I'm glad it ended when in did because if not, maybe Kate Winslet gets comfortable in TV and never becomes the international star she was meant to be.

"Get Back" was a BBC sitcom which is sure to show up on American television as soon as some Yank programming executive cottons onto the fact that Kate Winslet co-starred in this show when she was only 17. "Get Back" originally aired from October 1992 to December '93, and every episode of this programme contains references to Lennon-McCartney songs. This should tell you that the series was created by Laurence Marks and Maurice Gran, who also inserted a running Lennon-McCartney fetish into their next series, "Goodnight Sweetheart", which premiered only three days after the last episode of "Get Back" aired.

Martin and Loretta Sweet (spot the Beatles reference?) are Labour voters who live with their two teenage daughters in a dodgy council house in a neighbourhood which shall remain nameless, but which is clearly based on Finsbury Park, north London. Kate Winslet plays their daughter Eleanor (as in Rigby, geddit?). The girls' uncle Albert (geddit?) is a wealthy Conservative who lives in luxury and sings the praises of Margaret Thatcher while doing nothing to help his poor relations. (The political metaphor is painfully obvious.) Shirley Stelfox (the original Rose from "Keeping Up Appearances") played a sexy blonde named Lucy (as in the sky with diamonds, geddit?). Despite having all the subtlety of a sledgehammer, "Get Back" is still fairly funny ... although not nearly so funny (nor so original) as Marks and Gran's next project, the time-travel sitcom "Goodnight Sweetheart".

"Get Back" lasted for 15 episodes. Not only the programme's title, but every episode's title is also the name of a Lennon-McCartney song ... such as "We Can Work It Out", "She's Leaving Home" and of course "Help!" One episode is titled "I Don't Want to See You Again", which was also the name of a song written by Paul McCartney (co-credited to Lennon) for Peter and Gordon.

Ended at the point when things were hotting up. Would Martin and Loretta have ever got back to the top? And what of Jojo in the future? Anyone have any idea what became of the actress who played her?