Jeeves and Wooster: The Hunger Strike

Advice to the Lovelorn

Jeeves and Wooster: The Hunger Strike
ITV
13 May 1990
Historical Comedy
DVD
B

This is based on the novel Right Ho, Jeeves (reviewed here http://rereadingeverybookiown.blogspot.com/2012/05/right-ho-jeeves.html) and while it doesn't live up to the source material, it is easily the best J & W adaptation so far.  I recall Part Two as better, having as it does most of the classic moments of the story.  This is funny enough, from its witty script (preserving a lot of the original writing) to such random moments as a newt-inspired dance (shades of "The Chameleon" in Zelig) and Tom's rant about taxes that manages to mention Disraeli and King Harold.

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Bertie gives a bunch of bad advice, not just romantic-- for Tuppy to win back Bertie's cousin Angela (Amanda Elwes), and for newt-fancier Gussie Fink-Nottle (Richard Garnett) to woo poetic Madeline Bassett (Francesca Folan, who in the final season would return as the very different character Florence Craye)-- but also dietic/financial.  Aunt Dahlia (Brenda Bruce) needs to get a loan from her husband Tom (Ralph Michael), but instead Bertie upsets Tom and everyone else when he indirectly offends the temperamental French chef, Anatole (John Barrard).  We end on a cliffhanger, with Dahlia ordering Jeeves to pack Bertie's bags.

Adam Blackwood, Richard Dixon, and Michael Ripper return as Barmy Fotheringay Phipps, Oofy Prosser, and the Drones Porter respectively.