A Private Function

A Royal wedding ... and austerity Britain gets a longed-for whiff of glamour as preparations giving the full swing.

- That's step, mother. - You didn't say there was a step. - That it's.

For one happy young couple 1947 will be a year to remember.

The official wedding cake seen here on display depicted scenes from the life of the royal couple.

Australian "Girl Guides" provided the ingredients.

Grim faces on Downing Street this week,

when nation's fuel crisis continues,

The Government announces a further cut in a bacon ration.

Your weekly bacon ration used to look like this ... Now it's going to look like this.

Another blow for the long-suffering British housewife.

This is one person's rations for a week.

Hardly the fat of the land, but at least in England it's fair shares for all.

In France, with no food in the shops, the black market flourishes.

This pretty little mademoiselle seems to be going for a bike ride.

But why the attaché case? Careful with the amazon's fallow nylons!

Taking her bacon here for somebody. Ah, this is where the attaché case comes in. Mademoiselle gets her bacon from the black market.

That's right! Cover it up! We don't want to know! It's a rotten business!

In France, in any rates, money talks.

Go on mother. Sit on your seat.

- Where? - Go on! I'm going up.

Oh, mother!

Again, Veronica!

Da capo!

Mother, are you eating?

Hoar, Appleyard, Long, Coddington, Jezzard, Ibbotson, Starkey, Mrs R. Jack Palmer.

You're younger than I'd been led to expect ... However ...

Mrs Lockwood says she's a new woman.

Have you a newspaper, Mrs Allardyce? This is a good carpet.

Wholesale from Halifax. Of course it is.

- Newspaper, Henry. - It's today's!

And?

- Dickinson... - Dickinson.

- Just ... Give this ... Give you some support for your calf. Ah ... Ah ...

- Now ... - Ah.

My old little man died.

He used to say that a foot told him more than a face.

Well, you've got quite a lot of hard skin ... And this is a chilblain.

Are you on your feet a great deal?

My husband's an accountant. It's one function after another.

Brierley.

It wants to be a bit select, Henry. Their daughter was a GI bride.

Only just. Six months pregnant when I examined her. She was a Sunday school teacher.

The state of her private parts told a different story.

Henry, this is royalty! It's a pure and unspoiled couple.

Goldman?

- Not on my list. - They are very well off!

- Well apart from anything else, Henry, just think what we shall be having to eat. - Oink, oink.

O-o-oh ...

- Not now, Veronica ! - She's got to practise sometime!

Nylons. Henry gets them. Grateful client.

Bad for the feet.

Good for the morale!

I think we've let some toenail go on the carpet.

Yes, beg pardon. It's a bit hand-to-mouth, eh ...

- I'll have my own surgery soon. I've got premises on the Parade. - Oh, on the Parade.

And you're married to Veronica's piano teacher.

Yes, that's it.

You don't wear a ring.

- No, a fine and tiny bits of skin and scurf from people's feet tend to collect under it. - Mm.

Still a long way to go with those invites.

Have we anything tasty we could give Dr Swaby for his supper? You know what he's like.

Ah!

Steak?

Are you not eating that?

They're marzipan! You don't like marzipan.

I hate Mrs Chilvers !

No, you don't! This is Mr Chilvers.

- Children! You don't have any? - No.

Very wise!

Hello! ... Hello! ... Hello!

Thank you.

Heartbreaking these days, butchering.

Meat rations one and ten pence, what you can do with that?

His stomach's on a knife edge. And he's the only one who's straight.

There's two other butchers and they are both on the twist.

He comes in on a night and sits at that table and his face is gray.

You've got some nice thick hair.

Gestapo!

Blood and sand!

Not down here, you fool! Get it upstairs!

- You! Open this door! - I can't, I'm chiropodist. - This is the police. Open this door.

It's a funny lock.

Is there somebody at the door?

One moment.

- Upstairs! - We live upstairs. The shop is here. - Upstairs!

Excuse me. This is my house.

- I am on the toilet! - I can wait.

- What happened to the telephone? - He's a law unto himself.

Father!

Don't get him excited. He has trouble with his waterworks.

- It's not there. - Come out.

Dear oh dear oh dear oh dear ...

Put a bit of something under that.

The grease'll go all over your uniform. Your mom'll play pop.

- Mrs Metcalf ... - What?

- Are you wanting that banana? - I am, love. I'm planning a trifle.

- Your mom feels cold, Dorcas. - It's not surprising. She died in 1937.

Can you manage that?

Oops. See!

Downstairs!

Pork! In bed!

They need horsewhipping.

We never saw any of it.

When did we last have pork? And it wasn't clean. I've seen a cat on that counter.

What d'you think?

Suppose that now I've got to start looking for another butcher.

Wash it! It's probably filthy.

What was this meeting about?

It's a dinner they are getting up for the Royal wedding.

- No need to ask if we were invited. - It's a private partnership.

- Anyway, we don't want to be going to dinners. What do we want to be going to dinners for? - To meet people that's what for!

How else are you going to get a movement?

- It's dripping, Gilbert, it's dripping! - Have I had my tea?

- Eat some of your nougat, love. - She had my sandwiches again today. - She, Gilbert, she?

"She", as you call her, knitted you a lovely balaclava helmet, but we don't talk about that!

- It doesn't have an opening for my mouth! - You don't give me my proper rations. He has my rations.

- They're having steak for their supper. - Steak!

He's going to paint the pork.

- We can do that, Mr Wormold. You've done enough for one day. - No, this is the part that I enjoy.

- "Unfit for a human consumption." - Why?

Who killed it? ... And where?

I used to like painting when I was a youngster.

My mother wanted me to be an artist.

- What a waste! - No, no.

No, I'd never have been any good.

Another day? Nothing from Kuala Lumpur?

Mrs Forbes ... Your information was correct. You'll be happy to know an arrest was made and charges are being preferred.

- I am waiting. - He's just this minute gone.

- O, dear, dear, oh dear ... No, no, no, no ... - No, no, no ...

- What's I've told you: I want it prior to painting. - You don't know what he's like. He's a demon.

- It's dog meat, is this! - Dog meat is that ...

- We did try. - We did.

Oh, blood and sand!

- Dog meat is that ... - Dog meat be buggered.

Bath.

Bleach.

Brushes. Get scrubbing!

Saw another verruca today. Gone the wrong way again. They will hack at them with razor blades.

Don't bring feet to the table, please, Gilbert !

You've to wait till they come to a head! Then they're a piece of cake!

Still ... Mrs Roach's ingrowing toenail seems to turn the corner.

Thanked me profusely. Gave me a macaroon.

A macaroon! ... A macaroon!

- We are better than this, Gilbert. - Better than what?

Are you not eating your spam?

Listen, Joyce ... once I am in the new premises on the Parade, it will be different.

They'll be rolling up in their cars, ... we'll be going out to functions, ... having steak!

It's not just steak, Gilbert. It's status!

- How's your steak? - Just right.

- More sprouts, Dr Swaby? - No.

Poor Mr Metcalf! I didn't think he'd go to prison.

- You didn't tell me he'd go to prison. - I don't care who goes to prison, as long as it keeps Wormold off my back.

There's no fun in this for me, Douglas. It's all one-sided.

- Doris, you've got a magnificent bum! - I don't know that word.

- Bottom, then. - That either.

What then?

There isn't a word I do like.

My husband never felt the need to refer to it.

- No news? - Currants, British Guiana.

Dessicated coconut, Ceylon.

- What's this? - The Empire. Who's sent what for the wedding cake.

Look, Doris! Cheek to cheek to cheek.

Oh, you're common, Douglas! Why can't you just get on with it.

- Wish I had this on my slicer. Could sell it 15 times over. - Be sharp. I've Mr Wormold's dinner to get.

Doris, when you see him, just ... drop a hint about Barraclough.

- I'm fed up doing your dirty work, Douglas! - Go on!

- Is that green? - Yes, that's spinach.

You've ate spinach.

- So I did. - Did you enjoy it?

I don't enjoy food, Mrs Forbes. I have no sense of taste, no sense of smell.

I had German measles as a child.

- A little more, Mr Wormold? - There is no more, Mrs Forbes.

- I've eaten my ration. - We're only human, Mr Wormold.

My experience has been, Mrs Forbes, that when people say they're only human it is because they have been making beasts of themselves.

Do you make a beast of yourself, Mrs Forbes?

My husband's missing in Malaya, Mr Wormold. I live the life of a widow.

- Truly I hope so, Mrs Forbes ... I hope so ... - I'll get your sweet.

Yes, Mrs Forbes?

I was ... talking to a woman ... who gets her meat from Mr Barraclough.

She says she gets some lovely stuff, only ...

Only what, Mrs Forbes?

Now, she's not always sure she's not eating something that's run in the two thirty.

Know what I mean?

- I want this out of the house. Keep it somewhere else! - Why?

He trusts me.

You'll enjoy that. Come again! Next, please!

They shaved women's heads for this in France.

- Right! That's it! Cease trading! Will you all kindly leave the premises! - Why?

Horse, madam. Horse!

- Oh! - I don't mind! - Out! Everybody out!

Even if you'd only touch that, madam, and you are an accessory!

- She's 74! Horse! - Out! Thank you very much. - Gangway! Gangway! Gangway! Gangway!

We're hungry!

- It is horsemeat! - They eat it in Belgium.

We're not in Belgium! They ate rats in Stalingrad!

No question, it's a horse.

These used to be ordinary decent people!

- You see, darling. - Go, ladies, out, please! Make way for Inspector.

Should the telephone ring, Dorothy, and I am seeing a client.

On second thoughts ...