A Video Dance

Monday, March 30, 2020

Overnight and early morning winds are gusting in from the west and averaging 30 mph. It’ll be a chilly day although temperatures will reach into the 50s. Big western winds that can whip pitiful beings into submission will make this day mostly an insider.

I’ll not be unhappy about staying inside for Netflix has brought back one of my all time favorite series: “Last Tango in Halifax”. The series began airing on British television in 2012 and has great actors. There are Anne Reid, Derek Jacobi, and Sarah Lancashire, all wonderful! I’ll confess to having watched this series already three or four times. It’s been absent a couple of years, or has in some other way escaped my radar, before now reappearing.

The story is fun, simple, clear, layered, and compelling. An elderly widow and widower who were friends way back in high school rediscover one another on the internet. After so many years, they’re meeting for coffee and sharing old feelings about one another. It doesn’t take long before they decide to marry one another.

Meanwhile her daughter who’s an accomplished scholar and school administrator is in a complex relationship with a bumbling ex-husband, and also, in an early romantic situation with a professional colleague, a woman. His daughter has a complex relationship with the angry brother of her deceased husband. These working-women also are coping with their half-grown and observant children.

Utilizing all those complexities, it’s a wonderfully scripted series, perfectly directed and acted, and balanced with fine humor.

Derek Jacobi is a staple of British television and theater. Anne Reid is his talented match. I can’t imagine a more believable and likeable couple than those two. As always, Sarah Lancashire is superb. She’s appeared in various Netflix offerings, including “Happy Valley” (a must-watch but darker and more intense series).

Dear Friends: I highly recommend this series, I’ll happily be inside enjoying it. Diana