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Reviews
Mapp & Lucia (1985)
AN excellent series with a wonderful cast.
I can add little to the favourable reviews here but there are currently two or three reviews which are somewhat critical of this TV series. Their main criticism is that the series does not cover the entire books or all of the characters. However one must understand that TV budgets are seldom able to stretch to the complete written words found in a book.
This series does have all the essentials of E.F.Benson's wonderful work. Yes there has been some essential deviations but this series does capture the essence of the books extremely well. Also I think anyone who has read the books first forms their own ideas of the characters and are naturally disappointed if the ones in the TV series are different whereas if you watch the series first then the characters are defined for you if you subsequently read the books. Therefore if you have not yet read the books then I would recommend that you watch this excellent TV series first.
I think E.F.Benson would approve.
Mapp & Lucia (2014)
Worth watching
It is inevitable that there will be comparisons with the earlier 1980's production and I agree that some of them are justifiably unfavourable and many would agree that the cast of McEwan/Scales/Hawthorn etc. was a tough act to follow.
However I think it is unfair to compare the two as its often the case that we deem subsequent productions of any TV show or movie to be inferior to the original because we form our opinions on the first one that we see. It would be interesting to get a consensus of reviews for the new series from people who have never seen the original to see what they thought without being influenced by it.
I've read the books several times and also have the original series on a set of DVD's but still enjoyed this new series. Having said that I did find some of the acting a little unconvincing at first but I felt this did improve as it progressed. I also thought that bringing in the Guru (from a prior time in the book) was a great mistake but then it was nice that the vicar's wife 'Evie' was included as she was omitted in the original. Many things in the book were not included in the first series which ran for ten episodes so it was always going to be difficult to do justice to the book in just three episodes, although perhaps there will be further episodes if this series is successful.
Hopefully the new production will introduce E.F.Benson's Mapp and Lucia to a wider audience who may then read the books and view the original series.