Hyacinth Bucket
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| Hyacinth Bucket | |
|---|---|
| First appearance | in the episode Daddy's Accident |
| Last appearance | in the episode The Pageant |
| Created by | Roy Clarke |
| Portrayed by | Patricia Routledge |
| Information | |
| Aliases | Hyacinth Bouquet |
| Gender | Female |
| Age | 65 (last appearance) |
| Occupation | homemaker |
| Spouse(s) | Richard Bucket |
| Children | Sheridan (son) |
| Relatives | Daisy (sister), Rose (sister), Violet (sister), Father, Stephanie (niece), and her son Sheridan |
Hyacinth Bucket (pronounced, the character claims, as "Bouquet") is the main character in the BBC sitcom Keeping Up Appearances (1990 to 1995), played by Patricia Routledge.
Hyacinth's main characteristics include outstanding snobbery (particularly towards her neighbours), often-ludicrous attempts to pass herself off as a member (or affiliated friend) of the aristocracy, and a tendency to look down on others. Hyacinth always behaves in the way she imagines aristocrats to behave, usually to a comical effect, especially given her fairly average social standing. Her main criterion is judging people, and she is most impressed by material wealth and a high social status. To a lesser extent, 'celebrity status' also influences her readily. Hyacinth is fiercely patriotic and is obsessed with her own material possessions. Hyacinth also shows herself off as being incomparably better than most people, including most of her own family, of whom she is openly ashamed and extremely disparaging. It is implied that Hyacinth's obsession with appearing socially advantaged and/or enhancing her social status are to compensate for her own insecurities, possibly stemming from her coming from a family she considers common.
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[edit] Hyacinth's commitment to her social ascendancy
Hyacinth's dedication to improving her social standing, ingratiating herself (frequently in a completely shameless manner) with those she considers her social equals / betters, such as the local vicar, local notables, and aristocrats. In an early episode, while visiting a stately home, Hyacinth goes to extraordinary lengths in an attempt to convince other visitors that she is a friend of the noble family living there, and throughout the series, Hyacinth is often seen masquerading as a member, or friend of a member, of the aristocracy. This extreme desire to associate herself with the upper classes even prompts Hyacinth to rent a tiny, cramped apartment in a Tudor mansion, allowing her to boast about being "the owner" of a country estate. Hyacinth also, at one point, tricks her husband, Richard, into "requisitioning" an extremely expensive Rolls Royce at a local car showroom, and driving it to an expensive country estate to show off "her" Rolls. Her attempt to impress people with the car fails when she and Richard are apprehended at the hotel by the police for having stolen the vehicle. Her immense pretensions of having aristocratic lineage very occasionally prompt her to publicly lay claim to Huguenot ancestry; her mispronunciation (she says "Huguenicks") of the word reveals her lack of knowledge on the matter. Ironically, the one time Hyacinth is seen mixing with aristocracy, she makes a fool of herself in front of a higher social class; while attending an auction at the country estate of a local noble (during which her husband, Richard, has to restrain Hyacinth from trying to buy all manner of astronomically expensive goods which she only wants because they were owned by aristocrats), Hyacinth purchases several bottles of wine made by the noble family. When she chances upon the aristocrat in question and accepts an invitation to share a bottle of the wine, she becomes hopelessly drunk and makes a fool of herself by acting with extreme pretension while severely intoxicated.
Hyacinth's main device for enhancing her social circle, and by extension her own personal status, is to invite people to extraordinarily complex, pretentious, and lavish "candlelight suppers", the success of which is all-important to Hyacinth. However, unbeknownst to Hyacinth, her suppers are torturous occasions for her guests, who are known to go to surprising lengths to avoid them. The suppers are held in Hyacinth's dining room, decorated in an elaborate and anachronistic Victorian style, which is dominated by a gloomy portrait of Winston Churchill glaring down at the diners. Hyacinth has been seen to spend all afternoon arranging her table for a supper, and often recruits her next-door neighbour, Liz, to inspect it, forcing Liz to feign admiration at the over-decorated and elaborate table.
In keeping with her snobbery, Hyacinth has a tendency to look down her nose upon those she considers to be social inferiors, particularly her real, working class family. The joke, however, is all too frequently on her. Her efforts to improve her social status are nearly always scuttled by her immense self-superiority and the increasingly absurd lengths she will go to improve her social standing -- and in any case, she is regarded by both high and low as an extremely irritating presence. One of her most humiliating moments is when she and Richard rent out an old boat for a nautical candlelight supper for Elizabeth and Emmett, but it concludes disastrously with both Richard and Hyacinth falling into the river and ending up drenched. A similar event happened when Hyacinth tried to host a riverside picnic ("waterside supper with riparian entertainment") to Elizabeth, Emmett, the Vicar and his wife, and they went on the river in three rowing boats. Unfortunately, Hyacinth, who is rowing, is drenched by water pouring out of a digger. Soaked and disgruntled again, Hyacinth is further saddened when she sees all her family members, who are greeted warmly by all the other guests (who, ironically, appear to prefer them to Hyacinth), having a picnic on the bank.
She is unbelievably oblivious to those people who do not want to be around her. If they hang up, she blames the phone disconnect on a faulty line, She never listens to her long-suffering neighbour Elizabeth, but cannot understand why so many people (excepting the Major, who has a huge crush on Hyacinth and often behaves in a manner of borderline sexual harassment whenever they're in each other's presence) fail to covet invitations to her parties. Indeed, Hyacinth seems to have very few friends. "The major", a lecherous upper-class gentleman who claims (somewhat unconvincingly) to have served as a high-ranking combat officer in British Army, lusts for Hyacinth but rarely ever speaks to her in a normal fashion. Councilor Mrs Nugent, a snappy, unpleasant, and highly disagreeable woman serving on the local council, repeatedly subjects Hyacinth to lengthy tirades expounding her political views, prompting Hyacinth to shamelessly flatter Mrs Nugent by agreeing with whatever she says. Other people whom Hyacinth considers her friends recoil whenever they see her, and usually try to make a speedy and discreet getaway before they are spotted. Hyacinth's only real friend seems to be her next-door neighbour Liz, who is nevertheless terrified of her coffee mornings with Hyacinth, as her nervousness in Hyacinth's house always results in her spilling her coffee over Hyacinth's expensive rugs or smashing one of her prized bone china cups ("Royal Doulton with hand-painted periwinkles"). Hyacinth also considers Liz's divorced brother Emmett to be a friend, whilst in truth Hyacinth drives Emmett to despair.
Hyacinth always tries to outdo her neighbours, especially the Barker-Finches of 23 Blossom Avenue, whom she considers her bitter social rivals. If she hears that a neighbour has recently acquired an item nicer than hers, or has forged a new friendship with someone of high standing, Hyacinth recoils. Conversely, whenever Hyacinth hears gossip about a neighbour, particularly derogatory rumours, she embarks on a vicious campaign to belittle the neighbour in question. Hyacinth cannot talk about her three-piece suite without mentioning that it is "an exact replica of one in Sandringham House". She frequently berates the local postman for delivering letters with second-class stamps on them, even resorting to writing to the Postmaster General, to demand that the local Sorting Office attach first-class stamps to her mail.
[edit] Hyacinth's name
One of the most obvious examples of Hyacinth's snobbery involves her last name. According to her husband Richard, Bucket is pronounced as it is spelled. However, for Hyacinth, it may be spelled "Bucket" but is most properly pronounced "Bouquet," à la française. Despite her insistence on the more elegant French pronunciation, almost everyone calls her "Mrs Bucket" or, more disparagingly "The Bucket Woman," behind her back. The "dishy Vicar's" comedic tag line is, "Oh, damn! The Bucket woman!" Then he usually attempts a speedy getaway. Hyacinth's neighbour Emmet is similarly amused by her pronunciation of "Bucket" as "Bouquet," although his most pressing problem with Hyacinth is that she's desperate to be in his amateur operatic society, and will "sing at him!"
As well as the surname "Bouquet", Hyacinth's three sisters amplify the floral theme: Violet, Daisy, and Rose. Violet, who appears on screen in very few episodes, has made the most "successful" match. Her husband Bruce Paddock has provided her with a "large estate with a 'Mercedes, sauna and room for a pony'" He, however, seems to have an unfortunate habit of cross-dressing, randomly appearing on the street in odd costumes and hiding in trees. Hyacinth tries to protect the family name by covering up his odd behaviour. Violet eventually wants to leave Bruce, but Hyacinth refuses to lose the last high sociality of her family and pursues Violet down a street to keep her with Bruce. Daisy, whose singular lack of pretension serves as a foil to Hyacinth's snobbery, communicates genuine compassion. Rose, the fading beauty, craves men's attention but repeatedly fails to recognise when they use her.
[edit] Hyacinth on the telephone
Hyacinth's telephone manners vividly exemplify her pretensions. Hyacinth informs anyone within earshot of a ringing telephone that the call is "probably someone important", and when someone calls who has called before, she will refer to them in the exact same way she did last time. Tidying her hair before answering, she shrilly answers the phone, "The Bouquet residence, the lady of the house speaking!"
In another episode, she left Richard to answer the phone (actually making him sit next to it) to a very important person while she got changed, but every time the phone rang, she would appear and answer it before Richard could even stand up.
A constant irk to Hyacinth is that her phone number is constantly being confused with the local Chinese takeaway as it is one digit different. As a consequence, Hyacinth's pompous greeting is often followed by her frustrated refusals to send round chips or "a portion of 32",and she shrilly replies to one of these callers for the Chinese "I may only be one digit removed but believe me it's a whole other world" with an accompanying affirmation that her phone "has no Oriental connections whatsoever". She refuses to change her phone number, instead writing to British Telecom demanding that they change the takeaway's number, and made her husband Richard telephone the Chinese ambassador, but to no avail. Her telephone is only one of many household items to which Hyacinth attaches immense social prowess, and she is rarely capable of describing her possessions without adding often-ludicrous qualifiers. She describes her telephone as a "pearl-white slimline push-button telephone with automatic redial" and is constantly mentioning her "very expensive Royal Doulton with the hand-painted periwinkles" and also worries about 'Sheridan's pearl-button collection' falling into the hands of the lower-class type burglar that robbed her neighbors at No. 23 (in the episode "Hyacinth is Alarmed"). A running gag is when the caller is someone she considers important, and she feels the need to walk backwards with the receiver in her hand, stretching out the extra-long wire, and tell Elizabeth or anyone else in the living-room all about it ("It's my sister [insert name]! She's [not] the one with the Mercedes, sauna, and room for a pony!"), with the 'phone looking in serious danger of falling off its shelf. Another running gag is when speaking to either Daisy or Rose on the telephone, she asks them to tell Onslow (Daisy's husband, Hyacinth's brother-in-law) to put a shirt on because it makes her nervous if she is talking when Onslow is not suitably dressed. Another occasion that makes her nervous is if she is talking to Rose who would be wearing a mini-skirt, something Hyacinth finds obscene.
[edit] Richard Bucket
Hyacinth's relationship with her husband Richard can be somewhat strained. Usually, Richard acts as a hen-pecked husband, who has been turned into a subservient partner through his marriage to Hyacinth, and he generally indulges Hyacinth's whims. These include opening and closing the car door for Hyacinth in a chauffeur-esque manner, putting up with Hyacinth's extremely irritating passenger-seat driving, and grudgingly participating in Hyacinth's contrived schemes for enhanced social status. When Richard has the courage to stand up to Hyacinth, his resistance usually takes the form of whining, and he is unable to stand up to Hyacinth most of the time.
Nonetheless, he appears to be content in his marriage. When asked by an incredulous friend what he sees in Hyacinth, Richard cites a fundamental sweetness and also compares his marriage favourably with his time in the Army, when he never had to make a single decision.
[edit] Sheridan
One of the most successful running jokes is Hyacinth's receiving phone calls from her son Sheridan, who is away at "a polytechnic of university standard" with his roommate Tarquin. It is implied by the subject matter of these phone calls that Sheridan is homosexual, possibly with Tarquin as his lover, but Hyacinth just sees him as "mummy's boy". Although Sheridan is never seen on camera, she dotes on him in the form of compliments, such as "How very thoughtful of you to ring mummy, dear", and believes that she and Sheridan share a psychic bond. Sheridan is almost always phoning to ask for money, as Hyacinth's husband Richard realises — "What does he want?" Richard most likely has an idea that Sheridan is homosexual (in one episode he asks Hyacinth if she doesn't think it strange that Sheridan is not interested in girls, or that he is making curtains with Tarquin) but doesn't seem to be very able or willing to share this thought with Hyacinth. Like everything else in her life, Hyacinth uses Sheridan as a tool to enhance her social standing, often commenting on her son's university career (which, in fact, is merely a polytechnic, which Hyacinth hurriedly passes off as "university standard"). In addition, Hyacinth is constantly trying to persuade Sheridan to pursue an executive career, and has aspirations of him becoming a quantity surveyor (he would later switch to needlework). She constantly comments on his perceived artistic and intellectual abilities, although in truth, Sheridan seems to have neither.
[edit] "Daddy": Hyacinth's father
Hyacinth's senile father (played by George Webb) is never named and referred to only as "Daddy". Hyacinth appears to genuinely love him - although not enough to have him live with her. He lives with Onslow, Daisy and Rose and is rarely seen without his Army uniform due to the fact that he fought in the Second World War (one of the reasons Hyacinth likes him and something she often brings up in conversation) and is convinced that the war is still going on, often resulting in humiliating and outrageous circumstances.
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