Pat and Margaret

Pat and Margaret is a British television film written by comedian Victoria Wood. The story follows sisters Margaret, a cook, and Pat, a successful actress in the United States, after they are reunited on a television programme after spending 27 years apart. It stars Wood alongside frequent comedy partner Julie Walters in the title roles, and features other past collaborators of Wood, including Thora Hird, Celia Imrie and Duncan Preston. First aired in 1994 on BBC One, the film was directed by Gavin Millar and produced by Ruth Caleb.

After gaining over 10 million viewers, it won a Broadcasting Press Guild award and was nominated for two BAFTA awards. It drew comparisons with northern English dramatist Alan Bennett for its complex characterisation and observational dialogue.

Plot

Margaret Mottershead (Victoria Wood) works as a cook at a motorway service station. She joins her colleagues on a works outing to London to see a recording of Magic Moments, a Surprise, Surprise-style television series. Pat Bedford (Julie Walters), the British star of an American soap, returns to the UK to promote her book on the show, unaware that the producers have planned to make her part of one of the surprises. During the show, Margaret is shocked to be invited onto the stage by the host Maeve (Anne Reid) and asked about her sister Patricia, whom she has not seen for 27 years. Backstage, Pat freezes in a panic when she hears the name "Patricia Theresa Mary Mottershead" and is invited on-stage to meet her long-lost sister, Margaret. Attempting to remain professional, Pat embraces Margaret and feigns happiness. However, after the programme ends Pat tires to get it pulled, before discovering to her horror it was live. Pat tells Margaret she doesn't want to know about her, fearing further damaging revelations about her past. A dejected Margaret prepares to leave, but discovers the coach has gone without her. Unaware Pat has sent Margaret away, Pat's assistant Claire (Celia Imrie), who is sympathetic towards Margaret, tells her she'll be staying with Pat to her luxury hotel.

In the morning, a Magic Moments film crew arrives to follow the pair getting to know each other, and Pat resigns herself to staged bonding for the cameras. Margaret phones her boyfriend Jim (Duncan Preston) to let him know where she is, but his disapproving mother (Thora Hird) withholds the message. Pat tries unsuccessfully to pay off an angry Margaret, who tells Pat she doesn't want anything from her. However, when tabloid journalist Stella (Deborah Grant), desperate for dirt on Pat, discovers a woman she thinks is Pat's mother Vera in a nursing home in Pat's home town, Pat turns to Margaret for help. The two head North, hoping to stop Vera talking to the press. Having left all her credit cards and identification with Claire, Pat is unable to book into a hotel. Margaret asks her boss Bella (Lynda Rooke) to give Pat a bed for the night, but she is furious with her thanks to a newspaper article falsely claiming Margaret is ditching her "rubbish" job and moving to L.A. - leaving Margaret jobless and seemingly without Jim too.

However, Jim, worried Margaret has dumped him, has gone to London to find her in the meantime. He meets Claire there, and the two follow Pat and Margaret north. Meanwhile Pat and Margaret find "Vera" (Joane Hall), who is not their mother. Stella, however, has managed to track her down, and after seeing photographs of her realises she is linked to another story - a timeshare scandal. Stella digs up dirt on Vera by tracking down her old neighbours, discovering in the process that Pat was pregnant at 15 and had the child.

Margaret takes Pat to her bedsit where the two argue about the different paths their lives have taken. Margaret reveals that Vera was sent to prison after Pat left, while Pat reveals that she was thrown out because she became pregnant. The two begin to bond. Jim arrives with Pat's bag, but when he is more worried about leaving his mother alone than meeting Pat, an irritated Margaret ends their relationship. Pat takes Margaret to the Swiss Cottage Café where she worked as a teenager, which is still owned by her old boss, now planning to retire. Claire joins them for dinner where she gives Pat "a note from a fan", actually given to Jim by Stella. Pat is shocked to find the note is from Vera, asking to meet.

Pat and Margaret are stunned to find their mother (Shirley Stelfox) has won the pools and has a large house. Vera assumes Margaret wants money; she doesn't, but Pat angrily tells Vera it's the least she owes her and they argue about their past. Vera coldly reminds Pat that there was nothing to stop her tracking Margaret down and giving her a better life, forcing Pat to admit she is hard and selfish like her. Vera then tells Pat she should thank her, claiming she's what drove her to make a success of her life. Vera also reveals she has to sell the house due to being implicated in the timeshare scandal; at this point Stella appears with her photographer and Pat realises she has been set up.

Stella reveals Vera has given her an exclusive and that she knows about the baby, threatening to trace Pat's child. However, Pat turns the tables by revealing he has already traced her many years before and has no interest in being involved with the media. Margaret angrily tells Stella that Pat should be applauded for beating the odds rather than derided in the press; Stella realises Margaret has a point, and instead offers to make the story a sympathetic "rags to riches" tale if all three women give her an exclusive tell her everything.

The story concludes with Margaret and Jim making up when he decides to leave his mother and move in with Margaret. At the airport, Pat fails to persuade Margaret to move to the United States with her, but in a surprise move, takes Vera instead, telling her "they're very big at the moment, celebrities' mums", and giving Stella the happy ending the story needs. Pat leaves Margaret a goodbye letter which has a set of keys with it; the final scene shows Margaret and Jim happily, clearing up at the Swiss Cottage Café, which Pat has bought.

Production

The film was created and written by Wood, whose last full-length drama was Happy Since I Met You in 1981,^[1] directed by Gavin Millar and produced by Ruth Caleb.^[2] An early draft of the script was rejected by LWT, who said "a film is not a sketch, you know".^[2]

Filming locations included Blackburn in Lancashire, Acton in west London, and Heston services on the M4.^[2]

Reception

The film was watched by more than 10 million viewers.^[3]

After going on location during filming, James Rampton for The Independent said that the film "contains many lines of vintage Victoria. ... And – judging from the script – the film is not a three-minute idea tortuously spun out over 90, but a living, breathing feature, with characters rather than caricatures and pathos rather than punchlines."^[2] Writing for Screenonline, Mark Duguid says the drama is Wood's "most ambitious, rounded and mature work to date" and describes it as "rapturously received". On Wood's comparisons with Alan Bennett, he says that she "certainly shares Bennett's gift for characterisation and his ear for comic but natural dialogue".^[1] The Daily Telegraph's Judith Woods described the film, Victoria Wood As Seen On TV, Dinnerladies and Acorn Antiques as "character-led television gems".^[4]

The film won the Broadcasting Press Guild Award for best single drama, and the best actress and best screenplay awards at the Reims Television Festival.^[5] The drama was also nominated for two British Academy Television Awards in 1994: best single drama, and best actress for Wood.^[6]

References

External links

• Pat and Margaret at the Internet Movie Database
• Pat and Margaret at the BFI's Screenonline