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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Mel O&#039;Drama" data-source="post: 254494" data-attributes="member: 23">Victoria Wood With All The Trimmings (25th December 2000) <img src="https://ilarge.lisimg.com/image/7927058/828full-victoria-wood%3A-with-all-the-trimmings-screenshot.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" /> Last time I watched this, I believe, was over twenty years ago when it first aired. I remember because I can remember my surprise at seeing Anna Wing who at the back of my mind (like probably that of most of the general public) had died. Anna’s brief cameo was one of many, many celebrity appearances. Indeed, the episode opened with an elaborate spy-themed sketch (complete with theme from The Ipcress File) in which Victoria’s fur-hatted Russian spy met none other than Roger Moore in a capsule of the London Eye. Star-studded doesn’t even begin to sum up All The Trimmings. The cream of the crop includes Derek Jacobi, Imelda Staunton; Hugh Laurie, Penelope Wilton; James Bolam; Geraldine McEwan; Bob Monkhouse; Parky; and even Anna’s old EastEnders sparring partner June Brown. At the other end of the celebrity spectrum there’s naff celebrity whore H from Steps. Mercifully, only the briefest of appearances but, being close to the beginning of the show it had me a bit worried. In between are Vic’s reliable core team such as Celia Imrie and Susie Blake. Julie Walters presumably had a pretty full schedule She’s here, but not featured too heavily. Plus old Vic favourites Pete Postlethwaite, Anne Reid and Alan Rickman. Given the timing of this, it makes sense that the team would now include Andrew Dunn, Shobna Gulati, Maxine Peake and Kate Robbins. The women appear to be playing themselves, but the two younger ones speak and act very much like their dinnerladies characters so I’m assuming is heightened reality. Coming, as it did, immediately after that series, the actor continuity is appreciated and has helped reduce my dinnerladies withdrawal symptoms. Notably absent was Duncan Preston, who I kept expecting to pop up.The sketches, ranging from Dickensian through World War II newsreels to the contemporary WI (a scathing satire of American drama ER, but set in a church hall where Women’s Institute members are under pressure to open on time and get the tea urn running) are all spot on.It’s really good to see Vic given the budget and a time slot that she deserved. However, at times the big budget gloss and stunt casting start moving dangerously close to “style over substance” territory. It never crosses that line, but neither is it Vic’s funniest work. One key theme in the series is the then-nascent reality show trend. The main plot in the ongoing storyline that links the sketches together concerns Vic’s rehearsal being hijacked by a reality show team. Vic also sends up Jane McDonald in The Cruise, which I’ve never seen but I suspect is highly accurate. The grand finale is a musical number in which Vic sends up Ann Widdecombe, which seems incredibly prescient given Widdecombe’s 21st century proclivity for rocking up on any reality, quiz or panel show that will indulge her.[MEDIA=youtube]PhfbYtbpNxY[/MEDIA]Things would later come full circle following Widdecombe’s disastrously awkward chairmanship of Have I Got News For You?  Speaking in a broader discussion of that series, regular panellist Paul Merton later said this:</blockquote>

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