QUITE SIMPLY, A Private Function is a fabulously vicious soap opera about people who need meat, James Christopher writes. Pork, specifically. The year is 1947, a time of rationing. Malcolm Mowbray directs, but it’s the cast who are priceless.
In a small Yorkshire town there is a brisk trade in needy items, but the meat inspector, Bill Paterson, is a proud killjoy with vested interests in making sure that no one creams off more fodder than they should.
Michael Palin and Maggie Smith are a married couple with nothing in common. Palin, dressed like a schoolboy, is happy clipping Alison Steadman’s toenails. But Smith wants to move up the social ladder. Convinced that the only way is by nicking the local pig to get sausages