Wood also created a spoof arts documentary about the show for her As Seen on TV special, in keeping with similar straight-faced "behind-the-scenes" shows produced about soap operas, which reveals the shambolic Acorn Antiques production, and interviews the self-obsessed fictional actors behind the fictional characters. The announcement that the show's theme tune was available to buy as Anyone Can Break A Vase sung by Miss Babs, was a reference to the release of Anyone Can Fall In Love, based on the EastEnders theme and sung by one of its cast members, Anita Dobson. References to other daytime television devices featured after one episode a continuity announcer mentions an exhibition of costumes from the show touring several British towns, and after another episode a range of novelisations is mentioned (bearing such archetypical purple titles as A Waning Moon, and little resemblance to screened storylines). Fictional floor managers and directors can be heard prompting the dreadful actors to say their lines, whilst the end of several scenes show the actors not quite knowing what to do with themselves with the camera still rolling. Perhaps the most comical element of Acorn Antiques were the missed cues, harking back to the days when Crossroads was recorded live. The end credits referred to "Victoria Woods". This too was a parody of the new mid-80s Crossroads opening theme and titles sequences at the time, complete with the use of vertical blinds to reveal the show's title as the blinds closed (naturally, the Acorn Antiques version did not work and had to be pushed by a stage hand). The opening sequence was updated for the second series, with a reworking of the theme tune and shots of Miss Babs, one of the leading characters, driving to Acorn Antiques in the firm's van. The deliberately haphazard opening and end credits, together with its tinny title music, also lampooned Crossroads. This story-line also reflected changes in the Crossroads storyline in the mid-1980s as a leisure centre opened at the motel where the serial was set. One episode, for example, is introduced as reflecting the current interest in health fads with a plot where the antiques shop is merged into a "Leisure centre and sunbed centre", never to be mentioned again. A lack of continuity is seen in distinct lapses where storylines are introduced and dropped between episodes and character development is forgotten. It also satirised the shortcomings of long-running dramas produced on small budgets with its little artificial-looking set, missed cues, crude camera work and hasty scripts. Its premise-the lives and loves of the staff of an antiques shop in a fictional English town called Manchesterford-hardly reflects the ambitious and implausible storylines, which lampooned the staples of soap operas: love triangles, amnesiacs, sudden deaths and siblings reunited. She based it on the long-running ATV/Central serial Crossroads (1964-1988), and radio soap Waggoners' Walk (1969-1980). Wood originally wrote Acorn Antiques as a weekly slot in her sketch shows Victoria Wood: As Seen on TV. Wood later adapted the concept into a musical, which opened in 2005. For the musical based on the sketches, see Acorn Antiques: The Musical! Julie Walters (Mrs Overall), Victoria Wood (Berta), Rosie Collins (Trixie) and Celia Imrie (Miss Babs) in Acorn Antiques (1986).Īcorn Antiques is a parodic soap opera written by British comedian Victoria Wood as a regular feature in the two series of Victoria Wood: As Seen on TV, which ran from 1985 to 1987. This article is about the series of sketches.
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