Nice Little Learners
‘THEY say you cant teach an old dog new tricks but in the case of Dot Branning that might not be true. Since meeting her new driving instructor, Mr Rawlins (call me Michael please he purred), Dot seems determined to get to grips with his gear stick.
| ‘The Stick’ |
Mr Rawlins, viewers will have spotted, is none other than Gunner Gloria Beaumont from It Aint Half Hot Mum. What with Private Pike from Dads Army living with the Fowlers and DS Beech from The Bill as the Squares new Mr Big, Walford is fast becoming a graveyard full of half-dead stars of yesteryear.
Surely its only a matter of time before Mr Humphries is trilling Im free! while chasing Dennis around the bookies.
It says much about Walford that while Coronation Street attracts the likes of Peter Kay and Sir Ian McKellan for cameo sports, EastEnders is reduced to scraping the bottom of the 1970s light entertainment barrel.
Driving instructor Rawlins has been drafted in to form a comedy love triangle between Dot and Jim. Patrick Truman is doing his best to wind up Jim, telling him that the dapper Mr Rawlins has got less-than honourable intentions towards his wife.
Jim went rushing out into the street to confront the pair as they sat in the car. Go away, Jim, Ive paid for my time with Mr Rawlins and youre wasting it, Dot haughtily told him. Well as least she knows that if you pay by the hour, every second counts.
Elsewhere in the Square, Ruby has finally caught onto the fact that her dads new girlfriend isnt so new after all and were not just talking about the ring marks around her scraggy neck. Ruby and Stacy discovered the couples secret when they came across a picture of Jonny on holiday with Tina.
The pair have been pretending that theyve only just started dating so that his daughter wouldnt realise that while her mother and sister were burning to death in a house fire daddy dearest was getting his leg over Skelators twin sister.
There are more family secrets over at the Fowlers as Pauline cant leave her granddaughter Chloe alone, although she promised Sonia shed have nothing more to do with her.
Paulines persuaded Ian that faaamily is all that matters and that if Martin and Sonia dont want to bring little Chloe up, then she does. It takes more strength to let it go than hold on, Sonia sobbed to Pauline, although whether she was discussing her daughter or her third pie of the day was unclear.
Walfords latest worthy cause – hot on the heels of rape, incest, breast cancer and HIV – is adult literacy. Keith Miller is struggling to keep the Square from finding out that his reading level is about the same as his six-month-old granddaughters.
Hes promised son Darren that hell learn to read in return for Darren not skipping school, but so far Keith hasnt even managed to enrol in the adult literacy class which has handily just started up in the Square.
I was scared to go out – someone might see me and laugh at me, he told his son, I was embarrassed. He shouldnt worry – surely the entire cast of Eastenders feels the same ’
Posted: 16th, May 2005 | In: Tabloids Comment | TrackBack | Permalink
