Cider with Rosie.

Oh do read the book Lona - it is a joy!

There was a BBC production of Cider With Rosie, shown in 1971, and starring Rosemary Leach, which IMO is a better version that the one shown on Sunday.

I recorded then watched it and whilst the scenery was beautiful and very atmospheric I found it all a bit slow and to be honest got bored before the end and fast forwarded it. Timothy Spall was the narrator and I think he overdid the slow country accent - he almost sent me to sleep. I preferred the 1971 version too bohemian.

There was also a TV adaptation in the eighties starring Juliet Stevenson as Annie.

Where were the uncles in the latest version?

I missed the uncles, too.

It was my favourite book growing up, I found this adaptation very strange, if nothing else for the size of the children, for a poor country area just after WW1, they all looked like adverts for expensive yoghurts!!
Little frail Frances was running around looking not a bit consumptive, and the older Brother was smaller than Laurie and he was a pretty big 4/5 year old.
Not a patch on An Inspector Calls.

It was certainly all very beautiful and atmospheric but dare I say it.....a tad tedious.
My other problem was that I just kept finding myself thinking that the actor playing the younger Laurie was just too darn sturdy looking for a child who was supposed to be so frail and a constant worry for his Mother. He was a delightful little soul to watch but just too healthy looking....silly I know but I found myself distracted by it.

Lol felice....your post has just popped up after I had composed mine.....I'm not the only one then!

I think I will get the book as I used to love those sort of family meanderings when I was younger. Don't know why I've never read it.
I did think Samantha Morton (sp?) was very good.

I went to see Cider with Rosie at the theatre in the 80s and it is in my top three most boring plays. I think I will read it soon though because I don't believe the BBC would pay for a boring adaptation!

I fell asleep after the first half hour and then switched to Downton which also made me fall asleep!

I really enjoyed it but there is too much in the book to be condensed into an hour and a half.
The two grannies did not live with the family but lived together,one upstairs and one down.
The dead body was that of an ex-villager who had left the area and made good. When he returned he boasted of his success and was murdered by the villagers.
I was not at all perturbed by the size of the children .My father was born the same year as Laurie Lee and was very robust as a child despite being the son of a poor miner living in NE.

So glad I'm not the only one to have struggled! There seemed to be gaps in the story, which I just put down to lapses in concentration - I get easily distracted these days!

I struggled too and was confused about a number of things. Can someone tell me if Laurie was 4/5 years old and hadn't seen his father for 3 years , who was the father of the baby ?

I wondered about that, Ginny,and decided father might have paid occasional visits. He must have been earning reasonably well and had some overnight leave. For a lot of the story I was wondering what happened to the baby born the day Laurie (almost) died. Then, in the 1918 celebrations, there was a bouncy little girl wearing a Peace headband whom her mother called Rosie. I guess that was the baby.

The baby was a boy called Tony (I think) and the bouncy little girl would have been Rosie Burdock.

Elrel I think the mother made visits to London to see her husband, but he didn't seem to visit the children!

Merlotgran - of course, thanks! She was even a red head and looked the same ago as Laurie.
Lona - that makes sense too.
I really must give myself the pleasure of re-reading the book.

If you like this also try reading "As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning" which follows on.
This was the only book I took on a 4week + Inter Rail trip back in the early '70s so I know it well!

Just bought Cider with Rosie. Need to get off here and start reading it now!

Lottie - another one for me to re-read. I remember realising that it was one of the few books I'd read in which I had paid full attention to descriptions of the countryside instead of skimming them!

I read it so many years ago that I had almost forgotten it.

I did think the child was rather healthy and sturdy to cause so much angst to his mother regarding his healthy.
I got confused about the baby, and the fact that Rosie was in all the photographs with the family when they were young.
I did think Samantha Morton was very good (I think she occasionally met up with their father because there was obviously no-one else for her but him).

We were not far from the Slad Valley today but had no time to visit there.

healthy I meant health