The Archers Wednesday 26th October 2011: Christmas around the World auditions

• I’d pick grapes for a box of wine
• X Factor in Ambridge!
• Tony’s not letting go
• Tom is back to being smug
• Rhys is a bit over enthusiastic
• It’s fine. Ambridge is English
• You can depend on Ian

I’d pick grapes for a box of wine

As Mike and Vicky did at Lower Loxley.

Sounds like a fair deal indeed.


X Factor in Ambridge!

No, not really.

Vicky and Lynda at the auditions, but no-one else is.

Rhys turns up and makes the X Factor joke:

[Rhys] “I thought it’d be like the X Factor”

(!)

After three hours, they only had Jazzer and Rhys (with his Dylan Thomas).

Lynda is distraught.

[Lynda] “Christmas around the World … It’s supposed to be a dazzling visual and oral display of internationalism. Instead of that, we’ve got a halfhearted trek around the British Isles and nothing from other countries!

“I despair, the world’s supposed to be shrinking, but in Ambridge, where’s the colour, the glamour the exoticism”

Vicky half heatedly suggests Hilary Noakes and her cockatoo (you could feel Lynda’s icy glare to that one through the radio!)


Tony’s not letting go

Of the bad feeling he has about Brian and Jennifer (after his argument with Jennifer).

Seems Brian’s mart is irritating Tony. It’s blocking up the roads before it’s even opened:

[Tony] “Typical of him… pretending it’s for everyone’s benefit, when really it's about him making a quick buck, disrupting the lives of decent hardworking farmers, utterly selfish, never a thought for anyone else”

Tom is back to being smug

Seems Dave Langdon called and wants to take sausages again from Tom.

And what prompted him to do so?

[Tom] “Dave said the pig video really made him laugh … dad, it proves it, my rebrand is working!”

As Tom has had other new orders, he reckons he’s been proved right – so that now absolutely everything should be under the Tom Archer brand.

[Tony] “You’re not changing my mind! I’m not chucking away all the hard work you mother and I have put into building up Bridge Farm, just because Dave Langon’s got nothing better to do than watch pigs playing football. No. And that’s final!”

Oo-er. Very angry Tony there indeed.


Rhys is a bit over enthusiastic

About being told he’s got in to Christmas around the World.

(well, they didn’t have much to choose from, did they?)

[Rhys] “Dylan would be so proud. I’d bet he’d want to come as well!”

Eh?


It’s fine. Ambridge is English

Lynda isn’t too worried about the lack of international flare to Christmas around the World.

After all:

[Lynda] “But when all is said and done, Ambridge is quintessentially an English village”

Did I miss something?

Hasn’t Lynda only so far got a Scot doing Burns and a Welshman doing Dylan Thomas?

British – yes, but not exactly cricket on a summer day …

But with a gasp – Lynda also remembers that Leonie (and James) will be expecting great things from the show. Will Jazzer and Rhys be enough for their tome?

[Vicky] “Hand on, I’d had a swig of me wine now I’ve got me brain in gear”

 
And Vicky does indeed some up trumps!

She reckons Ambridge is international. What with Usha, Elona and Amy being residents.

(erm – wasn’t Amy born in England? Maybe that doesn’t count in Vicky’s world …)

So the day is saved. Or, it’s saved in theory – they’ll still have to persuade more folks to take part.

[Vicky] “We don’t do despair when I’m around”

You can depend on Ian

Pat does sound happy for Tom that he’s getting more orders – but she firmly agrees with Tony that they’ll not be rebranding. They’ll instead keep building confidence in the Bridge Farm brand.

And they are getting somewhere. Ian’s starting taking their stock again (ah – bless that Ian).

Tom poo-poos Ian’s order. And out loud wishes that Tony and Pat hadn’t managed to get a mortgage payment extension, nor a loan from Lilian.

[Tom] “You’ve gone all soft on it again”

What a twit!