Knitting in the Movies and TV: "All Creatures Great and Small" (2020)

I am finding the new "All Creatures Great and Small" series a fairly solid B- -- adding in backstories etc. for characters like Mrs. Hall is all right, but a few points off for non-period dialogue that's full of pesky Americanisms (why on earth don't the older folks in the production crew let the writers know that you didn't "call" people in Britain of the 1930s, not even in Britain of the 1980s, you "rang" them?!), and even more points off for rewriting scenes from the book and taking much of the sparkle out of them.  But the cast is excellent, the scenery is gorgeous of course, and in most respects the production values are very good.  And there are lots of knits, many of them handmade! there is that, of course.

Helen (Rachel Shenton) and James (Nicholas Ralph), pretending they aren't flirting.

Tristan (Callum Woodhouse) looking quite louche, as one might expect!

Mrs. Hall's knitting is alarmingly chunky for the 1930s.  Points off for letting her wool roll about on the floor, which I don't think any self-respecting Yorkshire housekeeper would do, but points back for the crochet squares on the table.  I was a bit alarmed that her right hand is over the needle when so very many English ladies at this time and for some years later held their right hand under the needle, but apparently that was a "posh" thing, and so it seems quite likely after all that a country woman would have held it the way Anna Madeley is doing.

Tristan seems to get the lion's share of the hand-knitted slipovers!

Well, this is actually a pretty characteristic thing for book-Tristan, actually ...

A truly splendid Fair Isle-style scarf, in gorgeous colors too!

I don't really know why barmaid Maggie (Mollie Winnard) should be holding a donkey on a rope halter, but perhaps that will be explained later -- what I am interested in at the moment is those very fetching Scandinavian-star fingerless gloves!

I am enjoying watching 1930s and 40s programs while I knit on the Rae slipover for Julia, so it's all good.  The Palette is loosely-spun and a bit splitty, but I'm hoping that most of the inconsistencies come out in the wash -- and it is surprisingly soft even still on the needles.  These are some of the craziest "Fair Isle" patterns I've ever seen, but there is no question about it not being "1940s"!

I couldn't get enough of the "Oregon Coast" in the same dyelot, and I also had a bit of trouble matching the gauge of the single-color bands to the gauge of the two-color ones, so I solved both issues at once by working the single-color bands with two balls of the same color but one each from the different dyelots.  I don't think the difference between the two is quite as apparent in real life as it is in the photo, or perhaps the random-ish alternation is working its magic.

And for a bonus, a flashback to the original series, here with a very young Peter Davison as Tristan -- now that I look at it, the slipover has a rather 1980s look to it in gauge and length! but it is still very charming --

Comments

[Berva Smith]

You noticed a lot of knitting that I missed. Guess my eyesight isn't as good as yours (or my glasses correction!). Or maybe it's because I'm knitting while watching and not paying close enough attention.

[Susan D in Toronto]

My thoughts exactly, Berva. All those knits! I can't understand why I didn't actually see them (except for James's birthday gift this past week). Because I'm knitting too, of course.

Thanks for the flashback to Real Tristan.

[juliet brown]

Some gorgeous knitting there, I haven't see the programme but some of those garments are quite lovely. In exchange I offer you the snippet that the V&A has an extensive range of knitting patterns (you may already know this of course) and has the odd post on knitting for instance should you wish to knit yourself some underwear, mittens and fishnet tights etc... https://www.vam.ac.uk/articles/1940s-knitting-patterns

[Katrina]

I was just so glad that this new series actually has a Scot playing the part of James, the choice of Christopher Timothy was awful in the original series, nothing like the character in the books. I agree with you about Mrs Hall's chunky wool and with all those dogs around it would be fairly coated with dog hairs. There is a Scottish way of knitting which Mrs Hall seems to be doing. If you ever see Kaffe Fassett knitting he also knits the Scottish way as he was taught by a Scottish lady he met on a train.

[Jeanne]

Katrina,

That’s interesting, I didn’t really feel that Christopher Timothy was unsuited to the role. Nicholas Ralph’s accent did make me wonder how much of a Scottish accent James Herriot actually had.

Oh, here is something from Herriot’s Wikipedia article! Though Herriot was born in Sunderland, his family moved to Glasgow when he was a child.

He had a "soft, lilting Scottish accent," according to actor Christopher Timothy and "always considered himself a Glaswegian at heart"

and from the article giving the first part of Timothy’s quote, when he finally got to meet Herriot, some time into filming –

"He turned out to be hospitable and friendly, with a soft, lilting Scottish accent -- though I was told to keep my speech neutral to retain the universality of the part, which I thought was complete b******s."

And even more “oh!” –

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lMdImANB43w&t=18s

My beef with the new series, after watching the whole thing and then listening to an audiobook of All Creatures Great and Small (read by Christopher Timothy in his “universal” accent …) was that the writers of the new series took out a great deal of the fun of it all, much of what made the books so appealing. Oh, well –

[Katrina]

Alf/James Herriot was interviewed on TV from time to time so I knew he had an accent just like my own and my husband's. It's hilarious that such a southern English accent like Timothy's could be described as neutral or universal. It's just a shame as there were several Scottish actors who would have been better in the part. I agree that the new series left out much of the humour, but the scenery was good!

[Louisa]

I love the woollen blanket James covers Helen with in episode 7? Would anyone know where I might find the same one? Thank you.

[Gail]

Yes, I also noticed that beautiful blanket. Would love to see it laid out flat, or a pattern.

[Jeanne]

For anyone who is curious, the blanket Louisa and Gail mention, that James covers Helen with ("rug," they would have called it, surely) in the "Night Before Christmas" episode appears to be woven or finely-knitted of scrap pieces like patchwork. You can see it here --

https://dai.ly/x7y9cq5 (a few seconds after the 43-minute mark)

I suspect it would be difficult to re-create *exactly* as you'd have to have all of the same colors of wool as in the original. But if you knitted say 4- or 5-inch wide strips in a random order of whatever comes to hand or out of your scrap stash, and make however many you need for the size blanket you want, then sew them together, you would come up with something similar ...