Just watched the Harrogate Crown Hotel docu with Alan Bennett. Really interesting filmed in 1988 which doesnt seem that long ago but shows us up for the pretentious snobs we are!!.

Have things changed from 1988? I don't think so.

"My mother would make up stories about the people in the room, "Thats the hotel owner" she'd say, "and that must be her nephew", and then the next day she'd see the woman on her own and say "ooh there's the hotel owner, she must have had a tiff with her nephew" forgetting that she'd made the story up all along..."


Classic Alan Bennett, one of those gentle half hours where you just observe and listen...

What a cracking evening.
Funny, whimsical, moving.
I'd forgotten what a wonderful actress Thora Hird was even in her 90s.
Brilliant piece of writing, brilliantly acted.
It reminded me so much of my own mum's last days in her old folks home.

Just watched that one.

Absolutely fantastic.

If you watch that and haven't a tear in your eye at the end of it there's something wrong with you.

My older brother was in the same class as Alan. His father had a butchers shop in Far Headingley not far from Bryan's Fish shop

Its a dry cleaners now but was still a butchers about 10 years back.

Seem to recall they also had a shop in Armley (co-op butchers maybe?).