A PRIVATE FUNCTION

After watching A PRIVATE FUNCTION, you might think that BABE was merely a warm-up for the true comedic masterpiece about those intelligent and, to some, delicious creatures. Malcolm Mowbray, working from Alan Bennett’s brilliantly barbed, absurdist script, takes us to Britain in 1947: a time of shortages, drab austerity and post-war gloom,  but also the year of the royal wedding between Princess Elizabeth and Philip Mountbatten. To mark the occasion, the elite of a small Yorkshire town secretly fatten up a pig for a celebratory feast. The whole enterprise, of course, is entirely illegal: the nation is in the grip of the so-called “bacon wars”, and the countryside teems with informers ready to snitch on any illicit meat trade. There is a shortage of protein for daily meals, and officials check every piece of pork loin that is on sale.

At the heart of this delicious farce are Gilbert (Michael Palin), a mild-mannered podiatrist who pedals round town on his bicycle, and his ambitious, socially climbing wife Joyce (Maggie Smith). When snobs from the upper classes put obstacles in their way and Gilbert accidentally discovers the whereabouts of a well-fed, unlicensed pig, the two come up with a quick plan to finally get their hands on a decent piece of pork.

Often compared to the beloved Ealing comedies, A PRIVATE FUNCTION shares their air of absurdity and tea-fuelled intrigue. Yet Mowbray’s satire of English provincialism and class obsession cuts far deeper. Maggie Smith gives one of her most dazzling comic performances – tightly wound, ruthlessly pragmatic and wickedly sharp in a way that borders on the subliminal. She is the driving force behind this delirious tale of the most coveted pig in the history of the British Empire.

‍

Text: Sebastian Smoliński