2013

S1.E1 ∙ The Box

Sat, May 11, 2013

Brought up in Ireland by his mother, Tom Chadwick returns to England when he and his sister Bea--who communicates through a monkey puppet--visit their father Keith and are told of a box that a great-aunt left them. Its contents include the photo of a distinguished-looking old gentleman in military garb: Tom's great-grandfather. Through antique dealer Mr Pfister, Tom and his best friend Pete meet genealogist Neville St Aubrey, who tells them that the man in the photo is Prince George. However he is not their relative, who was actually the man who took the picture and was an actor on the south coast of England.

6.6 /10

S1.E2 ∙ Treading the Boards

Sat, May 18, 2013

Tom sees a photo of his great-grandfather Harry in costume for "The Mikado" and travels with Pete to Hove to meet the very elderly Sybil, who used to live next door to Harry. She directs them to the Regents Theatre, whose archivist, Rex Mottram, reveals that not only did Harry have a--very tiny--part in a play starring Laurence Olivier but that he was also one half of a celebrated pantomime horse. Rex gives Tom the horse costume and he and Pete wear it in a charity race and come in last.

6.9 /10

S1.E3 ∙ The Austerity Games

Sat, Jun 01, 2013

After Bea and Tom visit their grandparents' graves, Tom notices from an old clipping that their grandfather William competed in the "Austerity Games", the London Olympics of 1948. They also discover that their great-aunt Vera left her flat to Mildred Budgens who, despite Pete's innocent surmise, was more than a friend. Tom and Pete visit Mildred, who gives them souvenirs of the Austerity Games, before Tom meets William's contemporaries, who tell him that William was not a very good athlete, any more than Pete when he tries his hand at boxing. Meanwhile, Bea and Monkey do a disastrous gig at a Greek wedding while Tom learns that he has American ancestry on his grandfather's side.

6.8 /10

S1.E4 ∙ Country Life

Sat, Jun 08, 2013

Tom traces his American ancestry to Charles and Rebecca Chadwick, who came to England and had three children--Victoria, Brian, and Tom's great-grandfather Harry. Tom, Bea, Keith, and Keith's Moldovan wife Luba head to a farm in Derbyshire to meet Tom's great-uncle's son Graham, his boy Ronnie, and Ronnie's wife Emma, who explain why their strand of the family are redheads. Graham and Keith instantly bond over their shared delight in the sitcom 'Move Along Please,' but Tom is perturbed by Ronnie's odd sense of humor, such as pretending to castrate a lamb. He is relieved to get a call from Al, his cousin in California with whom he had left an answer-phone message; Al invites Tom to stay with him and his wife Kitty. Meanwhile, zookeeper Pete must mate two alpacas, an exercise that leaves him feeling broody.

6.8 /10

S1.E5 ∙ Welcome to America

Sat, Jun 15, 2013

Tom arrives in California to stay with Al and Kitty, who make him very welcome--although he is inexplicably scared of their cat. In the middle of the night he is awakened by a Skype from Monkey, who reports that Bea has lost her job. At the weekend Al and Kitty hold a barbecue, inviting other cousins, the married Rick and Julie, and the rather strange Dave, who claims to have a vestigial tail and a Peruvian wife who has gone missing. Dave tells Tom that Charles Chadwick fled to England in the aftermath of the American Civil War--possibly because he was an accomplice to the murder of Abraham Lincoln.

7.1 /10

S1.E6 ∙ Civil War

Sat, Jun 22, 2013

Pete rings Tom to tell him he has a job interview on return to England, but Tom and his cousins are more intrigued by photographs showing Charles in uniforms of soldiers of both the North and South, suggesting that he changed sides at the end of the Civil War. Tom attends a battle re-enactment, but it gives no further clues and the organizer tells him off for not playing dead. After Bea phones to say that she and Pete are flying out to join him, Tom meets writer Ally Keele, whose side he takes after a traffic accident. Then Tom learns that Charles changed uniforms to allow him to get behind enemy lines to meet his sweetheart Rebecca, who was apparently a Native American.

7.1 /10

S1.E7 ∙ Indians

Sat, Jun 29, 2013

After going on a date with Ally, Tom finds out that Rebecca was apparently a Mojave Indian. so he meets Bea and Pete in his expensive hire car and they head off for the reservation at Barstow. They spend the day pretending to be natives but get no further clues as to Rebecca's background until Tom is pointed towards local man Marty Schmellf. Tom is perplexed when Marty matches his photo of Rebecca with one showing her to be part of the Jewish Schmellf family, one of whom, Ezra, was a leading actor in silent Western films. As if to confirm this, Mr Pfister rings Tom from England to say that his DNA has no Native American blood.

6.8 /10

S1.E8 ∙ Cowboys

Sat, Jul 06, 2013

Ally and Tom visit Melvin to see evidence of his grandfather, Jewish cowboy star Tumbleweed Tim, whose silent-film career was ended by scandal. Meanwhile, Bea goes ape when Monkey goes missing, until Tom discovers that he has been donated to a charity worker, from whom he must steal him back. When the Chadwicks regroup at Al's house to toast friends and family, Tom is looking for the toilet when he discovers Al's office, where he has built a model to show that President Kennedy was killed by a conspiracy and that the moon landings were faked. On the eve of his return home, Tom sleeps with Ally--and overcomes his fear of the cat--and the next day he is reluctant to leave her to return to England.

7.6 /10