British comedy has always had two quite distinct faces: dry elegant wit from the likes of Noël Coward and slapstick from the Benny Hills.
Agatha Raisin, a drama just now available in the States on Acorn TV (www.acorn.tv), tackles the difficult task of incorporating both. While perfection in that pursuit would not be possible, Agatha does it entertainingly well.
The title character in the series, which is based on the novels of M.C. Beaton, is played by Ashley Jensen (top) with fierce determination and an equally fierce set of blond bangs.
Agatha has been making her reputation in London as the founder of a high-end public relations firm. Her particular expertise seems to lie in throwing a coat of PR paint over the misdeeds of her clients, like the lead singer in a hot boy band who has been photographed in a love nest while his wife is in the hospital having their first child.
That, Aggie can handle. What’s more problematic is her own life, in which she is alone and staring at her 40s.
The same skills that have made her good at client damage control, like lying and being obsessed with work, seem to have served her less well in, say, relationships.
Then one day she puts some money on a horse that comes in at 45-1 and she decides she will take her money and retire to the idyllic Cotswolds, where she went on holiday as a child.
Her London-honed style isn’t an immediate fit in the small town of Carsley. So she decides to enter the prestigious village quiche-baking contest, with a quiche she bought from a shop in London. We mentioned the lying thing before, right?
Anyhow, her quiche ends up killing the contest judge, which is never a good sign, but does have a positive aftereffect for Agatha.
To clear her name, she must find out who really spiked the quiche. Sherlock Holmes she’s not, but she has a knack for reading people and putting clues together, and before you know it, she seems to be headed for a whole new career as the village sleuth.
Her posse includes the eager young local police officer Bill Wong (Matt McCooey, right, with Jensen) and Gemma Simpson (Katy Wix), the housecleaner that Agatha stole from her neighbor because it’s really, really hard to find a housecleaner in Carsley.
There’s a tiny hint here of Angela Lansbury’s Jessica Fletcher from Murder, She Wrote. There’s maybe even a little Grantchester in the sense that a small bucolic British village may have an extraordinary crime rate.
The reason to watch, however, is Jensen, who can be oblivious on an almost AbFab level yet also has this rather poignant dilemma of facing middle age alone.
Her funny side mostly comes through sharp repartee, while a number of the characters around her can swing from their own serious concerns to almost cartoonish vignettes.
Agatha Raisin’s first episode is 90 minutes and the remaining seven are about 44 minutes each. While it’s not a heavy lift, it is a pleasant one.