However, I was still glued to my TV last night for the start of this fantastic new drama.
It's impossible not love 'Our Zoo'. It's boasts the perfect combination of an all star cast, intriguing true story and adorable animals. I can well imagine that demand for a pet camel has gone through the roof.
Special mention too for ten year old Honor Kneafsey who play June Mottershead. She is an absolute joy and a star of the future for sure.
Faye turned to acting fairly late so has had to work hard for her opportunities but there is no doubting her talent and hopefully being part of one of this years biggest shows will help open more doors for her in the future.
Below is a review written by Michael Hogan for 'The Telegraph':
Our Zoo, BBC1: 'looks and smells like a hit'
“Never work with animals or children,” went W C Fields’s hoary old showbiz
adage. The adult actors in new period drama Our Zoo (BBC One) were
burdened with both. The kid had a cutely characterful face, with 10-year-old
actress Honor Kneafsey narrating this toasty-warm true story of how an
ordinary family established Chester
Zoo in the 1930s, but the beasts were the real scene stealers. A
squawking Australian parrot’s bright plumage brought a dash of colour to
Crewe’s slate-grey cobbled streets; a hairy Bactrian camel looked languidly
amused by us humans; and a cheeky Colombian squirrel monkey escaped and ate
its way through a screaming lady’s larder. William Claude Dukenfield didn’t
know what he was missing.
Actor Lee
Ingleby is best known as DS John Bacchus in Sixties police drama
Inspector George Gently. Ingleby must have a “period” face (pale, sensitive,
a bit beaky) because here he was cast in another retro role. George
Mottershead was an ex-servicemen still haunted by memories of the First
World War, frustrated that his family have to live and work with his parents
in their cramped corner shop.
Until, that is, animal-loving George made a delivery to the local docks and
rescued two unwanted beasts about to be put down in the quarantine bay. He
whisked them home in his grocer’s van, kept them in the shop’s backyard,
charged neighbours to come and gawp, and began to dream big. Could he buy a
crumbling stately homeand build the first British zoo without bars? Of course he could. However, it
will take him at least six episodes. And probably more, because Our Zoo
smelt like a hit and hits tend to get a second series.
It was winningly warm, with heaps of charm, lump-in-throat moments and
adorable wildlife. Ingleby, usually a supporting player, stepped into the
lead role with aplomb: his trenches trauma was touchingly portrayed and his
sparkly-eyed idealism about “putting a bit of beauty back into the world”
was infectious. The supporting cast – especially Anne Reid as George’s
battleaxe mother and Liz White as his loyal wife – were excellent, while
Sophia Myles added a dash of Downton-esque class (and potential love
interest) as a supportive lady of the manor.
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