The Last Ealing Comedy

by Matthew Baylis (Author)

• Used

  Paperback
  2003

  $3.27

  It's time for Alastair Strange to move on, Martha's left him in the lurch and discovered more to life than the TV and late night pizzas, and things at TV Forum magazine just aren't all they were cracked up to be...But, when you've got friends like Tara, and her rich husband, anything is possible, even teaching, just as long as you get the right reference. Alastair lands a job as a teacher at an Ealing boys' school and is set the task of enlightening teenage boys to the wonders of media and film; it doesn't seem like too tough a challenge but the 'ferals' in 4L shouldn't be underestimated. On the school grounds are the derelict Ealing Studios; the themes, as with the soap operas in Stranger Than Fulham, enhance Baylis's comic novel, combining the wit and fun of the films with the catastrophes of modern urban life. Living with the gregarious Davenport, dealing with mysterious girls on the bus and disastrous blind dates, it would seem that there is, perhaps, one last comedy left in Ealing.

• Used

  Paperback
  2004

  $3.27

  Alastair Strange is having trouble. His girlfriend Martha, tired of late night telly and takeaway pizzas, has reinvented herself as the real estate princess of Putney. His dream job has turned into a nightmare and his Dad's been arrested for burglary. Just when things couldn't get worse, along comes Alastair's old friend, society It-girl Tara, with a tantalising job offer. Alastair finds himself teaching media studies in an Ealing school. A cushy number, he thinks, but that's before Tara calls the favour in- The derelict Ealing Studios are next to the school - their presence haunts Alastair and acts as a continual motif for his story, combining the quirky wit and eccentricity of the Ealing films with an eye for the absurdities of modern urban life. Flat-sharing with the impossible Davenport, dealing with mysterious girls on the bus and disastrous blind dates, it would seem that there is, perhaps, one last comedy left in Ealing.