Play for Today: Who's Who (1979)

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Siskoid
I've read that because Mike Leigh takes aim at Yuppies and an emerging UPPER middle class in Who's Who, it doesn't work as well as his working-class material. While I don't dispute that this one isn't as effective as his other work, I don't think that's what's going on. To me, Who's Who is a lot like Abigail's Party in that it dramatizes people who WANT TO BE of a higher class - are indeed desperate to - but keep exposing themselves as less than. And of course, that's THEIR judgement call, not mine, nor even Leigh's. Britain's class anxiety is a kind of anorexia, all in the minds of those who care about this. If it doesn't really work, it's that while characters are connected through the brokerage firm many of the characters work at, the groups don't really have much to do with one another. Most effective is Richard Kane's tedious fan of the upper class, with his cat-breeding wife at home (the metaphor is clear) and an insolent, very young, colleague at work. Accessing a higher class has passed him by, and there's tragi-comic pathos to his obsession. The Yuppies themselves, however, might still have a shot if they socialize with the right people, but they are a largely insufferable lot, acting the parts they want, but coming off as pretentious and gauche. And the more time we spend with them (especially Catherine Hall's irritatingly flighty Samantha), the more I want to get back to Kane's household. 1 year 3 months ago