"Long hours combined with fury do not produce the best work..."

[thisbluespirit]

Staying in the same sort of era of TV, if nothing else:


Day Four: Beatrice Eliott (Stella Gonet) (from BBC 1990s drama The House of Eliott in which two sisters found a fashion house in the 1920s.)


"Just because I'm your wife doesn't mean I'm still your receptionist!"

As Jack is telling people before too long, Beatrice is amazing. Up until the start of the series she had been held back by her repressive father who saw no point in educating girls and valued Bea too much as a housekeeper to allow her to marry. Always being spirited, the thing that kept her from marching out anyhow, was her younger sister - her mother died when she was 13, leaving the baby Evangeline in her care.

It's no wonder then that she values her new-found independence so highly, she has trouble when she considers anything that might threaten it. On finding herself penniless, orphaned, with no education to fit her for any occupation, she sets out to earn her fortune and proves herself to be rather too good a receptionist to Jack Maddox, obtains a place at a London fashion house - and storms out again - and then manages, with Evie, to set up The House of Eliott in a world that finds a business run by a woman a thing bound to fail. She and Evie prove the world wrong.

For a woman who thought all her chances in life had passed her by, this definitely makes her awesome. There are other characters who are scared of her, including her pompous and patronising cousin Arthur, because she can be ferocious when she chooses. Plus, Bea is responsible for bringing Evie up, and, clearly, did a pretty fantastic job.

And, yay, would you believe there is a beautiful tribute vid here that tells some of her story from S1:

"joan clip" (Watch on YouTube)

(It is a little sadder than I would have chosen for Bea, but does fit perfectly that bittersweet side of her story - and Jack's. She may be inclined at times to sacrifice him to the business, but meeting her seems to inspire him to find his sense of purpose, instead of hiding from memories of the war in an aimless society life).

Beatrice:Jack Maddox, you have hidden depths of appalling sentimentality.
Jack: So you don't want me to carry you over the threshold?
Beatrice: No I don't! ...We'll see.

(And, yes, you can see that not only do I think Stella Gonet is great in this, but Bea/Jack is one of my very few OTPs that I never want messed with. Ever. And fic for them would be lovely, yes?)

With an honourable mention for the crusading Penelope Maddox (Francesca Folan) who makes Bea more than a little jealous by having done all the things that she was never able to do.
Jack, on Penelope: "She blew in, flogged me some tickets for a charity ball, downed a quick glass and then shot off to some meeting for emancipated vagrants, or was it homeless feminists?"

Actually, it's full of strong female characters - I could talk about Madge, and Evie, and Tilly, too, while I'm at it... Maybe even Aunt Lydia!




Day One: Soolin (B7)
Day Two: Dayna Mellanby (B7)
Day Three: Michelle of the Resistance (Allo Allo)

Comments

[persiflage-1.livejournal.com]

Ah, the lovely Bea...

[thisbluespirit]

Yes, indeed. How could she not be on my list after a recent rewatch? :-D

[persiflage-1.livejournal.com]

Indeed!

[(Anonymous)]

An excellent write-up of a truly inspirational character played brilliantly by Stella! Jack and Bea are one of my favourite couples :)

[thisbluespirit]

THank you!

[violetcreme.livejournal.com]

Random comment alert months later! And using my long forgotten LJ account too! Finding HoE again after 15 years on ITV3 and falling totally in love with it (not to mention developing a moderate case of Jack and Bea obsession) I found your post through searching around for something, anything about them and really loved reading your post. Yes to fic (how come there isn't any that I can find, that's criminal!) and yes yes to the brilliance of Bea (and Stealla).

Alas there is nowhere to squee online it seems, so thought I'd leave you a comment instead. *g*

[violetcreme.livejournal.com]

...and I've just seen you're a Press Gang fan too! Great minds and all that.

[thisbluespirit]

Random late comments are one of my fave LJ things! :-)

Jack/Bea are, as I said, still one of my all-time favourite TV couples. And thanks. And also: cunning plan to obtain fic (even if probably won't work), which is that I plan to nominate and request it for Yuletide.

There really ought to be. Someone once said there was a comm, but I've never been able to find it. And thanks. Also, with Press Gan - YAY. In normal circumstances, I would friend you like a shot at that point, but you say 'long-forgotten', so I leave that up to you.

I did also make a bunch of HoE icons a while back for icons100, if that's of any interest. Here: http://lost-spook.livejournal.com/140578.html#cutid1

[violetcreme.livejournal.com]

Huzzah! Oh it's been years since I used my LJ, actual years, although I still read the few people on my FList who still post - I'll bookmark your LJ and visit that way! Lovely icons, I do so miss icons and icon making, that's the one thing I loved about LJ-ing.

I used to run a PG comm here, but we migrated onto our own forum a few years ago:

http://s8.invisionfree.com/pressgangfans/

we don't post that often any more but if you fancy a PG discussion at any time, then pop over!

As for Jack & Bea, I assumed when the love struck that I'd go online to find loads of stuff, nearly everything under the sun including obscure cartoons has fic or fandoms etc., but there literally apepars to be nothing out there. Not a thing. There are three lovely YouTube videos so there are clearly fans out there though. I'm gutted as I have so much to squee about and discuss! Ooooh, you should start an LJ comm!

[thisbluespirit]

I friended you anyway, for that, if that's okay. :-) (At least I can find the forum again if I forget).

Thanks!

Yes, it usually gets a reaction, but no comm, no fic. Just some very nice vids, and my bunch of icons, as far as I can tell! I could make a comm. Making comms is much too easy and addictive, but I might find myself splendidly alone and looking silly...

[violetcreme.livejournal.com]

Oh of course!

Well it would be you and me, and maybe if the link were given to the vidders, then them as well - that would be, oh, about five of us! LOL! There must be others out there too, it's jsut been shown on TV again so there must be new fans out there. I am so up for a bit of Jack 'n' Bea analysis! *g*

[thisbluespirit]

Hmm. And one of the vidders is on my flist, and there are a couple of other people who like/know the show, so... It would be possible. I know a couple of places it could be pimped...

There doesn't seem any reason not to do it. I shall see what I can do, and since this is totally your fault, if I do, I might just give you co-modly powers, even if you never use them. :-)

Also even though we technically only just met. (I have a feeling, tho', we bumped into one another once before over Press Gang fics?)

[violetcreme.livejournal.com]

Yay! Go for it, I'll gladly co-mod, my LJ is still active even if very dusty these days. We may well have crossed paths over PG at some point too!

There's two Facebook communities/like pages for HoE, there may be some Jack & Bea fans there who want to geek over them. We could pimp and see what we got!

[violetcreme.livejournal.com]

I've been having a smashing HoE convo with this lovely lady the last few days! The Fans Are Out There! *g*

http://madameguillotine.org.uk/2011/10/20/the-house-of-eliott-again/#comment-10927

[thisbluespirit]

I knew they were, somewhere!

I didn't forget. I went off and snaffled the name immediately (in case there was some sort of rush on HoE comms) and have been making a start on a reasonably suitable layout, description etc. It is here: house_of_eliott. If you join in, I can make you co-mod. And you can then make additions/corrections. And I can correct them back, we can start a fanwar... and, no, let's not do that. :lol: (Seriously, I've just had one go at putting the basic bits in, so feel free!)

And, yes, I was only thinking of fic, generally - I was forgetting the ending (I try to do that with HoE). There is continuation and fixit fic needed!! We must start the comm and do something about it at once... I'm sure the rest of LJ can soon be converted.

:-)

[violetcreme.livejournal.com]

Oh wow, how amazing does that look? Love the banner! It's been so long since I used LJ I've forgotten how to do anything fancy, so I will leave it all in your capable hands - let me know if there's anything you'd like me to do!

The next step is to pimp it, pimp it baby! There are quite a few people chatting about it on Twitter, there's the FB page and doing an LJ search there seem to be a few people who seem to be fans about. Then, let the discussions begin! Woohoo!

[thisbluespirit]

Thanks. I can never do fancy layouts anyway, but that template seems quite nice and in-keeping for the moment. :-)

Okay, I've pimped it via my own journal, bbccostumedrama, britishdrama and asked to be added to the next fandom_of_one update. I'll think about anywhere else, but those were the main ones I could come up with.

Also, I looked at the interests I'd put on the profile and found that 'joseph wint' had a link, which I thought was very odd - and, oh, there actually was a comm, even if it never came up in any searches I did - just misspelt: house_of_elliot. It hasn't been posted on since 2008, so I won't feel too guilty, but... whoops.

PS. So far two members who aren't us! Go us! ;-)