The Darling Buds of May: 3 - Stranger at the Gates

Dreaming big runs in the family.

This enormously popular British comedy/ drama series made a star of Catherine Zeta-Jones (Traffic) who, in her first TV series, got more newspaper coverage than the Royal Family!


Set during the ever-sunny 1950s, this is the story of the indestructible Larkin family, headed by Sidney "Pop" Larkin (David Jason), a dreamer and schemer who has managed to avoid paying taxes throughout his working life.


The clan leads an idyllic (if flamboyant) life in the English countryside, coloured by the flirtatious ways of beautiful daughter Mariette (Zeta-Jones). Pop Larkin's never-ending supply of ill-fated entrepreneurial adventures and the fierce of each family member to one another through good times and bad.


Based on the popular books by H.E. Bates and filmed in gorgeous locales around Kent, this series is a touching and often hilarious tribute to family life.


Stranger At The Gates - A stranger arrives in town and introduces himself as Pieter and claims to be from Denmark. From the start he is a big hit with everyone. Then the villagers find out that he is actually German and people suddenly become hostile.


A Season Of Heavenly Gifts - Pop meets an ex-RAF type and has a sudden windfall, although he manages to fall foul of shady property developer, Marcus Cope. Charlie, on the other hand, is busy trying to raise the money to buy a hop garden in another potentially ill-fated, entrepreneurial enterprise.


Cope is desperately trying to get his hands on Pop's mysterious hoard of cash and also wants Charlie's hop garden for redevelopment.