Very Good Sir: The Fry-Laurie Jeeves-Wooster Brings Wodehouse's Stories Up to the 21st Century, Brilliantly.

classicalsteve

I do not believe that Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie played Reginald Jeeves and Bertie Wooster. The spirit of Wodehouse through the characters of Jeeves and Wooster infiltrated the living presences of Fry and Laurie and for 23 wonderful episodes walked the earth and brought us back to 1920's England. There is such a remarkable chemistry between Fry and Hugh that is magical and inexplicable.

For those who don't know the story, Wooster is the stupid aristocrat who leaps into turbulent waters without looking and his valet, Jeeves, must rescue him from drowning in bad judgment. However, Jeeves is incapable of instilling any kind of good sense into his employer, although he always tries. In many ways Jeeves and Wooster is a modern day "Marriage of Figaro", however here the lower social class mentors the upper and even saves them for themselves.

Bertie is not the only fool populated in Wodehouse's world. Much of the young male English upper-crust is portrayed as bumbling inept fools who have too much time on their idle hands, conniving and scheming in strange and frivolous exploits. And Bertie Wooster is the quintessential heir to not only stupidity but a large family fortune. In short, Bertie is a scatterbrain's scatterbrain who would bet (and lose) the entire family estate on the local sack race and then have to explain to his Aunt Agatha that it was a sure thing. But his plans do not end with monetary exploits. Bertie would push a young boy off a bridge in order that one of his colleagues would rescue him in order to impress a young woman, only to have it backfire. It is Jeeves who always comes to the rescue. Jeeves is far more worldly. His understanding of human nature is in direct proportion to Bertie's lack of good sense. Wooster and Jeeves go together in much the same way as Kirk and Spock.

Some in the aristocracy apparently complained of Wodehouse's portrayals of the upper classes which is to be expected. The unspoken and yet apparent message of Jeeves and Wooster, aside from the entertaining comedy that monopolizes the forefront of the stories, is an interesting criticism of privilege. Whether or not this was Wodehouse's intention is debatable, but the underlying message appears quite apparent.

Although harmlessly benign (except being his own worst enemy), Bertie Wooster is a cherry short of a fruitcake, and yet is bestowed with all the advantages of a young aristocrat. He studied at Eton and Oxford University, yet little of his studies remains with him, except for his aptitude at sophomoric pranks. Jeeves, on the contrary, has much practical knowledge to boot and can quote Shakespeare with ease. But Jeeves is from the working class. Jeeves might have excelled at a place like Oxford but would not be accepted because of the social status of his family. He can only secure a job as a valet to an idiotic aristocrat who was handed these things to him on a gold-rimmed platter and takes for granted the status given to him. And yet, with all the tom-foolery exhibited by Bertie Wooster, the Jeeves tales may have in fact re-enforced class distinction in Great Britain although it was often scorned by the upper classes. The lower classes needed Jeeves to remind them of the oft inferiority of the upper class. Jeeves gives them an outlet to express the unfairness of privilege and its inherit hypocrisies. I hope these stories not only entertained but have given the middle and lower classes reason to insist on changing the hierarchical landscape: a meritocracy instead of an aristocracy. Jeeves would have definitely approved.

score 10/10

classicalsteve 27 April 2007

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw1644709/