Mother & Son: Season 1

Newly divorced Arthur Beare (Garry McDonald), a rather drab, fortysomething gent, lives at home with his eccentric mother Maggie (Ruth Cracknell). Arthur is torn between duty (looking after his mum) and desire (getting on with his life while he's still reasonably young and healthy), and that dilemma informs most of the seven episodes from the 1984 first season of this daffy Australian sitcom, which ran in the U.S. on PBS. Written by Geoffrey Atherden and directed by Geoff Portmann, Mother & Son reflects its Down Under setting but revolves around familiar situations that will be easily recognizable to stateside viewers. The dialogue is generally sharp and the Cracknell-McDonald byplay consistently funny; in fact, their terrific chemistry enlivens what in lesser hands would be fairly routine sitcom plot gambits. DVD extras on this double-disc set include cast profiles. Recommended. (E. Hulse)