Series

The Good Life

The Good Life brings laughter and hope to suburbia!

7.719754 Seasons28 Episodes

Comedy

Tom and Barbara Good escape the rat race and pursue a self-sufficient lifestyle in Surbiton, much to the concern, frustration and sometimes envy of their neighbours Margo and Jerry Leadbetter. Entitled ‘Good Neighbors’ when shown in the USA.

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Episodes

7 episodes

1
1. Plough Your Own Furrow
30m
After he has celebrated his 40th birthday Tom decides that he is unhappy with his life style so he packs his job in, farms his large garden and becomes self sufficient.
2
2. Say Little Hen ...
30m
The Goods install the first chickens in their chicken coop, but they prove slow to lay their first eggs. Incensed by the condescension of the Leadbetters when they are invited to dinner together with Tom's former boss & his wife, the Goods decide to sacrifice one of the chickens to make a show of their not being as poor as the Leadbetters think.
3
3. The Weaker Sex?
30m
Tom buys an old-fashioned range for their kitchen from a passing rag-and-bone man, but Barbara becomes irate when she ends up doing most of the hard work to get it ready for use, while he tries to make a system for scaring the birds off their crops.
4
4. Pig's Lib
30m
The Goods continue their bartering with local suppliers, but Barbara has a misunderstanding while negotiating with the window-cleaner. They then add a pair of pigs in a sty to their back garden, at which Margo is so appalled she brings in the chairman of the local residents' association to persuade them out of it, but is unsuccessful. However, when one escapes into the Leadbetter's garden, she can only be mollified by getting rid of it.
5
5. The Thing in the Cellar
30m
Tom puts the finishing touches to their own electricity generator in the cellar, which runs on their animals' waste. He then goes fishing with Jerry, and decides to store the surplus in the freezer, until the generator plays up...
6
6. The Pagan Rite
30m
In order to pay for a treat for Barbara, Tom takes a short contract from his old firm, and tries to keep it a secret from her - but his plan is foiled when he fails to account for Margo's nosiness.
7
7. Backs to the Wall
30m
While starting the harvest, Tom injures his back digging,and since Margo and Jerry are on holiday Barbara is left to look after the farm all on her own. A storm then adds to their problems by turning their garden into a mud bath.

Cast

Richard Briers
Tom Good
Felicity Kendal
Barbara Good
Paul Eddington
Jerry Leadbetter
Penelope Keith
Margo Leadbetter

Reviews

Peter McGinn
Sep 27, 2020
8
This show is a product of the 70s. A suburban couple decide to drop out and go back to the land. They will grow their own food, barter or sell what they produce to make their living, whatever they need to do to drop out of the rat race. Their slightly stodgy friends next door remain in the rat race, providing a foil and a counterpoint for their shenanigans. If you had shown me a summary of the plot, I would have rolled my eyes, but they made it work. I especially like what they did with Margo. She is snooty, privileged and against what their neighbors are attempting. As a result, she is joked about and made fun of, but there is depth and warmth to her that comes out at various times during the show’s run. I am not a big fan of Richard Briar and I don’t know why, but he does a credible job. Penelope Keith owns her roles as Margo. This is not at the top of the list of favorites for me, but it turned out much better than it had any right to do. In the U.S. it was known as Good Neighbors (Good is the couple’s last name.)Read more
This show is a product of the 70s. A suburban couple decide to drop out and go back to the land. They will grow their own food, barter or sell what they produce to make their living, whatever they need to do to drop out of the rat race. Their slightly stodgy friends next door remain in the rat race, providing a foil and a counterpoint for their shenanigans. If you had shown me a summary of the plot, I would have rolled my eyes, but they made it work. I especially like what they did with Margo. She is snooty, privileged and against what their neighbors are attempting. As a result, she is joked about and made fun of, but there is depth and warmth to her that comes out at various times during the show’s run. I am not a big fan of Richard Briar and I don’t know why, but he does a credible job. Penelope Keith owns her roles as Margo. This is not at the top of the list of favorites for me, but it turned out much better than it had any right to do. In the U.S. it was known as Good Neighbors (Good is the couple’s last name.)
CinemaSerf
Feb 23, 2022
I wonder just how many people in the mid 1970s - anywhere in the world - would have realised just how visionary writers John Esmonde and Bob Larbey were with this marvellous tale of a happily married suburban couple who decide to give up their daily grind and revert to a subsistence existence. Richard Briers and Felicity Kendall are great in the roles of the optimistic and naive "Tom" and his stoic and determined wife "Barbara" as they scrap, save, cannibalise, economise and basically do just about anything to avoid needing/earning/spending money - not an easy task. For me, the best parts come from their loyal and wealthy neighbours "Jerry" (Paul Eddington) and "Margo" (Penelope Keith). The former, the long suffering husband to the loving but terribly snobbish wife who looks down with a mix of disbelief and disdain on the newly self-sufficient folks next door. It features hilarious scenarios that take the most basic of themes - heating oil, vegetable patches, making your own clothes or cheese or wine and turns them into genuine laugh out loud comedy. It is simple and hugely effective, the humour working on many levels as the underpinning principles of love, loyalty and obstinacy marry well with sheer bloody mindedness and, on occasion, downright stupidity - but not just from the same side of their garden fence each time. It probably helps, as with the contemporaneous "Fawlty Towers" series that there was a very limited run. It clearly has an environmentalist aspect to the narrative, but it not delivered in the preachy, puritanical fashion that is so often the style used now - it successfully uses humour as a conduit for a message that is both potent and, frequently, laugh out loud. The writers don't flog the heart out of the joke, and the characters are given plenty of space to develop and shine. Great stuff well worth a watch.Read more
I wonder just how many people in the mid 1970s - anywhere in the world - would have realised just how visionary writers John Esmonde and Bob Larbey were with this marvellous tale of a happily married suburban couple who decide to give up their daily grind and revert to a subsistence existence. Richard Briers and Felicity Kendall are great in the roles of the optimistic and naive "Tom" and his stoic and determined wife "Barbara" as they scrap, save, cannibalise, economise and basically do just about anything to avoid needing/earning/spending money - not an easy task. For me, the best parts come from their loyal and wealthy neighbours "Jerry" (Paul Eddington) and "Margo" (Penelope Keith). The former, the long suffering husband to the loving but terribly snobbish wife who looks down with a mix of disbelief and disdain on the newly self-sufficient folks next door. It features hilarious scenarios that take the most basic of themes - heating oil, vegetable patches, making your own clothes or cheese or wine and turns them into genuine laugh out loud comedy. It is simple and hugely effective, the humour working on many levels as the underpinning principles of love, loyalty and obstinacy marry well with sheer bloody mindedness and, on occasion, downright stupidity - but not just from the same side of their garden fence each time. It probably helps, as with the contemporaneous "Fawlty Towers" series that there was a very limited run. It clearly has an environmentalist aspect to the narrative, but it not delivered in the preachy, puritanical fashion that is so often the style used now - it successfully uses humour as a conduit for a message that is both potent and, frequently, laugh out loud. The writers don't flog the heart out of the joke, and the characters are given plenty of space to develop and shine. Great stuff well worth a watch.