LATE, UNLAMENTED entry in the POSTGATE/FIRMIN oeuvre, based on the novels by Rumer Godden. Like BAGPUSS, it featured a group of toys who came to life when their owners, Charlotte and Emily Dane, weren’t around. Tottie was a doll, who lived happily in a doll’s house with three other dolls, whom she considered her family. However, evil arrived in the form of a porcelain doll called – bizarrely – Marchpane, who was entirely self-centred. Instead of joining in the Tottie family’s love fest (they called themselves the Plantagenets), Marchpane plotted their downfall in order to gain more quality time with the owners. Said plotting culminated in the death by fire of Birdie, one of Tottie’s family, who Marchpane knew was made of plastic, and would melt. An air of morbidity then fell upon the Tottie family. Very dubious stuff and hardly the most palatable of pre-teatime endeavours. Marchpane did get her comeuppance, though.
Tottie: Story of a Doll’s House
By
Posted on
rich
December 9, 2010 at 9:48 pm
Thank God for that, I thought I’d imagined this!
Richard Davies
December 10, 2010 at 1:46 pm
Every other episode seemed to have the dolls wishing for something, & often getting almost what they wanted.
The boy was called Apple (years before Gwynnie & Chris) & there was another doll that replaced Birdie later on.