It was welcome news on a grey Monday. The BBC is set to bring back To the Manor Born, that gentle sitcom of rural idyll from when the 1970s slipped into the 1980s. But even as I trilled the theme tune all around the office this morning, I got to thinking... would the return of Audrey fforbes-Hamilton really be a good idea?
One of the great truisms of television is the simple fact that the memory cheats. Pick up any DVD of a fondly-remembered TV programme and often you will sit in front of the tube thinking "what was I thinking? This is pants".
But I am happy to report that this is not the case with To the Manor Born, the stately comedy of manners about the imperious Audrey fforbes-Hamilton, faultlessly played by Penelope Keith, who after she was widowed lost her cherished estate Grantleigh Manor to the head of Cavendish Foods, Richard De Vere (Peter Bowles). I caught an episode three years back and it was still as funny as ever.
On the plus side, Penelope Keith is now 67 and Peter Bowles 71, but both are still sprightly and have recently graced the London stage to great effect. And jolly good, Audrey's sidekick Majorie (Angela Thorne) is still around as well as is Gerard Sim, the vicar.
But the actors playing Mrs Poo and Brabinger died in 1983, while the actor who played Old Ned passed away in 1993.
I fear that any return of the comedy, even as a Christmas special, couldn't hope to recapture the magic of the programme.
The original series was such a creature of its time, not just in terms of its humour and its sensibility but also in terms of it as a television production, I'm not sure that 2007 would or could do it justice. As Anna Pickard writes on the Guardian arts blog, the show would be out of place in the modern world, in "the age of reality TV and the starring role of the ordinary person".
Most people love the new Doctor Who even more than they did the original, but the return of This Life in the dubious form of This Life + 10 was not a resounding success, as this Organ Grinder post revealed.
Would To the Manor Born fare any better? The BBC might be better off simply repeating the series in peak time on BBC1, after all, its budget is about to be slashed, so why recall a few solid gold repeats. I suspect it would do surprisingly well.
My overriding fear is that the reviving of To the Manor Born will be the wrecking of it. Some things are best left alone.