In this comedy drama, a suburban housewife’s secret £38 million lottery win unleashes a torrent of greed and chaos within her dysfunctional family.
Alison Braithwaite (Amanda Redman), a middle-aged mother from Leeds, wins a fortune on the lottery but decides to conceal the news from her self-absorbed family. Her husband, David (Peter Davison), is in the midst of an affair, while her three daughters, Virginia (Sarah Smart), Charlotte (Keeley Fawcett), and Sarah (Sarah Churm), are spoiled and demanding. Fearing the money will only amplify their worst instincts, Alison establishes a charitable trust under a pseudonym and hires her friend Pauline (Lynda Bellingham) to help her give the fortune away. The secret, however, is a ticking bomb. Its eventual detonation shatters the family’s fragile suburban peace, forcing them to confront their own greed and resentments. Later storylines see the family lose the winnings on a technicality, only to have them restored through a last-minute legal loophole.
Sally Wainwright’s creation was a defining ITV drama of the early 2000s, a sharp and cynical satire disguised as a wish-fulfilment fantasy. The series took the popular dream of a lottery win and turned it into a cautionary tale about the corrosive power of unearned wealth. Its success was built on Wainwright’s acidic scripts, which expertly balanced farcical set pieces with moments of genuine domestic trauma. While the plot mechanics sometimes strained credulity, the programme was grounded by an impeccable cast, led by a formidable Amanda Redman. Her portrayal of a woman attempting to do good in the face of her family’s monstrous selfishness gave the series its moral and emotional anchor.
Broadcast: ITV – Yorkshire, 26 Episodes, 20 January 2000 – 9 April 2003
Creator: Sally Wainwright
Producers: Hugh Warren, Jacky Stoller, Kieran Roberts, Sue Pritchard
Directors include: Robin Sheppard, Andy De Emmony, David Innes Edwards
Theme Music: The Egg
Main Cast: Amanda Redman (Alison Braithwaite), Peter Davison (David Braithwaite), Lynda Bellingham (Pauline Farnell), Sylvia Syms (Marion Riley), Julie Graham (Megan Hartnoll), Sarah Smart (Virginia Braithwaite), Keeley Fawcett (Charlotte Braithwaite), Sarah Churm (Sarah Braithwaite), Kevin Doyle (Mike Hartnoll), Kulvinder Ghir (Manjit Mathura)
