Duty Free

1980s British tv sitcom

David Pearce lost his job and decided to spend the severance pay on holiday in Marbella for him and his wife Amy. In the hotel they meet another couple from Britain, which leads to tensions.

David Pearce recently lost his job as a draughtsman, but he got enough severance pay to afford a holiday for two in Spain. For David and his wife Amy it is a first chance to take such vacation and they plan to make the best of it, as sort-of second honeymoon. In the hotel they meet another couple from UK, Linda and Robert, who are frequent travellers around the world, so David tries not to show that he is not used to staying in fancy hotels. Despite their limited budget he tries to show off his wealth, although Robert and Linda see through his small games.

While the two couples come from different worlds, they spend a lot of time together, especially since Linda and David seem to enjoy each other’s company very much. Too much to be exact and David is on a verge of being unfaithful to his wife. Amy, at first, joked about it, but with each day it all seems far too real - Linda and David are trying to spend as much time as possible away from their spouses, which is not easy while you are on a vacation in hotel or on trips to nearby tourist attractions.

Sitcom built around a simple premise - two married people start what seems to be innocent flirt at first, but suddenly they start to think it is the beginning of something more serious. While it can be entertaining for a while, the secret meetings, the suspicious spouses, the ridiculous charades, Duty Free just took that single idea and stretched it far, far, far too long. The first series had logical beginning and the end, the second series was just repeating the same formula, while the third season was completely unnecessary and contained hastily put together episodes that used ideas from previous seasons or previous sitcoms by Eric Chappell.

For example in third season there is an episode, in which suddenly both couples get involved in a political disputes, which hardly a good idea in a series set on a vacation, since topic does not fit into the atmosphere and was never mentioned before. In another episode TV crew visits the hotel and everyone tries to end up in front of cameras. Both of those ideas were used in f.e. Only When I Laugh, also created by Eric Chappell.

Rating	5.2
Funny	5 / 10
Entertaining	3 / 5
Characters	3 / 5
Nonrepetitive	2 / 5