Story Line
The sketch presents the 90th birthday of elderly upper-class Englishwoman Miss Sophie, who hosts a celebration dinner every year for her friends Mr Pommeroy, Mr Winterbottom, Sir Toby, and Admiral von Schneider. (The plot has nothing to do with New Year's Eve. There is a "Happy new year" toast, but this is purely a reference to Miss Sophie's birthday.) The problem is that due to Miss Sophie's considerable age, she has outlived all of her friends, and so her equally aged manservant James makes his way around the table, impersonating each of the guests in turn. Miss Sophie decides on appropriate drinks to accompany the menu: Mulligatawny soup (Miss Sophie orders dry sherry), North Sea haddock (with white wine), chicken (with champagne), and fruit for dessert (with port) served by James, who finds himself raising (and emptying) his glass four times per course. That takes its toll, increasingly noticeable in James's growing difficulty in pouring the drinks, telling wine glasses from vases of flowers, and refraining from bursting into song. Even before the alcohol begins to exert its influence, he keeps tripping up on the head of a tiger skin lying on the floor between the dinner table and the buffet.
The crucial exchange during every course is:
- James: The same procedure as last year, Miss Sophie?
- Miss Sophie: The same procedure as every year, James!
After the dinner, Miss Sophie indicates to a very drunk James that she wishes to retire to bed, to which James responds:
- James: By the way, the same procedure as last year, Miss Sophie?
- Miss Sophie (delightedly): The same procedure as every year, James!
- James: Well, I'll do my very best!
Read more about this topic: Dinner For One
Famous quotes containing the words story and/or line:
“This story is no good, I’m almost beginning to believe it.”
—Samuel Beckett (1906–1989)
“The middle years of parenthood are characterized by ambiguity. Our kids are no longer helpless, but neither are they independent. We are still active parents but we have more time now to concentrate on our personal needs. Our children’s world has expanded. It is not enclosed within a kind of magic dotted line drawn by us. Although we are still the most important adults in their lives, we are no longer the only significant adults.”
—Ruth Davidson Bell. Ourselves and Our Children, by Boston Women’s Health Book Collective, ch. 3 (1978)