James May: My Sisters' Top Toys

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James May: My Sister's Top Toys

James May

Tracy Jeune

Claudine King-Dabbs

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Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media

23/12/2007

BBC Two - James May: My Sisters' Top Toys

James May celebrates the toys from his sisters' toy box that made his childhood hell.

James May, stuck between his older and younger sister as a child, reveals how his toys were their hand-me-downs. He goes through the family toy box, rediscovering some classics.

James May celebrates the toys that made his childhood hell, as he opens the lid on his sisters' toy box. Sandwiched between elder sister Jane and younger one Sarah, many of their favourites he couldn't understand, or stand the sight of, or see the point of. This is both a tale of brotherly revenge, and the story from the other side of the toy room. 

Each toy prompts a story - a history told via archive, anecdote and the occasional obsessive collector or inventor. Dolls, dolls' houses, dolls' prams, Tiny Tears, Girls' World, Look and Learn, Major Morgan the electronic organ get the May inspection... and sisters Jane and Sarah dish the dirt on their brother and their toy memories. 

James blows up the Tree House Family, races in a converted Silver Cross pram, tries out his hair and make-up skills on Girls World, projects Spirograph on the side of the Royal Festival Hall, and appears in a Fuzzy Felt animated film... all jolly good clean fun.

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