Episode 5

Adrian Mole is balding, he's bitter and he's back, this time aged 30¼. Working at the Hoi Polloy restaurant, Soho, where a typical menu includes: Heinz Tomato Soup, (with white bread floaters) Grey Lamb Chops Boiled Cabbage avec Dan Quayle Potatoes Dark Brown onion gravy Spotted Dick à la Clinton Bird's Eye Custard Cheddar Cheese, Cream Crackers Nescafé After Eight Mint he is spotted by a cable TV producer and ends up starring in a celebrity chef show celebrating offal. Though he may be older he is certainly no wiser, still passing his time by dreaming of Pandora (now a shining star in Tony Blair's New Government) after his marriage to a Nigerian beauty ends in tatters. But underneath the layers of experience and sophistication, fans of the Mole family will find the same dysfunctional mess that made Adrian's Secret Diary an instant bestseller--his young son is being brought up by his mother in Ashby-de-la- Zouch, his 16-year-old sister leaves home to live with her multiply pierced boyfriend and his father is bed- bound with manic depression. Adrian still makes constant lists of juvenile neuroses and concentrates on his penis activity to an unhealthy extent (it is when it reaches 0/10 he realises something has to be done). Cast: Helen Baxendale ...Pandora Braithwaite Stephen Mangan ...Adrian Mole Alison Steadman ...Pauline Mole Alun Armstrong ...George Mole Zoë Wanamaker ...Tania Braithwaite James Hazeldine ...Ivan Braithwaite Harry Tomes ...William Mole Melissa Batchelor ...Rosie Mole Roderic Culver ...Nigel Hetherington