I was watching this Australian show (title in the title of this post). The idea is two families connected by adoption. The upper middle class people (doctor and architect; doctor is a woman whose birth mother is a drag racer). One episode in particular is a great lesson on Bourdieux's cultural capital.
The birth mother gives the doctor a knock-off designer purse. The real one would cost thousands, and this one is 25 or so. The doctor can't be seen with the knock off, so she goes and buys the real one. But she ends up not being able to tell them apart. Meanwhile, the snooty adoptive mother defends the artistic integrity of one of the sons in the drag racing family, who is being exploited by a shop keeper. She arranges a gallery show for him, even though she despises his cartoonish art.
Meanwhile, the husband, the architect married to the doctor, finds out that his favorite shirt has become the uniform at the local coffee shop. He gives away all his shirts because he wants a more unique look, opting for a black t-shirt look. The men from the drag racing family rescues his shirts from the donation bin and starts wearing them. The architect notices that all the people at the gallery opening are wearing black t-shirts. The children make fun of their architect father.
These three plots are woven together in something like 26 minutes. The tone is comic and good natured. Everyone is allowed to be themselves, with the foibles typical of their class position. The humor comes with the endless friction between two cultures, and doesn't end up mean-spirited.
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