The House of Gristle

The House of Gristle was a British children's comedy sketch series for Children's BBC which ran for nine weeks in the spring of 1994. This was the Gristle family that had previously appeared in Dizzy Heights. This was mainly down to Steve Nallon's puppetry and voice talents. The main concept behind the show was that an ordinary family, the Gristles, had been given their own television series and so they produced a sort amateur “Family Television Channel”, creating their own special versions of television programmes of the day. The series had parodies, sketches and its own serial. The serial, a comic gothic horror send up called The Curious Case of Dr Van Rental, was later broadcast as a whole in 1995 as a one-off special. In the series Steve Nallon played Vera Gristle, the mum of the family, who spent most of her time eating. The series was produced and directed by Martin Hughes.