Mrs Harris Goes to Paris is on Channel 4 this Saturday

Mrs Harris Goes to Paris gets its free-to-air premiere on Channel 4, this Saturday night at 9:15pm.

Lesley Manville stars as a humble cleaner who decides that she simply must have a Dior couture dress, and heads to Paris to find one in director Anthony Fabian’s Oscar-winning period comedy drama.

Ada Harris (Manville) cleans houses for the great and the good… aka the rich… including Giles Newcombe (Christian McKay) and his polished knobs and Lady Dant (Anna Chancellor) and her wonderful wardrobe. It’s at Lady Dant’s house that Ada sees something quite exquisite – a £500 Dior dress. And she simply must have ‘one them frocks’, she tells her friend Violet (Ellen Thomas).

After a bit of scrimping and saving and a windfall from a war-widow’s pension, she travels to Paris to realise her dream. In The City of Light, she encounters a snooty Dior manager (Isabelle Huppert), who takes an instant dislike to our hero. But then the Marquis de Chassange (Lambert Wilson) invites Ada to a showing of the latest collection. Suddenly she’s hobnobbing with the likes of Dior accountant André (Lucas Bravo) and renowned model Natasha (Alba Baptista).

Perhaps it’s not just a dress that Ada will end up with… Based on the novel Flowers for Mrs Harris by Paul Gallico. For her work on the film, Jenny Beavan won the Oscar for Best Achievement in Costume Design.