The Vicar of Dibley

A new vicar shakes up the village

The Vicar of Dibley is a British sitcom created by Richard Curtis and written with Paul Mayhew-Archer, broadcast on BBC One. Prompted by the Church of England's 1994 decision to ordain women, it sends the warm, chocolate-loving and thoroughly modern Geraldine Granger, played by Dawn French, to the sleepy fictional Oxfordshire village of Dibley. There she does battle with a bemused and eccentric parish council, chaired by the pompous David Horton and populated by the likes of his gormless son Hugo, the hesitant Jim Trott and the star-struck verger Alice Tinker. Each episode traditionally closes with Geraldine telling Alice a joke she fails to understand. The series won two International Emmys and remains a much-loved staple of British comedy.