How realistic is Call the Midwife”?

Virtually all of the issues tackled by the show have some real, serious, historical backing. Is it realistic? Well, for one thing, the streets, clothes, and people are - in general - far too clean. I remember London in the 1960s. And it was filthy. Every building was black from a couple centuries of coal smoke. You came back from a day shopping and museum visiting (in the West End, not Poplar) with your collar black with smut and dust. In fairness though, this is a shortcoming of just about every show set in pre-Clean Air Act London. I laughed at scenes in Foyle's War of spotless walking through a spotless, gleaming Westminster. The people also looked different. They mostly get the hairstyles right. But people were generally much thinner, and more malnourished looking. Pale and pasty too. No sunbeams or cheap package holidays in Spain. They do a fairly good job handling race relations. Britain never had the sort a vicious, violent racism that plagued the American South. But most people, even kind, decent folks would have been a little bit wary encountering their first South Asian or Black people. Not that Call The Midwife sugar-coats race relations. But it wasn't quite so saccharine-sweet as it's sometimes portrayed. Children too weren't the little angels they are typically portrayed as. There were some nasty little villains amongst my schoolmates. Boys who'd think nothing of tossing a brick through a window, or little girls who'd happily shoplift a pack of Smarties or a magazine if they thought the shop clerk wasn't looking. Again: Those are criticisms you could level at many modern day television or film productions.