Article: What the Dickens is Scully doing in Bleak House with that girl from EastEnders? ... and everything else you need to know about the classic novel TV has transformed into a soap.

Byline: DAVID THOMAS

LAST NIGHT saw the first episode of the biggest, most radical costume drama in the history of the BBC. Bleak House, the Charles Dickens epic, will not be shown in the standard two-hour-long episodes, tucked away on BBC2.

Instead, it has been turned into a crinoline-clad soap opera in a further 14 gripping 30-minute episodes - shown twice a week from tonight. Each is guaranteed to end on a cliffhanger. Bleak House will be the most talked-about literary adaptation in years - and we can all join in, with the help of DAVID THOMAS'S ultimate Bluffers'Guide To Bleak House...

THE PLOT

LET'S start with our heroine, Esther ...

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