Acorn Antiques is a soap opera parody created by British comedian Victoria Wood. It appeared as a recurring sketch in the two series of Victoria Wood: As Seen on TV, broadcast from 1985 to 1987. Wood later developed the concept into a stage musical, which premiered in 2005.

Wood originally wrote Acorn Antiques as a recurring segment in her sketch series Victoria Wood: As Seen on TV. The format was inspired by the British soap operas Crossroads and Waggoners’ Walk.

The series focused on the daily lives of the staff of an antiques shop in the fictional English town of Manchesterford, parodying the melodramatic plots and stylistic conventions typical of British soap operas, such as love triangles, amnesia, unexpected deaths, and long-lost relatives.

The dialogue was intentionally mundane and poorly written, often including overt references to ongoing storylines. The production satirised the technical and narrative limitations of low-budget serial dramas through its simple studio sets, visible production errors, rudimentary camera work, and abrupt plot inconsistencies. Storylines were frequently introduced and dropped without resolution. One episode, for instance, revolved around the shop’s conversion into a "leisure centre and sunbed centre" which was never referred to again. This plotline echoed similar developments in Crossroads during the 1980s, when a leisure centre was introduced into its setting.

The title sequences and music of Acorn Antiques also directly parodied Crossroads. In the first series, Acorn Antiques replicated the long-standing Crossroads opening, in which the programme began directly within the first scene, showing the actors in silence until the theme music ended. The second series imitated the later Crossroads format, which featured a dedicated opening credit sequence with a revised theme tune and a title card revealed as vertical blinds closed. In the Acorn Antiques version, the blinds malfunctioned, requiring a visible stagehand to push them manually. The closing credits deliberately misspelled the creator’s name as "Victoria Woods".

A recurring comic device was the inclusion of missed cues, reminiscent of early soap opera broadcasts. Off-screen voices of fictional production staff could often be heard prompting hesitant actors, and scenes sometimes ended with performers left uncertain of how to react as the camera continued recording. Other elements of television production were also parodied, including mock continuity announcements promoting travelling exhibitions of costumes, tie-in novelisations, and a fictional single of the programme's theme tune, Anyone Can Break a Vase, performed by Miss Babs. The latter referenced EastEnders actor Anita Dobson’s 1986 single Anyone Can Fall in Love, a vocal adaptation of the EastEnders theme tune.

Wood also produced a mockumentary for a Victoria Wood: As Seen on TV special imitating behind-the-scenes programmes about soap operas. The segment depicted a chaotic production environment and featured interviews with the fictional actors behind the Acorn Antiques characters. In one scene, the producer Marion Clune (played by Maggie Steed) dismisses a continuity error by remarking, "We professionals notice – Joe Public never clocks a damn thing". The documentary also portrayed the actress playing Mrs Overall as a demanding soap star named Bo Beaumont.

In the final episode of Victoria Wood: As Seen on TV, a sketch depicted the supposed dismissal of Mrs Overall and Mr Clifford from the soap, with Bo Beaumont parodying Noele Gordon’s real-life dismissal from Crossroads.