TV Review: TOMMY COOPER: NOT LIKE THAT, LIKE THIS

This article was originally published in The Courier on Saturday 26th August 2014.

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Tommy Cooper: Not Like That, Like This: Monday, STV

Paul Whitelaw

In the unlikely event that I should ever appear on Mastermind, I suspect my specialist subject would be 'TV Biopics About Dead Comedians'. That's hardly the most impressive claim, but you work with what you have.

BBC Four has famously mined this seam for all it's worth in the last few years, more often than not with dubious results. For every incisive drama about the likes of Kenny Everett and Kenneth Williams – famous, funny Kens have been served well - they've produced half a dozen hackneyed biopics seemingly hell-bent on reducing the subject in question to the laziest set of tears-of-a-clown clichés. I've seen 'em all, and admired very few.

So I wasn't expecting much from Tommy Cooper: Not Like That, Like This. He may be one of our most beloved comics, but the grisly details of his personal life – alcoholism, infidelity, domestic violence – suggested that this would be just another tawdry wallow in showbiz misery. How wrong I was. What I hadn't banked on – and this was foolish in retrospect – was that this prestigious production was written by Simon Nye, a seasoned comedy writer whose respect for the Gods of his craft couldn't be more obvious.

Unlike most dramas of its kind, this one actually went out of its way to remind us that the tragic Pagliacci in question was a very funny person. The re-staging of classic comedy routines almost always fall painfully flat in biopics, but in the careful hands of Nye and David Threfall – who delivered an uncanny performance as Cooper, rubbery latex face and all – they really came alive. It was an affectionate tribute to the craft and toil of mirth-making itself; very few dramas in my experience have explored the idea of comedy as a serious business with such scrutiny and understanding.

Cooper came across as an artist who knew exactly what he was doing at all times. Like all performers, he could be anxious, self-involved and demanding. But you have to admire the amount of effort he devoted to looking like an inept, befuddled fool on stage. The irony, of course, is that in private he was a mess. 

All of the care and attention he lavished on his studiously ramshackle act was absent from his dealings with the women in his life. But Nye and Threfall, both of whom have clearly studied Cooper in some detail, understood that behind his maddening frailties, this was ultimately a lovable man. He was obsessed with comedy, but ill-suited to reality.

The way he treated his wife and mistress – both portrayed with dignity by, respectively, Amanda Redman and Helen McCrory – was unforgivable. Without going into graphic detail, Nye didn't shy away from the fact that Cooper could be physically abusive when drunk. But he never came across as a monster. Rather, he was a lost and rather hopeless alcoholic who craved adoration on his own unreasonable terms. 

I didn't think any less of Cooper after watching this sensitive, witty, nuanced drama. On the contrary, I came away from it with a renewed respect for his genius, and a sort of weary, hesitant sympathy for him as a tortured human being.

Everyone involved should be applauded for creating that rare beast: an angst-ridden biopic about a comedian that succeeded in celebrating his art while seeking to understand his personal demons. Without question, it was one of the best dramas of it's kind I've ever seen. 

TV Review: THE CRIMSON FIELD and THE TRIP TO ITALY

The Crimson Field: Sunday, BBC One

The Trip to Italy: Friday, BBC Two

Paul Whitelaw

If the Sunday evening gulf left by Call the Midwife is proving difficult, then The Crimson Field should help to ease the pain. Similarly mired in suffering, it's a death-infested medical drama set in an army field hospital during World War One. While I wouldn't go so far as calling these shows subversive, it's somewhat pleasing that BBC One's traditionally cosy period drama slot is now the reserve of determinedly miserable bedpan horror stories.

Our plucky heroines are a trio of mismatched voluntary nurses. They're a carefully selected study in contrasts: one plays by the rules, the other is a brusquely perceptive rebel, and the third is a golly gosh posh girl who's frightfully eager to please.

As played by Oona Chaplin, the taciturn maverick is the only truly interesting character. Immediately at odds with the stereotypically stern matron, she's a novel protagonist – certainly for dramas of this nature – in that's she's not immediately sympathetic. 

“I didn't come here to make friends,” she snapped, like a prototypical reality TV star. Indeed, she didn't bond with anyone other than the possibly psychotic dying soldier who physically attacked her and demanded that she save his life. When she refused to beg for mercy, he crumbled in confusion. How convenient. There was an intriguing suggestion that she doesn't really care if she lives or dies, which given her circumstances is probably an ideal state of mind.

As with most Great War dramas, The Crimson Field makes a blunt point about the mercenary madness of governing officers. We were treated to a visit from a straight-faced General Melchett type who was practically frothing at the mouth at the prospect of getting wounded men back in the firing line.

“If they can walk and shoot then back up they go,” he barked, his medals for cruelty glistening by gaslight. Not content with sending a clearly traumatised young man to war, he then accused the patients of faking venereal disease. Thank heavens, then, for the kindly hospital chief played by Kevin Doyle, otherwise known as that nice Mr Molesley from Downton Abbey. He's like a beacon of decency in a quagmire of carnage.

The late arrival of Suranne Jones as a strikingly modern Sister – she has a bob and rides a motorbike – suggested an impending storm of friction, and there's obviously something afoot with the quietly bitter Sister whose position she's usurped.

Written by former EastEnders scribe Sarah Phelps, it's a slick and assured drama. While it was hardly free of cliché, episode one was more or less a textbook example of how to establish an ongoing drama. And hats off to Phelps for including a plot strand about graphically depicted dismembered toes and the incineration of amputated limbs. It was admirable in that it would be insulting to shy away from the visceral realities of World War One. I'm sure we've got a lot more discomfort to come.

One of the most purely pleasurable shows I've seen in quite some time, The Trip to Italy reunites Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon as barely fictionalised versions of themselves on a culinary road trip through gorgeous scenery. Mostly free from the animosity that characterised series one, their enjoyment of each other's company is contagious. Spending half an hour with them each week is a grin-inducing treat.

TV Review: NEW WORLDS and ALEXANDER ARMSTRONG'S REAL RIPPING YARNS

This article was originally published in The Courier on 5th April 2014.

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New Worlds: Tuesday, Channel 4

Alexander Armstrong's Real Ripping Yarns: Thursday, BBC Four

Paul Whitelaw

Six years ago, Channel 4 aired a semi-fictionalised drama about the English Civil War called The Devil's Whore. Despite boasting a cast including Michael Fassbender, John Simm, Dominic West, Peter Capaldi and Andrea Riseborough, it was a distinctly average affair.

Perhaps it's the circle of one I move in, but I don't recall much clamour for a sequel. And yet here it is, in the guise of New Worlds, galloping over the horizon on a wave of public apathy. Television is often accused of being a doggedly predictable medium, but it doesn't half surprise and confound sometimes.

Set 20 years after the unmemorable events of The Devil's Whore, it flits between an unstable 17^th century England and settler-dominated Massachusetts. Writer Peter Flannery, best known for Our Friends in the North, seems to be groping towards a valid point about the hypocrisy of Britons railing against royal oppression at home while subjugating an entire race of people abroad. He's aided in this regard by shots of Native Americans being slaughtered in meaningful slow-motion. Subtle, it is not.

Back in rural Oxfordshire, former Cromwell acolyte Angela Fanshawe – now played by Eve Best, rather than Andrea Riseborough – presides over an idyllic retreat of twee, gown-clad maidens. This safe refuge for ethereal Timotei models was inevitably invaded by the bloodied chaos of the outside world. As in The Devil's Whore, Flannery revels in presenting a lurid, violent world rife with heavy symbolism.

Although speckled with ostensibly dramatic incident – Angela's daughter being kidnapped at gunpoint; James Cosmo falling to his death against an unconvincing CG backdrop – it suffers from the same problem as its forebear: it's hard to invest in these thinly drawn characters, as they feel more like pieces being moved around on a flame-engulfed chessboard. It's handsomely shot, but pretty pictures count for nothing when used to mask such turgid storytelling. New Worlds isn't so much a drama as a lavish historical pop-up book; a bewigged chore in search of meaning.

Accompanied by a welcome repeat run of Michael Palin and Terry Jones' post-Python classic, Alexander Armstrong's Real Ripping Yarns delved into the square-jawed world of Boy's Own adventures. Much like the series itself, it was mired in a sort of appalled affection for this archaic terrain of absurd Victorian values.

Armstrong, our genial guide, could barely disguise his admiration for an era when boys were trusted with dangerous poisons and explosives, although his excruciating dip into an ice-cold bath – once thought of as a catch-all cure for male ailments – left one in no doubt about the madness of the era's teachings.

Palin and a curiously marginalised Jones were on hand to discuss their love/hate relationship with the literature of their youth. Palin is often lazily categorised as a frightfully nice and placid chap, but it was clear that a spur of righteous anger underpinned his satirical recollections of a childhood spent in the public school system. It's hard to be truly fond of an epoch steeped in racism and bullying conformity.

Nevertheless, I had to marvel at the deranged metal contraptions used to stave off adolescent sexual urges; “self-pollution” was the wonderfully chaste description. And the letters pages of the day were a font of inadvertent comedy. Full of blunt editorial answers shorn from the context of the letters themselves, they were a master-class in straight-faced surrealism. No wonder Palin and Jones were taking notes. 

TV Review: MAMMON and INSPECTOR DE LUCA

This article was originally published in The Courier on 29th March 2014.

http://www.thecourier.co.uk/lifestyle

Mammon: Friday, More4

Inspector De Luca: Saturday, BBC Four

Paul Whitelaw

Home to cult hits such as The Killing and The Bridge, BBC Four is the crime-sodden kingdom of gloomy Nordic noir. So it's little wonder that their rivals have recently tried to grab some of that subtitled treasure for themselves. After all, these quality imports are relatively cheap to acquire, but very popular among discerning viewers. It's the sort of equation that TV executives drool over.

Channel 4 gambled wisely when they aired French supernatural drama The Returned, which turned out to be one of the TV highlights of 2013. Flushed with that success, they now give us Mammon, an intriguing Norwegian thriller about journalistic integrity versus corporate corruption.

Our hero is investigative journalist Peter Veras, who uncovers evidence of fraud involving Norway's elite. Unperturbed by the fact that one of the alleged fraudsters is his own brother – they hardly seemed close – he ploughed on with the story in spite of a police report claiming that no crimes had been committed.

But why did his brother resign? And if Peter really is such a hot-shot, why didn't he pick up on the screamingly obvious clues that brother dearest was about to commit suicide? He practically had “DEAD SOON” tattooed on his face. As the episode progressed, I began to suspect that, far from being a leading light of Norway's Fourth Estate, Peter Veras is in fact a blundering idiot.

He hadn't even verified the source of his story. No wonder he was so shaken when it turned out to be his own brother, who was presumably trying to bring down the system from within. That's possibly why he left behind a series of Treasure Hunt-style clues for Peter to chase, which resulted in him donning scuba diving gear and searching for something or other in a roadside lake.

The episode climaxed while he was out on this goose chase, when another millionaire embezzler crashed his car into the lake before shooting himself in the head. It was an unexpected turn of events, I'll grant you that, but it still felt like a ridiculously laboured attempt to create an explosive cliffhanger. That sort of nonsense is acceptable in a comic book thriller like 24, but Mammon appears to think of itself as more meaningful than that. Why else would it begin with a sombre quote from the Book of Revelation?

Its more wayward tendencies aside, this slow-burning and occasionally quite suspenseful drama does show some promise. With its weighty themes of guilt and morality – it's no coincidence that Peter's father is a priest – it may well add up to something quite substantial. I just hope Peter stops behaving like the Norwegian equivalent of a depressed Frank Spencer.

There was more high-powered corruption in BBC Four's latest foreign import, Inspector De Luca, only this time it involved the fascist regime of Benito Mussolini.

Set in 1930s Italy on the eve of World War II, it squanders a potentially interesting period setting with a lugubrious pace and anaemic plotting. It's like watching an armchair age in slow motion. De Luca himself is your standard lonely detective: driven yet subdued, a haunted man apart. I'd quite happily never see this archetype again.

It's enough to make you long for a cop drama about a jovial detective who lives in a bouncy castle. Obviously I wouldn't like that either, but at least it would be different.

TV Review: THE WIDOWER and W1A

This article was originally published in The Courier on 22nd March 2014.

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The Widower: Monday, STV

W1A: Wednesday, BBC Two

Paul Whitelaw

As anyone who's ever watched Take Me Out will attest, ITV is no stranger to the banality of evil. But nowhere is this theme better expressed than in the work of their undisputed king of true-life crime, Jeff Pope, whose list of credits include highly acclaimed dramas about the likes of Myra Hindley, Peter Sutcliffe and Fred West.

Whether as a writer or producer, the defining characteristic of Pope's work is its sensitivity. They may be torn from the headlines, but there is nothing sensational, exploitative or tabloid-esque about his dramas. Few of us would deny that we have a morbid fascination with killers and psychopaths, but Pope always manages to satisfy that impulse without being disrespectful to their victims.

And so it was with his latest effort, The Widower, in which Reece Shearsmith stars as convicted murderer Malcolm Webster. In 1993, this outwardly unremarkable man killed his first wife, Claire, for her life insurance. Having succeeded in passing it off as a tragic car accident – in reality he poisoned her – he then attempted to do the same to his second wife. He was eventually convicted for his crimes in 2011, 17 years after Claire's death.

How did he get away with it for so long? Pope and Shearsmith – a superb actor better known for his darkly comic roles in The League of Gentlemen and Inside No. 9 – did an effective job of illustrating Webster's plausible nature. Superficially charming and sympathetic, he duped his wives with ease. It's clear that these women weren't stupid or naïve. Rather, they were the helpless victims of an arch manipulator.

The scene in which Webster convincingly performed grief-stricken tears in the mirror, before switching them off in a flash, was particularly chilling. But it also contained a trace of black, queasy comedy, of the type that Shearsmith is known for. Both he and Pope realise that even the most appalling events can have an undercurrent of bleak humour. That such moments never came across as distasteful is testament to their careful handling of the material.

If Shearsmith's performance at times felt ever-so-slightly theatrical, I took that as a deliberate choice on the actor's part. Webster, after all, was a man who was constantly performing. A congenital liar and dangerous fantasist, his entire existence was founded on duplicity. Shearsmith's embodiment of this murderous Walter Mitty is never less than mesmerising.

A strange story skilfully told, The Widower exerts an uncomfortable pull.

A sequel to the affable sitcom Twenty Twelve, W1A deposits Ian Fletcher, the former Head of Olympic Deliverance, into the bowels of the BBC as their newly installed Head of Values.

Anyone expecting a savage media satire would've been disappointed. But that's not really writer/director John Morton's style. He's more interested in poking sly fun at corporate gibberish and incompetency. Fine, just as long as it's funny.

But therein lies the problem: the jokes are far too obvious. The concept of Britain's Tastiest Village may be an accurate parody of bland, populist BBC output, but it's a cheap and easy gag.

Plus Morton's signature writing style, that tortured stew of deliberately clumsy language, has finally worn out its welcome. It no longer surprises or amuses, and narrator David Tennant always sounds like he's winking knowingly at the audience.

It's frustrating, as the rest of the cast are impeccable. But they can't do much with such underwhelming material.

TV Review: INSANE FIGHT CLUB and EDL GIRLS: DON'T CALL ME RACIST

This article was originally published in The Courier on 15th March 2014.

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Insane Fight Club: Tuesday, BBC One

EDL Girls: Don't Call Me Racist: Monday, BBC Three

Paul Whitelaw

Where would documentary film crews be without little-known subcultures? Were it not for these eccentric cabals of people doing unusual things, their work would dry up overnight. So BBC Scotland must've been delighted when they stumbled across the blood-caked soldiers of Glasgow's Insane Championship Wrestling league.

As their bright, likeable, articulate leader Mark admitted in Insane Fight Club, wrestling is pantomime for adults. “It's a drama, a comedy, a soap opera. It's performance art,” he said, between busy bouts of promoting gigs and writing storylines. Yet despite the cheerful fakery, the physical pain and gallons of blood are excruciatingly real. ICW takes the standard theatrics of professional wrestling and adds a gruesomely violent twist. Fights tend to spill out of venues and into the streets. One clip depicted a wrestler being bounced off the side of a passing bus.

The programme followed this tight-knit group of friends in the months leading up to their biggest fight night so far. Their usual stomping ground was the Garage nightclub in Glasgow. But Mark had his eyes on a bigger prize. The nearby ABC holds twice the usual ICW crowd, and Mark was hoping for a sold-out event. Their goal of turning professional and making a decent living out of wrestling obviously meant a lot to them. A colourful tag-team of self-supporting underdogs, you couldn't help rooting for them.

It gradually became apparent that wrestling presented a form of escape from life's mundane status quo. For the likes of star wrestler Grado – an affable, gregarious, overweight fool – it's a way of transforming yourself into a beloved folk superhero. No wonder the camera focused on him. 

With his camp, skin-tight leotards and bellowed catchphrase - “IT'S YERSEL!!” - he was a magnet for comedy, both planned and unintentional. The scene in which he encountered baffled celebrity hairdresser Nicky Clarke was one of the oddest mismatches I've seen on TV in a long time.

But there was an unexpected layer of poignancy lurking beneath the programme's extrovert veneer. The gang's mutual respect and affection was palpable, as was Mark's heartfelt ambition. Having raised his autistic son in a disadvantaged area of Glasgow, he wanted to do everything he could to improve their lives.

At one point, with tears in his eyes, he recalled his son worrying about not fitting in with the other children at nursery. Mark pointed to his own life as a wrestling promoter, and told him that it's okay to be different. He and his friends were all oddballs, and that's something to be proud of. It was a surprisingly moving moment.

While the programme at times felt like an extended promotional video for Mark's burgeoning business, I can't begrudge the gang any success that comes their way. There's something quite heroic in their dogged insanity.

An altogether more dispiriting community of outcasts could be found in EDL Girls: Don't Call Me Racist, in which female members of the notorious far-right movement stated their case.

Confused, angry and naïve – I'm not sure the girl who photographed herself dressed as Hitler really knew who he was – they were typical racists in that they couldn't sensibly articulate their arguments beyond half-baked complaints about a perceived cultural enemy. Their efforts to “protect” England from some non-existent invasion are utterly pointless

TV Review: SILK and JONATHAN CREEK

This article was originally published in The Courier on 1st March 2014.

http://www.thecourier.co.uk/lifestyle

Silk: Monday, BBC One

Jonathan Creek: Friday, BBC One

Paul Whitelaw

The problem with idealistic QC Martha Costello is that she's far too human and empathetic for her own good. If only she could somehow dispense with her feelings and carry out her job with the ruthless efficiency of a programmed assassin. Until then, she's doomed to wrestle with ethical dilemmas on a weekly basis at 9pm on BBC One.

That, in a nutshell, is the recurring theme of Silk, the diverting legal drama that returned last week for a third series. As played by Maxine Peake and written by former barrister Peter Moffat, Martha is certainly one of the more convincing lawyers to grace our screens. Her ability to balls things up almost as often as she gets things right makes her infinitely more sympathetic and believable than your standard maverick courtroom hero. I'm no legal expert, but Moffat's work always carries a persuasive ring of authenticity.

Her latest case was typical in that it found her getting emotionally involved to the detriment of her professional acumen. While the problem of a professional getting TOO DAMN CLOSE to a case is a terrible genre cliché, Silk tends to handle it with relative aplomb.

“There's too much mothering and not enough lawyering,” frowned Clive, her Harrow/Oxford-educated paramour and colleague. You could hardly blame Martha for embracing her maternal instincts while defending the son of her own Head of Chambers. A vulnerable teenager with mental health issues, he'd accidentally killed a policeman while taking part in a protest march. What unfolded was a slickly executed rumination on police brutality, corruption and the compromised values of insular institutions.

Peake, who has a knack for delivering dramatic courtroom speeches without ever overselling them, was as solid and affecting as ever, while Neil Stuke, as morally ambiguous chief clerk Billy, handled his terminal cancer sub-plot with admirable restraint.

Although Silk is essentially a case-of-the-week courtroom drama – and therefore fairly forgettable in the grand scheme of things – it's realised with such skill that it rarely fails to engage. Plus this week's episode treated us to the sight of Peake dancing badly to Joy Division's Love Will Tear Us Apart. Beat that, Law & Order: UK.

Despite its layers of black comedy, whimsical mystery drama Jonathan Creek has always struck me as rather too cosy for comfort. I admire David Renwick as a writer, but I've never been taken with this particular creation. At its worst it's little more than Midsomer Murders with a self-aware sense of humour.

To give Renwick his due, the latest episode did feature an enjoyably sly dig at the success of Sherlock, an increasingly tricksy and self-regarding show that's usurped Jonathan Creek in the nation's affections. Creek, competently played as always by Alan Davies, was lumbered with an unwanted sidekick: a young, cocky David Tennant lookalike who constantly rattled off detailed yet entirely incorrect deductions a la Sherlock on a bad day. But it was Creek, of course, who solved the case.

Even so, Renwick's attempts to spice up the formula by showing us, a la Columbo, how the murder happened in the first act felt half-baked. The inherent pleasure of Columbo is in watching the faux-naive detective lure his quarry into a trap. But Creek has none of that character's endearing charm. He's just a dull middle-aged man solving crimes in his spare time.

While the episode hung together more coherently than some of the recent feature-length specials, tonally it didn't quite gel. The story of a mentally ill mother hanging herself after losing her baby and murdering an actress jarred rather harshly against the jokes about Piers Morgan and unsubtle Alien references. With the addition of a superfluous sub-plot involving Paula Wilcox and an urn of ashes, it all felt like something of a hodgepodge. 

I was more entertained by the notion that the moment where Creek was bitten by an angry theatre-goer was a cheeky nod to the real-life incident in which Davies bit a homeless man's ear. Do I deduce correctly?