Churchill's Secret

'Elderly man isn't all that well' isn't really a revelation, but when the man in question is Prime Minister Winston Churchill (Michael Gambon), symbol of British Bull-doggedness in WWII, the news is not to be bandied about.  Loyal members of his cabinet want the PM's stroke kept under wraps, lest there's an unseemly scramble for power in the absence of both Churchill and likely successor Anthony Eden (Alex Jennings), who was having gall bladder surgery abroad.  Mrs. Churchill, the redoubtable-in-her-own-right Clementine (Lindsay Duncan), wants Winston away from the temptations of Westminster and brings him back home to the Kent countryside home of Chartwell.  To nurse him, they contract Nurse Millie Appleyard (Romola Garai) but their peace is short-lived when the in-fighting Tories - plus ca change! - and the equally quarrelsome younger Churchills flock to Winston's bedside.

One of those 'rather nice' dramas that will go down well in America, this is a bit of a curio.  The storyline runs in a similar way to 'The Madness of George III': statesman brought low, struggles of his family and the succession, slow recovery, lessons learned etc.  It's beautifully filmed, some of it at Chartwell itself, now a National Trust gem, and is directed solidly by Charles Sturridge.  Overall though, it's rather a byway in the great man's life, and not that one that really altered the course of his remaining decade or so.  The addition of a fictional character to nurse him, who of-course happens to be from a Labour family, seems an unnecessary addition to proceedings, and merely a cypher in whom Clemmie can confide about the grief of losing her young daughter Marigold some thirty years earlier.  Things only really spring to life when the children arrive and, facing their father's death, are candid about the drawbacks of growing up with parents who were almost always otherwise engaged.

The Honourable Woman

We weren't all that crazy about Blick's previous dramatic outing in 2011, 'The Shadow Line'.  It was one of those intriguing but flawed pieces we wanted to like but....  'The Honourable Woman' has been trumpeted as this year's serious BAFTA contender with a stellar cast including Hollywood's Maggie Gyllenhaal and a storyline encompassing the unending conflict in the middle-east.

So far, this is a huge improvement on its predecessor, which was willfully opaque and overblown.  Not that this is the kind of drama you can snooze through, by any means, and nor does it deal with smaller themes.  Ms. Gyllenhaal plays Nessa Stein, who with her brother Ephraim (Andrew Buchan) directs the legacy of her rich Israeli father, who was killed in front of them when they were children, 29 years previously.  Nessa makes an enemy of a friend when she awards a communications contract for Palestine to a Palestinian.  Unknown to her, the recipient is already dead, having been murdered by killers who made it look like suicide.  Newly created a cross-party peer, Baroness Stein of Tilbury has secrets.  She tells us little more in her voice-over, but we're introduced at a steady pace to her bodyguard, her PA, her brother's family and a Foreign Office operative who knows her secret (Eve Best, from 'Shadow Line').  Another hangover from the other series is slightly rumpled, slightly sinister Stephen Rea as an about-to-be-retired spy who is drawn into the suspicious death, and who will no doubt have to call on his embittered ex (Lindsay Duncan) in the process.  Then there's the Israeli woman who helps Ephraim with his family, and has a past with Nessa in the Gaza Strip.  Whatever happened 8 years ago is catching up to the Steins by the end of the hour, leading Nessa to a tense, nighttime run through Hyde Park with unforeseen consequences.

Part one of eight and we'll keep watching.  Maggie Gyllenhaal is wonderful as Nessa, with a flawless English accent and a performance of poise and gravitas as the self-possessed, super-rich but damaged businesswoman.  A sense of doom hangs around her, evidenced by protests that dog her even to a musical evening and a hounding by a radio presenter.  There's also the poignant music, which is currently balancing between adding atmosphere and instructing the audience that hey, this is tragic stuff, but is in danger of veering towards the latter.  Whatever the secrets are, Blick will no doubt unfold them in unexpected, cleverly-measured ways, and with the superb cast and the script thankfully understated, we're hoping this will be the rich experience it promises to be.

White Heat

TV producers, and presumably viewers, have a longstanding preoccupation with the love lives of groups of friends, a la 'Cold Feet' and 'This Life'.  Seemingly we love to see people form deep friendships and betray each other.  'White Heat' takes this format and adds a 'Big Chill' opening (the death of one of the group) and a big dose of social history straight from 'Our Friends in the North'.


First episodes are often awkward, bearing the burden of introducing everyone and generally setting the scene.  The scene looks prop-perfect and the performances are as good as anyone would expect from a classy cast, which provides a gloss over the unsubtleties.  It's an ok ride so far, but a slow one, with only marginally engaging characters.  The six flatmates are very PC for 1965: gender balance; the men a gay Asian, a Caribbean, and a Northener; the women an arty blonde, a brainy brunette and a poor overweight Catholic.  There are three initial attractions pointing to pairings that will of-course rearrange over time.  And just in case you forget which time they're all in, there's plenty of television and radio reminding you of events, and a soundtrack almost as intrusive as that of 'Heartbeat'.  Nothing by The Who and no mention of an ailing Churchill, however, can detract from anachronisms like telling a girl to take out her aggression in the gym.  Boxing gym?  She'd be waiting a long time for a Fitness First.


Comparisons to 'Our Friends...' are inevitable, and not discouraged by the BBC, but this may prove to be a double-edged sword.

Black Mirror

If only Rory Kinnear were PM.  He has all the attributes, namely the ability to keep a straight face while saying ludicrous things.  Cameron manages too, but would he simulate sex with a pig on television if the Duchess of C were kidnapped and de-fingered?  It ought to be the acid test.

We declare an interest as Charlie Brooker fans, but his űber-spiky cynicism seems even more suited to satirical drama than to column inches.  Elegant may be a strange way to describe a story involving scoop-hungry journalists, a prurient public and an MP’s bestiality with a sow, but it was a simple premise, fitting neatly into its fifty-minute slot and brilliantly served by its cast.  We wouldn’t play poker with any of them.

Does the fact that it’s satire negate TWNH moments along the lines of mistaking a man’s finger for Suzannah’s?  Or the security forces finding no trace of her kidnapper, whose talent for art was questionable beside his flair for publicity and skill at staging a crime?  Maybe not, but if the absurd realities of modern Britain aren’t slapping you in the face already, this should shift some cogs into action.

There’s also the matter of the PM rising to the occasion when faced with a porcine rear end, but we live in an age of duck-house moats, retail riots and the Murdoch media, and we can believe anything.