Friday Five: More TV Shows

I was doing posts about ISO TV, but feel slightly fraudulent calling it that in Australia, where almost everything is back to normal operations - apart from theatre and festivals. So let's just go with TV shows; here are another five that I have been watching.

5 TV Shows Recently Watched:

1. Belgravia (ITV) It's not a patch on Sanditon, but it has some pretty bonnets, sly asides and wildly anachronistic character developments. The nineteenth-century drama focuses on illegitimate children, inherited wealth and social climbing as one would expect from Julian Fellowes, writer of Downton Abbey. The cast includes Tamsin Greig, Philip Glenister, Tara Fitzgerald, Paul Ritter, Harriet Walter, Saskia Revves and Tom Wilkinson, who are all marvellous, even if they barely get to flex their acting muscles.
2. Between Two Worlds (Seven Network) The monochromatic colour palette (almost everything is a shade of blue or grey) is matched only by the complete lack of inflection in the acting and dialogue. The premise should have been interesting - a man who has a heart transplant starts to imagine he has inherited characteristics of his donor - but the simultaneously tawdry production and deadpan delivery cannot raise a pulse. Models are all very well but their acting is more of the cardboard cutout variety.  Hermione Norris, what were you thinking?
3. Roadkill (BBC) Hugh Laurie seems to be cornering the market in nasty bastards. This political drama written by David Hare has a touch of Yes, Minister crossed with The New Statesman, but the comedy is replaced with cold hard pragmatism. Hugh Laurie plays Peter Laurence, a government minister on the rise until a past scandal threatens to bring him down. Helen McCrory and Saskia Reeves also star. The four-part thriller was filmed last year and, if COVID and finances permit, is perfectly poised for a second season. 



Julia Davis and Catherine Shepherd in Sally4Ever



4. Sally4Ever (Sky Atlantic/ HBO) Inevitably this will be compared with Fleabag because it is written by a woman  (Julia Davis) and features 'normal' women (Catherine Shepherd; Julia Davis) dealing with life and having sex. I long for the days when this isn't such a unique premise and the gender balance is more equal in terms of writers and actors getting decent work. In the meantime, this is a good benchmark. The seven thirty-minute episodes cause the viewer cringing discomfort and cathartic guffaws of laughter. It's black comedy at its best. 
5. The Good Fight, Season Four (CBS All Access) It begins with Diane (Christine Baranski) in an alternate reality where Hilary won, the #MeToo movement has never happened and Harvey Weinstein is still a good guy. After she wakes up it continues with military whistleblowers and an investigation into the death of Jeffrey Epstein. It's well-written and topical, with characters we grow to love (Cush Jumbo as Lucca Quinn; Sarah Steele as Marissa Gold; Nyambi Nyambi as Jay DiPersia; Michael Boatman as Julius Cain) and it combines stand-alone stories with a continuous thread. It's like a cross between Boston Legal and The West Wing, and I enjoy the glitzy American courtroom drama with powerful women not just doing the filing and answering the phone. Only seven of the scheduled ten episodes were fully completed before production was halted due to the COIVD-19 pandemic, and it feels unfinished with a tantalising mystery still in the air and Lucca has left the series. I feel a bit bereft. 

More of this sort of thing: Cush Jumbo, Christine Baranski and Audra McDonald in The Good Fight

Friday Five: Local TV

Moving to another country is weird in all sorts of ways. Even (or perhaps especially) if you're in a place that speaks that same language and is similar in many ways, you can still get thrown by everyday events, such as 'what's on TV'. Australia appears to be three years behind New Zealand in Coronation Street and, as New Zealand is already at least eighteen months behind Britain, it can all get a bit confusing. Charlie Stubbs popped up the other day, large as life (and twice as ugly)! The second series of Downton Abbey (which I saw in NZ last year) has just begun.

We have got repeats of Doctor Who from the Rose days through the Martha Jones/ Torchwood debacle and the Donna Noble days. I love David Tennant and I really enjoy the Doctor Who Confidential, which strangely manages to add to the magic as it demystifies the secrets. We're also getting old runs of Remarkable Vets, which make me feel nostalgic for the many times Chester visited and was so well looked after. Plus a couple of friends works there, and it's amusing to watch one try and dodge the camera, while another seeks to hog the limelight.

5 TV Programmes I'm Watching:

1. Silk/ Harry's Law - It may not be fair to put them together, but they are both excellent examples of legal dramas in their own way and representative of their county. Silk is intelligent, well-written, and well-directed, highlighting persoanl, political, and legal concerns. It features great acting from Maxine Peake (Veronica from Shameless and Twinkle from Dinner Ladies), Rupert Penry-Jones (Adam from Spooks) and Neil Stuke (Paul from Grafters) and seems real. As a compariosn, Harry's Law is yet another legal drama by David E Kelly, this time starring the inimitable Kathy Bates with good support work from Nathan Coddry and Mark Valley. It's a lot neater and slicker with jump cuts and obvious musical overlays, and you don't have to think much to follow it, but it's fluffy emotional legal drama and I like it.
2. Episodes - Relationships, writers, actors, relationships between actors and writers, anglo-American co-operation and miscommunication - it's all there, and it's funny. And Matt LeBlanc is the perfect foil to Stephen Mangan and Tamsin Greig (both from Green Wing among countless other things).
3. Tricky Business - worth watching for Antony Starr and the scenery (Wollongong), it's billed as 'an Aussie family drama' about a debt collection company. As it's pretty good, and involves real actors, it will probably be axed in favour of yet another reality cooking/singing/home rennovation/ dancing programme.
4. Once Upon a Time - Everyone is actually a fairy tale character in a parallel universe, and the evil queen prevents them from knowing the truth. It's as fun to imagine which character you might be (I think I'm the gingerbread house witch) as it is to watch Robert Carlyle play Rumplestiltskin.
5. Death in Paradise - Ben Miller is a stiff-upper-lipped policeman trying to battle island crime while sweating in a suit in the French Caribbean - kind of like Bergerac with better weather, or a cross between Wild at Heart and Doc Martin. An excellent excuse to film somewhere exotic, and fill the screen with sun-drenched clichés.