From
what I can tell, Titmuss Regained is
PC’s first foray into playing unscrupulous politicos. He’s played powerful, less-than-moral men
in sitcoms (The Thick of It,
obviously,) sci-fi (Torchwood,) and
historicals (can’t forget old King Charles I in The Devil’s Whore!), but this, it seems, is where he cut his teeth.
This
miniseries is evidently a sequel to an earlier story that I’ve not seen. Both revolve around Leslie Titmuss, a country
man from the “by your own bootstraps” school of political advancement. Episode 1 sees him championing development in
rural areas, but he runs into trouble when his childhood village winds up in
the path of the bulldozer. While he
knows that, in light of his usual M.O., it’d be hypocritical to go against the
proposal, he has an awful lot of hometown constituents preparing to make a
fuss.
PC
plays Ken Cracken, a junior minister in Titmuss’s department. His introductory character moment involves
yelling at the man who catches him and his secretary in flagrante, if that
gives you any idea what he’s like.
Cracken is aggressively ambitious, he’s snobbish, and he seems to enjoy
messing with people “just cuz.”
Translation? Probably not someone
you’d bring home to meet the folks.
PC’s
performance is a lot of fun. This role
came early enough in his career that his acting is still a little unpolished,
but Cracken is full of the unique energy that PC brings to his work. He’s a sleazy, two-faced politician, but in a
really entertaining way. Also, his disregard
for the environment (and thus, his love of urban development) is ridiculous. He takes a palpable glee in it; you’d think
he was a villain from The Lorax.
I have
to say, Shameless was one of the
first British series I watched, and I saw all 11 seasons, but I didn’t even recognize David Threlfall as
Titmuss. I saw on the Netflix envelope
that he was in it, but I had to check IMDb to figure it out. Not even a hint of Shameless’s Frank Gallagher, and bizarrely, he looks/seems older in
this, even though Shameless started a
decade later.
Accent Watch
A
really nice RP, crisp and plummy.
Recommend?
In
General
– Not necessarily. Good performances,
and the premise is interesting enough, but it’s awfully slow-moving. Hasn’t hooked me yet.
PC-wise – Quite
possibly. Like I said, Cracken is a
broad but entertaining baddie.
Warnings
Sexual
content and some light swearing.
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