I didn't really have any interest in this project when I heard it was coming, but then I heard about the cast. For me, Andrew (and I won't refer to him by any title, considering the fact that he keeps trying to weasel back into royal duties he was supposed to be removed from) is someone who was, at the very least, guilty of something that made him pay out a considerable sum of money to settle a sexual abuse lawsuit with Virginia Giuffre, the young woman pictured alongside him in the photograph that would prove to be the major contributing factor to the fall from grace that he keeps trying to return from. I couldn't even watch the full interview, the clips I saw were just too cringe-inducing for me. But seeing how it all played out in a drama featuring performances from Gillian Anderson, Rufus Sewell, Billie Piper, and Keeley Hawes? Yeah, I became convinced that I might actually enjoy watching this.
And I did. There's not much to say in terms of a plot description here. This is based on the book by Samantha McAlister (played onscreen by Piper), the woman who arranged a number of great interviews for the BBC, and it shows how things all came together in time to provide us with one of the most incredible interviews of the last few decades. Sewell plays Andrew, Anderson is well-known BBC presenter Emily Maitlis, and Hawes plays Amanda Thirsk, an adviser to Andrew who ends up being convinced that a frank and full interview might just be the thing to end all of the speculation and rumours about him.
There's only so much you can do with this to make it engrossing entertainment, considering most people will watch this with the knowledge of what was shown on TV. Although there's fun to be had from seeing Andrew being given enough rope with which to hang himself, all without breaking a sweat, it's arguably more interesting to see the tension and dynamics behind the scenes of the BBC, with equal attempts made to deliver relevant news content while simultaneously keeping an eye of the guests and conversation pieces that help to maintain decent viewing figures. The arguments that Sam McAlister has with her colleagues are reflections of how many members of the public have viewed the BBC in recent years (especially when they have so many guest appearances from the likes of Nigel Farage, for example, or try to spin old news into something a bit fresher), and her pivotal role allows viewers to feel like they are being guided around the environment by someone who recognises the flaws of the place, but still believes in how much good can be done there.
Written by Peter Moffat and Geoff Bussetil, and directed by Philip Martin, everyone here has the mix of experience that you'd expect, with nobody standing out for being awful or great. They are all competent and dependable pairs of hands, in my view, and they have excellent source material to work with (and, yes, I immediately bought McAlister's book, "Scoops", after seeing this). They also do themselves a massive favour by casting the leads pretty perfectly.
Although they have arguably the hardest jobs to do onscreen, both Anderson and Sewell are excellent in their roles, both capturing mannerisms and an essence of the famous people that they're portraying. Sewell is helped by a great make up team, while Anderson is helped equally by the fact that she's Gillian Anderson, although the make up team and costume designers also give her some assistance. Piper is equally good, in a different way. She shows the tenacity and daring that it took to get, and hold, the exclusive interview opportunity, as well as how hard she had to keep fighting to stay involved with the whole process. As for Hawes, it's odd to see her character become more and more sympathetic as she struggles to handle a situation that shouldn't really be within her job description. I wouldn't ever say that the real Amanda Thirsk wanted to help Andrew self-destruct on TV, but there's some hint of relief mixed in with the astonishment of what she ends up seeing and hearing during the interview. Maybe just a thankfulness that, one way or another, a certain chapter is over, even if it leads to a whole new mess for others to swarm in and deal with.
I won't rush to rewatch this, and I still can't bring myself to watch the original Newsnight interview (which the BBC have cannily started promoting again on their BBC iPlayer platform), but it's a well-crafted piece of work, acted perfectly by a bunch of people I tend to really enjoy watching onscreen. It's not going to rock your world, but it's a solid bit of entertainment that serves as a timely reminder of why Andrew should remain away from any public duties, and why he should have been completely cut off from the rest of the royal family by now. Maybe if he'd done something truly terrible, like fall in love with someone who wasn't 100% white (please note the sarcasm), then he would have been more strongly punished.
7/10
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