You know that autumn is approaching when you start seeing more horses and aristocrats on your television. Like browning leaves and the need to switch on the central heating, seeing big-name talent in dinner jackets is a sign that summer’s over – it’s time to sit inside with a bowl of soup and watch people do some acting.
With the Olympics a sweaty memory, the BBC wheels out the gold medal acting talent to squeeze Ford Madox Ford’s mountainous Parade’s End tetralogy into five digestible episodes. Written by Sir Tom Stoppard and featuring talent including Benedict Cumberbatch, Rebecca Hall, and Anne-Marie Duff, it’s a production that’s so Merchant Ivory in its execution, if it were any more lavishly made it would be on the side of a Ming Vase behind a velvet rope, rather than on your TV.
Placed centre stage in the sumptuous cinematography, Cumberbatch plays the plummy-voiced Christopher Tietjens, an Edwardian statistician so repressed he wouldn’t know a sexual innuendo if it dragged him to the top of Big Ben and tossed him off. He marries the flighty socialite Sylvia (Rebecca Hall), and though she soon has an affair, Tietjens vows to stick with her, because that’s what we Brits did back then. But along comes Suffragette Valentine Wannop (Adelaide Clemens), and Tietjens finds his dedication to monogamy faltering…
Lately you can’t read an article about Parade’s End without mention of a certain ITV period drama being invoked, but really it’s unfair to compare the two. Whereas Downton Abbey is a very good period soap, this is very good period drama, and so high-brow it’s touching the top follicles of a smartly lacquered hairdo. No ad breaks to pause and discuss ‘er Ladyship’s machinations here.
In fact, a moment’s distraction will likely leave you lost, as Parade’s End zips back and forth across its own timeline in almost Brownian motion. The first 15 minutes are bewildering enough to alienate the less dedicated, as past and present events flicker into each other without warning, mirroring the kaleidoscopic imagery of the show’s title sequence.
Stick with it though and you’ll be rewarded with some magnificent performances. Cumberbatch is as mesmerising as you’d expect, bringing a noble and at times maddeningly virtuous hero to life with a stiff upper lip and quivering breath. Rebecca Hall oozes sex appeal through every pore and pout as she treats her life like a series of dinner party anecdotes. Yet it’s Rufus Sewell who almost steals the show in a brief appearance as insane Reverend Duchemin, who has some rather, shall we say, ‘obtuse’ talking points at the breakfast table.
Like consommé or caviar, this is drama that will very much rely on personal taste. It won’t be for everyone but it’s not trying to be. It’s a drama you absolutely have to pay attention to and really invest time and concentration in (or have a finger on the Sky+ remote for). Not all will be willing to offer up the effort required to get the most out of it, but it’s no bad thing to have a drama that demands its viewer’s undivided attention. Even if that does mean you have to let your soup go cold for an hour.
Airs at 9pm on Friday 24th August 2012 on BBC Two.
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