This was perhaps the best BBC drama I have watched in a very long time. Matthew Macfadyen was brilliant, capturing the character of an outsider who desperately wants to belong to a family he's never really been a part of. The best scenes are those where we see his profound embarrassment at the conduct of his father and those where we see him interacting with the seemingly perfect members of the family in who's circle he attempts to install himself. One winces when he, raised in a relatively middle class environment, but part of an upper class extended family gives away those roots in the manner of many middle class people who yearn to be part of the other set especially when he becomes aware of what he has just said or done after the fact.It brings to life, in a very subtle fashion, the continuing dark side of the Britsih class system.
Matthew has managed, in his shy gestures and boyish smile to bring to life a character on the fringes who just wants to fit in and fix everything, but who's task ends up destroying the relationships he so wanted to maintain.
Matthew has managed, in his shy gestures and boyish smile to bring to life a character on the fringes who just wants to fit in and fix everything, but who's task ends up destroying the relationships he so wanted to maintain.