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Secrets, yes... but nothing like the drama of Holly and Phil

Deborah Ross

Maryland was first conceived by Suranne Jones in a dream. ‘I wrote it down, this mad little dream,’ she has said. ‘I still have the bit of paper and it just says: “double life, house, sisters”.’ Generally, I’m of the view that what happens in a dream should stay in a dream as it’s not that interesting to other people, and there was nothing here that changed my mind.

Despite some sublime acting talent (Jones, and also Eve Best) it wasn’t particularly convincing and often dragged, while I kept waiting for the big twist that never came.

Possibly that’s not it, it’s me, what with my head being all over the place lately. All this worrying about Holly and Phil, it takes its toll, don’t you find?

This is written by AnneMarie O’Connor and directed by Sue Tully, who played ’Chelle in EastEnders but has since made a name for herself behind the camera.

It’s set on the Isle of Man, because if it’s not by the sea no TV drama wants to know (I blame Broadchurch) – but was filmed in Ireland, which is a bit odd, as there is no reason it would have to be the Isle of Man.

Anyway, it opens with a dead woman being discovered on the beach there. Her daughters, Becca (Jones) and Ros (Best), are informed by the police that it’s their mother, Mary, and they’re baffled. What had their mother been doing there? Wasn’t she meant to be in a caravan in Wales with her friend Maushe’d reen? Doesn’t she live in Manchester with their father (George Costigan)? What has Phil done to Holly that’s so bad? Oops. Sorry. There’s that worry creeping in again.

Becca, who has a husband (Andrew Knott) and two teenage daughters, still lives in Manchester, while Ros is a career woman who has decamped to London and wears power blouses. She doesn’t have children because, in TV drama, whether set by the sea or not, that’s the price you pay for having a career. (Women, you can’t have both: so, power blouses or kids?)

Ros and Becca fly to the Isle of Man to repatriate their mother’s body and quickly discover that she’d been leading a double life. She had a dishy fella (Hugh Quarshie), an American friend (played by Stockard Channing, which is a coup, but it did feel as if been airlifted in from another drama entirely) and a large, detached house filled with photos of Ros and Becca as well as people they don’t know. She even had a cat.

From the off I had a wager with myself that a character would say at some point: ‘You never really know someone else.’ I bet £20 and won it. I haven’t decided what to spend it on yet.

It’s a family drama rather than a thriller, and over the three nights we learned why the two sisters had kept their distance. Plus, it goes without saying, secrets were unearthed.

It should have been more interesting than it was, possibly because it was hard to buy. The sisters’ lack of curiosity, that was hard to buy. They discover their heritage is not what they’d thought but have no curiosity about that. They discover their mother ran a writers’ group and loved music and books, which isn’t how they knew her at all, but they have no questions about any of that either.

I also wondered how a certain person

obtained a certain drug but daren’t say more. (Spoilers!) Plus, I was also confused as to their father’s role in any of this. Was he meant to be the villain of the piece?

But, in more cheerful news, Ros meets a lovely fella who is good at sex and wild swimming and looks hot in a fisherman’s jumper. She was last seen not wearing a power blouse, so perhaps she’s been cured of all that.

Once Upon A Time in Northern Ireland is a documentary made by James Bluemel, who also made Once Upon A Time In Iraq, and this is also superb.

I’ve only watched one episode (of five) but already I understand The Troubles better than I ever have. There is archive material – oh God, Ian Paisley in his pomp – but it’s mostly told via first-hand recollections which, arranged chronologically, clearly show how injustice and discrimination, if not addressed, curdle into a murderous hatred. (‘It crept in and crept in and then the monster was on our doorstep…’)

Bluemel keeps his camera on people’s faces even after they’ve finished talking so we can register their emotions. It’s a small thing, this lingering, but powerful and humanising.

We understood the interviewees’ arcs, even how someone might join the IRA. (‘We thought we were the French Resistance under the Nazis…’).

People recounted but also reflected: ‘You look back and you think: Was I ever that person? Clearly, I was that person.’

Some of the old footage was distressing – screams of grief, bloodied bodies, houses on fire, the police beating protesters with batons – while other moments were shocking, such as the studio discussion hosted by David Frost where the protestant audience said that ‘Bloody Sunday’ was known as ‘Good Sunday’ in their minds and ‘they didn’t shoot enough (people)’.

It was rivetingly fascinating although not quite as fascinating as what’s gone down between Holly and Phil. Obviously.

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2023-05-28T07:00:00.0000000Z

2023-05-28T07:00:00.0000000Z

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