Romance, resentment and a family unravelled
Disaster looms when a widow is swept off her feet by a flashy doctor – to the horror of her children and her very nosy neighbour – in new TV thriller Flesh And Blood
As the name suggests, ITV’s intriguing new drama Flesh
And Blood is about a family, with all its complications. But there’s a twist to this saga. The four-part series starts with what appears to be a mysterious accident, a faceless person being taken into an ambulance and the police asking questions, but we don’t know who’s been injured, or how it came about.
‘Families can be unbearable, we all know that anyway,’ says Stephen Rea, who plays Mark, a retired GP who sweeps widow Vivien (Francesca Annis) off her feet, the catalyst for the events that will eventually lead to disaster. ‘My character is interesting because his arrival makes what appears to be a functional family unravel into one that’s completely dysfunctional. I have four sisters in real life, and my personal belief is that most families aren’t functional.’
Slowly the story starts to emerge. ‘It has the absolute classic opening scene to a thriller, something bad has happened to one of the characters but you don’t know who it is,’ says Francesca. ‘Then it cuts to this breezy, chatty family where everything seems so ordinary, but you wonder, “What is the story that leads to this end?” The script was a real page-turner – unexpected things kept coming up in the most ordinary situations.’
The backbone of the series – the relationships within the family – actually came before the mystery, according to series creator Sarah Williams, who also wrote 2018’s BBC slavery drama The Long Song and is one of six siblings herself. ‘Our brothers and sisters can be our closest allies or our sworn enemies, often in the space of a heartbeat,’ she says. ‘Our shared history means we know each other’s biggest dreams, deepest fears and darkest secrets, and consequently our siblings can push our buttons faster and harder than anyone else.’
The drama, set in two houses on a stunning but stark shingle beach, was filmed last summer near Eastbourne, where More caught up with the cast. The blue skies and scenic location lend a lightness to a tale that, although it has a smattering of humour, is laced with dark drama.
At the centre of the series is Vivien, who’s been a widow for just 18 months when she meets Mark on a dating website for the bereaved. A giddy romance ensues, just the tonic Vivien needs after caring for her sick husband, and within weeks Mark is buying her expensive presents. Then he pops the question.
It’s a rare foray into television for acclaimed stage actress Francesca, still strikingly beautiful at 74, who says she loved the idea of a widow becoming romantically involved. ‘She’s obviously had this great sadness in her life, but now she’s looking ahead. She’s the innocent in this scenario. She’s just having a lovely time with this new person. You don’t find that many people attractive as you get older, but then suddenly Mark comes along and she thinks, “Wow!”
‘I’ve never done online dating or anything like that, but it certainly seems to be something many people do now and many do it successfully. Vivien thinks it’s terrific, while her children are horrified.’
Vivien’s three children are, indeed, disgusted by the relationship, especially her son Jake who’s ‘the epitome of toxic masculinity’, according to Years And Years star Russell Tovey who plays him. ‘Jake is a man-child whose own family has broken up because of his gambling habit. He’s now permanently broke and angry, and desperate to return to his wife and two children. He’s hardly in a fit state to look after his mother, but he’s resentful that another man has now entered the arena.
‘He’s never wanted to imagine his mum as being anything other than his mum. He isn’t ready for her to move on because he idolised his dad. But then this other man comes in and he’s just got that bit more. He’s a doctor, he’s sorted, he’s flashy, he’s got money, he takes Vivien on holidays. It’s quite emasculating for Jake and he also feels it’s a betrayal of his father’s memory.’
Only slightly less resentful is big sister Helen (Claudie Blakley), who’s dealing with her own problems. Recently appointed CEO in the health service, her job involves having to sack lots of people, while at home her househusband is feeling abandoned and her children are misbehaving. And then there’s little sister Natalie (Lydia Leonard), whose dreams of making it as an actress have come to nothing. She’s now a personal assistant to a property developer, who’s married with THEY LOVE EACH OTHER BUT IT FEELS LIKE THEY JUST TOLERATE EACH OTHER children, and she’s having an affair with him.
‘There’s a lot of bickering between them,’ says Russell. ‘They love each other, but it also feels like they just tolerate each other. They don’t really know what’s going on in one another’s lives. Jake’s going through hell, his sister’s having an affair while his other sister is neglecting her family – and they don’t talk about it.
‘But like all families they’re good at having that spikey little dig at each other. They all have that very recognisable thing of being quite immature, especially when they’re at home with their mother. When Jake meets Mark, he has no interest in discovering what he’s like as a person. There’s just instant distrust, dislike and rivalry.
‘He’s annoyed this other bloke’s got her attention, and the idea his mother is being a sexual person again has made him recoil. So he’s very, very wary and his sisters whip themselves up into a kind of frenzy. Most of my mates have parents who are divorced, and it’s often like that when a parent
moves on with someone else.’
Stephen says poor old Mark doesn’t know what to make of their suspicions. ‘He’s a nice man who’s fallen in love with this nice lady, and if I was him I’d take my passport and head across the channel to Europe because they’re all awful,’ he jokes. ‘Vivien is nice, but her kids are unspeakable. I don’t know why anyone would want to get mixed up with it all.’
He says he enjoys the idea of this loving relationship at the centre of the story. ‘I had thought the time would come when I would stop being asked to take my clothes off in front of the cameras, but I was still up for it,’ he confides. ‘They’re having a very loving relationship.’ But could Mark actually be more sinister than he appears? ‘I do sometimes play suspicious characters,’ he says with a shrug.
As if the heady mix of characters and emotions weren’t enough, the final ingredient is Vivien’s deliciously nosy neighbour Mary, played with glee by Imelda Staunton. She’s been around for years to help Vivien with the kids and to have a natter over the garden fence. A widow
SHE LIKES TO SPY ON FAMILY WITH HER BINOCULARS... SHE’S LOOKING OUT FOR THEM
herself, she’s been a shoulder to cry on, and if she likes to spy on the family with her binoculars, well, it’s only because she’s looking out for them.
‘I think Mary’s quite lonely,’ says Imelda. ‘They’re the family she hasn’t got, that she never had. She used to look after the kids when Vivien, who was a hairdresser, was working so she’s been in their lives for a long time. She’s quite reserved and doesn’t want to impose, and yet she’s desperate, I imagine, to be part of the family.’
She also has her suspicions about Mark. ‘Mark seems like a decent bloke and he’s very nice to Vivien, but he threatens Mary’s patch. And maybe she thinks he’s trying too hard. Mary’s reaction is child-like – she wants to say, “She’s my friend, not yours.” I’ve played a lot of dark characters and she isn’t like that. It’s quite nice playing someone who’s friendly, very nice and yet slightly wounded. Things haven’t always gone right for her.
‘I live in London where you can have neighbours who are best mates and others you never talk to. But in this story these two women are basically just there on their own. And then something very shocking happens. The viewers won’t know exactly what it is until about halfway through, but it just so happens Mary can see everything from next door. I think people will enjoy thinking, “Oh, what happened there?” but they will also see a very honest portrayal of how difficult it can be to be part of a family.’ Flesh And Blood starts later this month on ITV.