Swingers, Peeping Toms and suitcases full of cash – and all the curtains open
The Couple Next Door
Monday & Tuesday, Channel 4 ★★★★★
Such Brave Girls Wednesday, BBC3 ★★★★★
The Couple Next Door is a ‘raunchy thriller’ where one couple moves across the way from another couple who are ‘swingers’, and we know it won’t turn out well. This begins at the end with a gunshot and that sexylady-in-nightie-running-barefootand-terrified-though-woods thing, so consider yourselves warned. In particular, never lustfully lock eyes with your neighbour while you’re both putting the bins out as it will soon get out of hand. I know I never will from now on.
Our first couple are Evie (Eleanor Tomlinson) – the one who will end up in a sexy nightie running through the woods – and Pete (Alfred Enoch). They are having their first baby and have moved from the city to a suburb that is said to be in Leeds, but I did not believe it was Leeds, and on further investigation discovered this is an international production mostly filmed in Antwerp.
I don’t know about Antwerp’s past work – has it convincingly played Manchester? Bridlington? But it does not cut it as Leeds. Something about the colonial-style mini-mansions with columns and large, lush lawn areas to the front spoke to me and said: ‘NOT LEEDS. NOT ANYWHERE NEAR.’ But God bless Evie and Pete, who never say: ‘Hang on, where the hell are we?’ They may be a hot couple, but if it makes you feel any better, they’re not a bright couple at all.
On moving in, Evie and Pete are immediately befriended by their new neighbours, who are also hot. They live across the road, so why this isn’t called The Couple Opposite, I’ve no idea. Becka (Jessica De Gouw) is a yoga instructor, while Danny (Sam Heughan) is a traffic cop who is basically a muscle-tee on a motorbike. He sometimes sounds Australian, sometimes Scottish, sometimes Yorkshire, and sometimes all three, which is interesting. Also on the street lives a Peeping Tom (Hugh Dennis, hamming it up), who is obsessed with Becka. Becka doesn’t help herself by having sex at a window where anyone passing could watch. What you will now want to shout at the TV is: ‘NOT LEEDS. NOT ANYWHERE NEAR. AND DRAW YOUR CURTAINS! JUST GRAB ONE SIDE AND PULL ACROSS! EASY! TRY IT NOW!’
For those tuning in for the raunch there’s quite a wait. First, there’s a tragic twist in the opening episode (of six) concerning Evie that’s quite the mood-killer. Not that it’s allowed to kill the mood for long. On the other hand, we all process grief differently, so maybe Evie’s way is riding on the back of Danny’s motorbike while hanging on to the muscle-tee, or having dreams where their eyes lock lustfully while putting out the bins. I kept wanting to shake her and say: ‘Stop objectifying the poor boy and admire his gifts. He can speak three accents at once, you know?’ Eventually, Becka and Danny explain that they’re nonmonogamous and how it all works while Evie’s eyes widen, and they all become closer and closer, spending beach days together and going on a spa break, while I was worried about Olly. He’s Becka and Danny’s young son, who is not on any of these trips but for whom no childcare provisions are ever made. I kept praying
that his parents had at least put the bleach out of reach. By the time the sex does arrive – I’ll save you the trouble of randomly fast-forwarding: it’s episode three at the 38minute mark – I had all but slipped into a coma. It felt like an extended coffee advert rather than real characters doing real things. Also, Danny is involved with a criminal bloke who unpacks a briefcase of dodgy cash that anyone passing would see. Seriously, what is it about not drawing the curtains in this place that isn’t Leeds?
The comedy Such Brave Girls is magnificent. And there is a lesson here too: while you can’t make even hot people sexy if a script isn’t well written enough, you can make anything funny if it is. The issues Such Brave Girls covers makes for a grim list: suicidal thoughts, abortion, depression, self-harm, being sectioned. Yet it is brilliantly and wonderfully (if brutally) funny.
It is written by Kat Sadler, who has said it is ‘loosely biographical’ and describes it as being about ‘three narcissists in search of love’. She plays Josie, who has a sister, Billie (played by her actual sister, Lizzie Davidson), and their mother is Deb (Louise Brealey).
Josie considers herself an artist because ‘I’ve got too much pain to not be’. Deb is not impressed with one of her (terrible) pictures. ‘Psych ward good… it’s not the Turner Prize.’ Deb has a new boyfriend whom she needs to keep sweet as he is her only way out of debt, and also he has underfloor heating.
Billie has been traumatised after the abandonment by a father who went out for teabags a decade ago and never came home. She is in thrall to an awful boyfriend, and when she becomes pregnant it’s up to him whether she’ll have an abortion or not. (‘My body, his choice.’)
All the performances are wonderful and, even though Josie and Billie and Deb are vain and selfish, they’re drawn with such heart and soul you can’t help caring about them. Also, Deb may well be right when she gives Josie this advice: ‘Never follow your dreams. You’ll only be disappointed.’