So good at being bad
Hit comedy series Perfect Scoundrels began 30 years ago with a chalk and cheese duo living on the wrong side of the law
CADS, rogues and scoundrels to the core. Peter Bowles and Byran Murray joined forces 30 years ago for Perfect Scoundrels. The ITV comedy drama saw the To The Manor Born star and Brookside’s bad ‘un Trevor Jordache – who ended up buried under the patio – as career conmen Guy Buchanan and Harry Cassidy.
They had their fingers in every dodgy deal going from pretending they can get their hands on a rare Elvis Presley recording to a suspicious preacher.
Perfect Scoundrels ran for three seasons with cast appearances from the likes of Lulu, Leslie Ash, Thora Hird, Sir Michael Horden and Red and X-Men actor Brian Cox as Father Amedy.
Peter and Bryan first appeared together in The Irish RM in the 1980s and they devised Perfect
Scoundrels for television with That’ll Be The Day and Stardust movie scriptwriter Ray Connolly penning the scripts.
The light-hearted comedy saw Guy as the sophisticated, smooth conmen and Harry as a cheeky rough diamond. The series launched on April 22, 1990, with a 60 minute episode entitled Bad Penny Blues which saw the duo meet at the funeral of a fellow conman and decide to work together.
Future episodes gloried in names like The Play’s The Sting, Dirty Tricks and The Milk Of Human Kindness.
The lovable rogues proved a TV hit and Perfect Scoundrels ran for three seasons before ending in 1992 after 18 episodes with The Goodbye Look.
Both actors remain familiar faces on TV. Peter, aged 83, was recently seen as the venerable Duke Of Wellington in ITV’s period drama Victoria and 70-year-old Dubliner Bryan has been a regular on Irish soap Fair City since 2005 playing Bob Charles in more than 200 episodes.