The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
Cox’s role as ‘lockdown’ Rebus hailed by Rankin
Rebus writer Ian Rankin has praised Scots actor Brian Cox for his intimate portrayal of the detective.
The author, 60, was asked by the National Theatre of Scotland to write a Rebus monologue as part of the company’s Scenes For Survival series of digital artworks in response to the Covid-19 outbreak.
The ten-minute short film Rebus: The Lockdown Blues was shot by Dundonian Cox in isolation in his cabin in Upstate New York and sees the ageing detective inspector shielding at home in his second-storey flat in Marchmont, Edinburgh, missing his favourite pubs and human contact, while comparing the solitary confinement of lockdown with serving time in jail.
Rankin said: “A lot of people had been saying to me ‘how would Rebus cope with the lockdown’, because they know he’s got COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease) and he loves the pub.
“It got me thinking, and then fortuitously the National Theatre of Scotland got in touch and said ‘we’re putting together these wee monologues’. And so I got to actually deal with what was inside my head, how would Rebus cope with this?
“I wrote the script and I sent it to them and they said ‘we’ve got Cora Bissett to direct it... and we’re approaching Brian Cox’.
“It was a lovely, intimate portrait of this man in his late 60s with health issues who’s trying to survive this crisis.”
Rankin, 60, introduced John Rebus to readers in his 1987 novel Knots And Crosses, and has gone on to write more than 20 books featuring the Edinburgh detective.
Scottish actors John Hannah and Ken Stott have both played Rebus on TV.