The prescient political thriller that parallels Corbyn’s rise (and fall)
BLAST FROM THE PAST A VERY BRITISH COUP ( 1988)
Michael Hogan picks the TV classics that you can now rediscover
Tom Watson, the former Labour deputy leader, is the latest politician to turn his hand to novel writing
– a well-trodden career path from Jeffrey Archer onwards. Among the finest examples was Chris Mullin, the Labour backbencher whose Eighties thriller A Very British Coup was turned into an unjustly neglected television classic. Channel 4’s miniseries, adapted by screenwriter Alan Plater, still makes for riveting viewing.
The three-parter charts the ascent to power of unassuming Labour leader Harry Perkins (superbly played by Ray McAnally), whose election victory takes the establishment by surprise. Shadowy forces – including Whitehall mandarins, the military, MI5, press barons, the IMF and CIA – soon conspire to destabilise his radical, far-Left government and plot the prime minister’s downfall.
Perkins, a former Sheffield steelworker who resembles a cross between Tony Benn and Lord
Prescott, must use his quick wit and streetwise nous to outmanoeuvre their dirty-tricks campaign. He selfdeprecatingly insists he’s “just a simple-minded northern lad”, but is anything but. Keith Allen snarls as his press secretary-cum-fixer (Alastair Campbell, who fulfilled the role for Tony Blair, was an adviser).
It was a golden era for TV portrayals of politics, with comedies such as Yes, Prime Minister, The New Statesman and Spitting Image. Michael Dobbs’s House of Cards would come along two years later. A Very British Coup was up there with the best, going on to win four Baftas and an Emmy. Sadly, McAnally died of a heart attack, aged 63, the following year.
For a drama broadcast 32 years ago, it feels startlingly prescient. Parallels with the rise (and fall) of Jeremy Corbyn abound. It would be remade in 2012 as the stodgy and less subtle Secret State, starring Gabriel Byrne. Mullin recently published a sequel, The Friends of Harry Perkins, set in post-Brexit Britain. Might that get the TV treatment, too?
What the critics said: “Harry Perkins is the best leader Labour would never have” – The New Statesman
Did you know? The series was directed by Mick Jackson, whose eclectic CV also includes Threads, the harrowing nuclear holocaust docudrama, and The Bodyguard, the Hollywood blockbuster.
Available on All4 or DVD (£10.29)