DARK NIGHT OF THE SOUL

BBC crime drama THE RESPONDER follows policeman Chris Carson (MARTIN FREEMAN), an embattled urgent-response officer tackling a series of night shifts in Liverpool, England.

While trying to keep his head above water, Chris is assigned a rookie partner, Rachel (Adelayo Adedayo), and they soon discover that survival in this relentless twilight world will depend on them helping or destroying each other.

The series is written by ex-cop Tony Schumacher, who based it on his own experiences. “When I first joined the police I remember on my second or third night an old bobby called Colin said to me, ‘You’ll never knock on someone’s door and tell them they’ve won the lottery. You’re only ever going to deliver bad news in this job’,” Tony says.

The decision to set the series at night was deliberate, he says.

“I worked for 10 years as a copper and I drove a taxi for five years, working nights in both jobs. In every night job I’ve ever done, I’ve invariably met many more interesting people. The real characters come out at night like bats that the sensible people with sensible jobs never get to meet.”

“Chris is a hard person,” Martin says. “He can handle himself as well as dole out the punishment when necessary. But he’s really not in a good way at all. We have tiny little glimpses of enjoyment in his life and we know the things he values – his wife and child above himself – but he just doesn’t know how to make that work.”

Chris isn’t the hero riding in to save anyone’s day and that’s what drew Martin to the role. “Drama without vulnerable characters is boring because it’s just a lot of cardboard cutouts of people being heroic.”