Innocence abroad
THIS new mini-series, written by James Wood, is the first-ever television adaptation of Evelyn Waugh’s Decline And Fall, one of the greatest comic novels of all time, commissioned to mark 50 years since Waugh’s death.
Decline And Fall tells the story of Paul Pennyfeather (Jack Whitehall), an inoffensive divinity student at Oxford in the 1920s, whose academic career suffers a major setback when he is wrongly expelled from the university for indecent exposure after falling victim to a prank by members of the infamous Bollinger Club.
In order to make ends meet, Paul manages to find employment as a teacher at Llanabba, an obscure public boarding school in Wales, presided over by headmaster Dr Fagan (David Suchet).
Here, Paul’s fellow teachers include the ineffectual Prendergast (Vincent Franklin) and the disreputable Colonel Grimes (Douglas Hodge).
It is at the school that he encounters a beautiful and wealthy South American woman, the Honourable Mrs Margot Beste-Chetwynde, played by Eva Longoria, who is the mother of one of the pupils.
For Paul, it is love at first sight, but little does he know what lies ahead of him when he agrees to tutor her son over the summer holidays.
Of his casting as Paul Pennyfeather, Jack Whitehall says: “I am extremely pleased to be a part of this amazing adaptation by James Wood. I’ve been a fan of this book since I read it as a teenager and I just hope that I can do it justice.”
Shane Allen, Controller of BBC Comedy Commissioning, says: “One of the greatest comic novels of all time, this satirical masterpiece is long overdue a television debut.
“Waugh deploys comedy and tragedy to point up prevailing institutional corruption and the dehumanising consequences of elitism, very timely and apposite for today.
“James has done a terrific job of getting to the core of it, and the writing has attracted a fantastic cast.”
Also starring Stephen Graham as Philbrick, Oscar Kennedy as Peter Beste-Chetwynde, Gemma Whelan as Dingy Fagan, Tim Pigott-Smith as Sniggs, Matthew Beard as Arthur Potts, Jason Watkins as Sir Wilfred Lucas-Dockery and Chike Okonkwo as Chokey.