NEW DRAMA REVISITS WHO WANTS TO BE A MILL
IT WAS the scandal that gripped the nation – the “coughing major” who cheated his way to £1million on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?
Now the story of Charles Ingram, wife Diana and their accomplice Tecwen Whittock is being brought to screens in new TV show Quiz.
Based on a play by James Graham, it examines whether the trio really were guilty of swindling their way to the jackpot in 2001 – using Whittock’s coughs to indicate the correct answer as Ingram was in the hot seat.
But for Fleabag star Sian Clifford, who plays Diana, that question isn’t really important.
She says: “It was a question we tossed around every single day but I don’t know that’s it’s important to answer that question.
“We don’t answer it on the show either but we do present something very balanced. I don’t sit on either side – I think it is impossible to answer.
“I think it’s more important to ask the question whether or not they should have criminal convictions.”
Ingram answered 15 questions correctly to host Chris Tarrant – played with an uncanny likeness by Welsh actor Michael Sheen in Quiz – but producers became suspicious when they heard a cough every time the right answer was read out.
Valuable
While Ingram insisted he hadn’t heard anything and college lecturer Whittock claimed he had always suffered a persistent cough, all three were convicted of procuring the execution of a valuable security by deception. Both the Ingrams were given an 18-month prison sentence, suspended for two years, while Whittock, below, received a 12-month, sentence suspended for two years.
The scandal caused them to become hate figures, as
Sian discovered in her research for the role.
“They were persecuted and harassed,” she says. “Their pet animals were all attacked and their dog was killed.
“It was pretty gruesome. Their children were bullied so much they had to take them out of school.
“Plus, the daily minor aggression of being coughed at for years.
“It was quite extreme, wasn’t hard to empathise.
“I can only imagine how damaging and so it