Four Lives
BBC1, Mon 3 - Wed 5 January, 9pm / BBC iplayer
Irecently wrote in this column about how the Sky series Landscapers, starring Olivia Colman, challenged the whole idea of true-crime dramas – and whether they can ever capture “the truth” – while at the same time being a pretty exceptional example of one. Now, along comes Four Lives to show us what a true-crime drama can achieve when it’s done “properly”. This three-parter, available in full now on iplayer, is written and produced by Neil Mckay and Jeff Pope, the duo behind previous true-crime series The Moorside and Appropriate Adult, and foregrounds the stories of the four young men – Anthony Walgate, Gabriel Kovari, Daniel Whitworth and Jack Taylor – who were killed by Stephen Port in 2014 and 2015. Mckay’s script doesn’t try to analyse Port or explain his crimes, and Stephen Merchant plays him with a perfectly modulated performance. Instead, we meet his victims and get vivid insights into their lives, as well as exploring their families, friends and partners. The series has to explain what happened to them, and how they were killed, but it’s much more about the botched police investigation and the heroic indefatigability of the likes of Anthony ’s mother Sarah (played by Sheridan Smith), Gabriel’s friend John Pape (Rufus Jones), Daniel’s partner Ricky (Robert Emms) and Jack’s sister (Jaime Winstone). They had to make their own enquiries in the face of police incompetence, as was recently confirmed in the verdict of the official inquest. The drama does not flinch from showing the grotesque Met police failings, and it makes for infuriating but profoundly moving viewing.