Lumley’s enlightening tour of Iran is absolutely fabulous
It’s “axis of evil” week on television. While Michael Palin tours North Korea on Channel 5, the third leg of Joanna Lumley’s Silk Road Adventure (ITV) found her traversing Iran. The programme’s access to the country was in doubt until the 11th hour. “Suddenly our visas came through and I’m here now,” Lumley reported with breathy urgency. “And so are you.”
She is such a familiar figure that you can occasionally take her for granted, so it is good to be reminded why she deserves her place as a national treasure. She is exceedingly good company – witty, inclusive, curious, and a keen communicator. Plus she looked – it almost goes without saying – absolutely fabulous in a mandatory headscarf. She took her cue from Iranian women who seem to wear them less for modesty than display. “Today, I’m rocking the Florida golf widow look,” she said of one dazzling turquoise confection.
All this is not as easy as it looks, especially in 40 degree heat and filming to a doubtless super-tight schedule. Lumley is cleverer than some TV travellers, for one, at collapsing the distance between her and the invisible millions on the other side of the camera. “Come! Come!” she said, beckoning us to follow her into the Shah’s Golestan Palace in Tehran. Then at other times she seemed almost to talk to herself as, with unfaked awe, she communed with the spirit of an interior.
As for the country formerly known as Persia, it put on a spectacular display of ancient culture, artisanal craftsmanship and disarming friendliness. Lumley met all sorts – the Brad Pitt of Iran, a woman who’s been weaving carpets for 55 years – and extracted from each brief encounter a useful nugget of information.
Aside from the miracles of architecture of Isfahan, Yazd and Persepolis, beautifully filmed from a busy drone-cam, there were glimpses of modern Iran beyond the gaze of the more intrepid tourist. Instagram is not banned and Lumley met one young influencer called Reihane Taravati who is well worth following (@ reihanet) for further insights beyond the purview of meddling authority. It’s really enlightening.
Danny Boyle knows how to make an entry: anyone suffering from early-onset Getty fatigue after the first two episodes of Trust (BBC Two) got a shock at the start of the third. Grabbed by the lapels and slapped round the chops, you were pretty much ordered to pull yourself together and get stuck in.
A rapid-cut montage featuring much cocaine and conflagration with liberal quotes from the early Seventies jukebox dragged you through the keyhole into John Paul Getty III’S lifestyle of choice, posh Bacchanalian squalor in photogenic Rome, all nude painting and street riots.
The last time we saw the future kidnappee (Harris Dickinson) he was flunking the audition to be anointed his loving grandpa’s heir. You were reminded of Prince Hal failing to tear himself away from the Boar’s Head Tavern. The Falstaff in this story was Bertolini (Giuseppe Battiston), a roly-poly restaurateur and supplier of recreational drugs who couldn’t wait to join the beautiful young kids at a party thrown by Roman Polanski. They made a big mistake when they stood him up.
Bertolini, having already fakekidnapped young Getty once, became his abductor for real, though it profited him naught: by the end of the episode he’d been garrotted in a sunflower field, after making the mistake of bartering at gunpoint with the cold-blooded slayer Primo (Luca Marinelli).
We’ll be seeing a lot more of the grimly handsome Primo. Perhaps he will manage to keep JPG III quiet as the young Getty’s company is becoming a little grating (in fairness, it rather runs in the family).
This was Boyle’s last hour at the reins. He has established a house style in which bravura back-and-forth jags between past and present tend to trigger dizziness. I’m still wondering whether lashings of style, and an inventive interpretation of the known facts, are quite enough to win hearts and minds. Take Paul’s description of himself as the golden boy: no sooner had he articulated the thought bubble than a fantasy sequence visualised him smearing gold paint over his bare torso. It looked splendid. But too much hectic hallucination gets a bit exhausting. Next at the helm is Dawn Shadforth, a garlanded director of music videos. Don’t expect the pace to slacken.
Joanna Lumley’s Silk Road Adventure ★★★★
Trust ★★★