‘Beecham’ blends beefcake and history
“Masterpiece: Beecham House” (10 p.m. Sunday, PBS, TV-PG, check local listings) offers an exotic variation on an “Upstairs Downstairs” drama — an imperial take on “Downton Abbey” set in India circa 1795, in the days before British rule.
Tom Bateman (“Vanity Fair”) stars as John Beecham, an independently wealthy English trader who had cut ties with the rapacious East India trading company and established himself in a vast estate. He arrives, handsome and vibrant, with an infant in tow, but no hints as to its mother or whether he has a living wife. Naturally, this sets tongues wagging amongst the gossipy servants as well as his British neighbors. Even his recently arrived mother (Lesley Nicol, “Downton Abbey”) appears flabbergasted.
In addition to his personal affairs, Beecham is plunged into the deadly battle between his old company and its French corporate rival, and the tottering Indian regime hoping to pit the Europeans against each other.
Somewhere in the background lurks Beecham’s dissolute brother, ready to associate himself with the worst atrocities the East India Company has to offer.
It’s interesting to note that this is the second recent elaborate costume drama (after FX’s “Taboo”) that has cast the East India Company as the heavy. The notion of evil corporations bigger than governments appears to be in the air.
Shot on location in Rajasthan and Delhi in India, “Beecham” offers plenty of palatial splendor, a kaleidoscope of colorful costumes, pretty faces and period pulchritude. My wife used to say that she watched “Downton Abbey” “for the clothes alone.” “Beecham” is similarly endowed with beautiful costumes. And it obliges by having its handsome, hunky hero dispense with them on occasion. He’s often seen hunting, riding and hacking vegetation in shirtless attire, undertaking manly acts well below his caste and station. And I’m sure much of its audience (or fans of series like “Outlander” and “Poldark”) won’t mind.
› A great sports story too “feel good” to leave a bad aftertaste, “30 for 30” (9 p.m. Sunday, ESPN)
presents “Long Gone Summer,” a glance back at the seemingly enchanted baseball season of 1998, when sluggers Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa set about trying to topple Roger Maris’ legendary record of 61 home runs in a single 162-game season.
Sosa and McGwire’s competition would eventually inspire both men to shatter that record and, for a time, make baseball “America’s game” once again.
Everyone who follows sports knows that these triumphs quickly turned to ashes as it became clear that both men were among the untold number of players who used performance-enhancing supplements and steroids.
The film includes interviews with both McGwire and Sosa, who do not explain or excuse their steroid use here. In many ways, the film does a bit of that for them, arguing that since baseball had established no official guidelines,
nobody had ever broken any rules.
Bob Costas makes a fine distinction, contending that while he refuses to stand in moral judgment of the players, the “authenticity” of the game and its all-butsacred records must be protected from juiced-up numbers. Baseball scholar George Will makes a similar case.
“Summer” has the difficult task of trying to milk drama about a season whose ending (and bitter coda) is well known. Its dissonant musical score, composed by Wilco’s Jeff Tweedy, goes a long way toward providing some sonic tension. Rambling, scratchy guitar ruminations offer an almost neurotic undertone to the proceedings, avoiding the triumphal or amped-up scores accompanying most sports documentaries, and signaling a painful reckoning to come.