The Dorriteers show their vesatility

Being a charming, worthy Mr Nice Guy is so boring - do you mind if I play a control
freak wife abuser? (Fine, Matt, see 'Criminal Justice' 2008)

As far as Matthew Macfadyen goes I seem to be a late convert - I found 'Spooks' portentous and totally lacking in credibility. I somehow missed him playing D'Arcy to Keira Kneightly's Elizabeth Bennett in the 2005 film version of 'Pride & Prejudice' (but I, like everyone else, was in thrall to Colin Firth then any way). The trailer for the 2004 NZ film 'In My Father's Den' looked good, and he looked good in it, but I haven't seen it (one for the Quick Flicks list). I thought he was a competent, pudgy, but hardly charismatic, straight man in 'Death At A Funeral' (2007).

'Little Dorrit' (see last post) was the breakthrough for me - Macfadyen brought to Arthur Clenham (so boring on the page) wonderful humanity, warmth and humour. I'd put him up there with James Stewart in 'Harvey' for making niceness* acceptable and admirable on screen.

'Little Dorrit' was full of fine performances and I was tantalised to see three of its stars, Macfadyen, Eddie Marsan and Maxine Peake, reunited in 'Criminal Justice' which the ABC has just run as a 2 part drama over the last two Sunday nights (but which was actually filmed to be shown as a 5 part series in the UK the same year as 'Little Dorrit', 2008).

I have enjoyed Eddie Marsan's work since I first saw him in as the hyper tense driving instructor with stalking tendencies and anger management problems in 'Happy Go Lucky'. His Pancks in 'Little Dorrit' was a wonderful blend of grotesquery and zeal. He outdoes them all for wearing his east end Jewish heritage like a badge, making Bob Hoskins seem like Ralph Richardson by comparison. In 'Criminal Justice' he was clerk of chambers in the practice where MacFadyen's character worked as a barrister and god father to his daughter. We saw him seemingly callous, 'I've go a nice rape for you in Manchester', but also touching in his obvious regard and love for his colleague and when recounting how his character's father came to London in WWII as part of the Kindertransport.

When I saw Maxine Peake as the enigmatic and manipulative Miss Wade in 'Little Dorritt', I thought 'I know that face', then I read her screen credits but nothing rang a bell until I saw she was Twinkle in Victoria Woods' Dinnerladies. Hard to believe it, but her recent performance surpasses even that sublime creation! John Preston in Britain's Daily Telegraph called her work in Criminal Justice 'a marvel' and so it was. To quote him further, the production suceeded in:

ratcheting up the tension with 'Hitchcockian precision' and (using) the weight of the character's dilemmas to drive the narrative forward

Can't omit reference to the performances delivered by Sophie Okonedo and Alice Sykes either - all the cast were just outstanding. Superlative telly!

* Stewart as Elwood P. Dowd in 'Harvey': Years ago my mother used to say to me, she`d say, "In this world, Elwood, you must be" - she always called me Elwood - "In this world, Elwood, you must be oh so smart or oh so pleasant." Well, for years I was smart. I recommend pleasant. You may quote me".

Don’t call me that!

'Little Dorritt is such a silly name, mind if I call you Fanny Chuzzzlewit?'

They call me 'Hell'

They call me 'Stacy'

They call me 'her'

They call me 'Jane'

That's not my name

That's not my name

That's not my name

That's not my name

They call me 'quiet girl'

But I’m a riot

Mary, Jo, Liza

Always the same

That's not my name

That's not my name

That's not my name

That's not my name

The Ting Tings 2009

I just loved it the Sunday night before last when Claire Foy (as Amy Dorrit) snapped at Matthew Macfadyen (as Arthur Clennam - above) “Don’t call me that” when he addressed her by the absurd sobriquet ‘Little Dorrit’ just once too often?

Dickens’s penchant for creating mawkish models of immature womanhood (whether dolts or angels) was never more cloyingly demonstrated than in fashioning ‘Little Dorrit’. I struggled with the novel, and with that epitome of selfless, sexless devotion, Amy, when reading it as an English Lit student in the 80s. Once again, I pay tribute to Andrew Davies for having breathed new life, and not inconsiderable mojo, into the characters of a ‘bonnet drama’ with this adaptation for television. And good on yer, Claire, for making 'Little Dorrit' a spirited and likeable heroine.

During the following week my 19 year old son also had occasion to insist ‘don’t call me that in public’ when I farewelled him thus: 'goodbye, honey bun’ on the steps of my office building after we'd shared a delicious Yum Cha lunch.

All families use pet names, don't they? The Mitford sisters were 'Decca', 'Nardy', 'Bobo' etc. My sisters and I are known to one another by similarly absurd terms. But when and where you use a pet or nick name is obviously a matter of judgement. When referring to sports stars the use of an epithet seems almost compulsory - 'Shark', 'Tiger', 'Brick with Ears'... for some other public figures too - I have no idea what 'Weary' Dunlop's or 'Chopper' Reid's given names actually are!

The above are all nicknames conferred on their bearers by others as distinct from an adopted name under which one chooses to perform or publish; Prince, Phiz, Madonna, Englebert Humperdink, Guillaume de Gnome de Plume come to mind. The difference being that it is presumably NOT embarassing to declare loudly and publically 'It is I, the Scarlet Pimpernell' while it is probably cringe-makingly awful to be greeted with 'Oi, I thought it was you, Silver Bodgie'. Unless of course you're Richard Roxburgh in which case you might be quite chuffed!