Tony a former teacher turned taxi driver in Liverpool is extremly lonely and finds himself doubting everything he thought he knew about the world, he develops an unhealthy obesseion with a late night radio talk show host Lawrence Brightway.
Episodes – 4
Running Time – 3 hours
Channel 5
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Tony is very lonely and doesn’t have anything in his life anymore after leaving his teaching job, where he taught science and was involved in pastoral support in a secondary school. We find out his passion was for science and teaching, but we are left wondering what happened for him to leave the job he loved. Haunted by memories of Joe Hall, which runs though all four of the episodes until we find out what actually happened.
He is shown a tiny bit of compassion by Rosa who works in a local cafe where he often spends time between fares. While driving around through the night he starts to call the late night radio station, talking with Lawrence and being fully engaged in different conversations and venting about teaching. He was clearly struggling and this leads to some erratic decision making.
The thing that really hits home about Tony is that it just shows how quickly one event can cause your life to unravel and doubt everything you thought you knew about yourself in the worst possible way. He didn’t really care anymore because quite frankly no-one cared about him, in teh grand scheme of things the world wasn’t bothered either. At the same time as seeing him slowly make stupid decisions, as a viewer you cannot help but feel utterly sorry for him. Lawrence isn’t all he appears to be either and it raises the questions around how much of themselves someone in the public eye really puts out there. A radio host who has a live talk in is in a very different situation to someone acting in tv or films.
I don’t think I have actually watched many of the drama’s from Channel 5, but I am very pleased that this one popped up on the Sky home screen. Naturally I was drawn in by Sean Pertwee who I have been a fan of for many years. He puts in a very good performance and let’s face it his voice is very soothing and therefore a perfect choice for this role. Robert Glenister is the true star of the show, managing to push so many emotions and be engaging from the first moment to the closing moment. Suzanne Packer offered some good support.
Given the running time of 3 hours across the four episodes it is more than worth it for the performances and the interesting direction the story heads in. I guess we are all one bad event away from completely losing it.
