The Rupert Graves Project - Scott & Bailey
The Rupert Graves Project - Scott & Bailey
‘Nicholas Savage….looks about as savage as a wet sponge’
As character assessments go this one couldn’t have been further from the mark but more of that later.
Scott & Bailey is a Police drama based in Manchester and centres around one team within the ‘Major Incident Team’. Scott and Bailey are two DC’s within the team and, as always seem to be the case in this type of drama, are if not quite the polar opposite of each other, they are certainly different.
Janet Scott (Lesley Sharp) is the older and wiser of the pair. She is happy to plod along as a DC, doing things by the book and trying to balance a boring home life with her need to spice things up with a brief fling with a colleague.
Rachel Bailey (Suranne Jones) is new to the MIT and although a good police officer, she has a tendency to not consider the ramifications of her not always legal actions, especially where her ex-boyfriend, barrister Nicholas Savage (Rupert Graves) is concerned.
Savage has been stringing Rachel along for a couple of years and decides the time is right for him to move on, so he dumps her. Not one to take things lying down Rachel embarks on a sort of vendetta against Nick, tracking him down to his house and threatening to tell his wife about their affair unless he gives into her demands. Desperate to save his own skin, and no doubt his reputation as a top barrister, he agrees hoping that will be the end of her demands.
When a court case pits Savage against the MIT he uses information that Rachel had told him in private when they were still going out and tricks her into lying in court. Somebody tips Nick’s wife off about his affair and she throws him out, he changes the locks on the flat he was renting for Rachel and leaves her in a greasy burger bar with her belongings in black bin bags. He thinks that he no longer needs to worry about what Rachel might do or say.
Silly boy!!
A chance meeting in a coffee shop leads Rachel to discover that in a case he tried a few years back, Nick had an affair with one of the jurors whilst the trial was still going on. Now she has him! If Rachel chose to use this information then Savage would be ruined, personally and professionally. So of course she tells him that and the two of them start their affair again, with Rachel trying to convince herself that Nick is a changed man and that he does love her.
Nick, on the other hand, is loosing his grip on Rachel. Nothing he seems to do pleases her and the longer their relationship goes on the more he thinks that maybe she will tell somebody about the affair he had. So he decides that he has to get rid of Rachel once and for all and hires a local thug to kill her by making it look as if she was the victim of a hit and run accident. It all goes wrong and Rachel escapes unhurt but discovers that it is possible that Nick set her up. With a little detective work she manages to link him to both a crime boss (who conveniently taped Nick asking him to kill her) and to the man who tried to kill her.
Nick Savage is a ruined man, his professional life as a barrister is over and he’s likely to endure an unpleasant time in prison for the next few years. Rachel somehow manages to escape with her job intact despite her illegal actions during her harassment of Nick.
*****
Nicholas Savage is a man with few redeeming qualities, no doubt he knows that his looks and his powerful job are an attraction to women and uses that to get what he wants. He admits to having had several affairs whilst still managing to have what appears to be the perfect home life with a loving wife, two children and a big house in the expensive leafy suburbs.
It is hard to like him, which I suppose is the point, because he is a serial user of women and until he meets Rachel Bailey has never had to consider the consequences of his actions. She is probably the first woman who refused to just allow him to walk all over her.
Rupert does a nice job of switching between the loving Nick and the evil scheming bastard Nick, even when the story veered into the silly with him planning to kill Rachel. In some ways the character reminded me of Brendan Block in the David Tennant vehicle - Secret Smile - both creepy manipulative gits who could still charm their way into and out of almost anything.
It probably wasn’t a great acting stretch for Rupert as he’s played both these types of characters before but it was nice to have a change from the wrongly accused brother/husband/etc roles he seemed to have been landed with in recent years (New Tricks, Case Sensitive etc).
On a shallower note - he looked great, had some lovely sets to work on and a nice line in jumpers! There were equal amounts of laughing and frowning a bit of shouty acting and some sweet bumbling (which for a guy who was supposed to be a top QC was a little out of character) all of which made for an enjoyable two days of watching these DVD’s.
I kind of liked the concept of two strong women leads but I’m not sure that will be enough to bring me back for another series. Although for me, by far and away the MOST galling thing about Scott & Bailey was that if you drew a circle 3 miles wide from where I work you would encompass most of the locations used in this show.
To think….Rupert Graves could have been within spitting distance of me and I was didn’t even KNOW WHO HE WAS!!!
Ain’t life a ……?
‘Nicholas Savage….looks about as savage as a wet sponge’
As character assessments go this one couldn’t have been further from the mark but more of that later.
Scott & Bailey is a Police drama based in Manchester and centres around one team within the ‘Major Incident Team’. Scott and Bailey are two DC’s within the team and, as always seem to be the case in this type of drama, are if not quite the polar opposite of each other, they are certainly different.
Janet Scott (Lesley Sharp) is the older and wiser of the pair. She is happy to plod along as a DC, doing things by the book and trying to balance a boring home life with her need to spice things up with a brief fling with a colleague.
Rachel Bailey (Suranne Jones) is new to the MIT and although a good police officer, she has a tendency to not consider the ramifications of her not always legal actions, especially where her ex-boyfriend, barrister Nicholas Savage (Rupert Graves) is concerned.
Savage has been stringing Rachel along for a couple of years and decides the time is right for him to move on, so he dumps her. Not one to take things lying down Rachel embarks on a sort of vendetta against Nick, tracking him down to his house and threatening to tell his wife about their affair unless he gives into her demands. Desperate to save his own skin, and no doubt his reputation as a top barrister, he agrees hoping that will be the end of her demands.
When a court case pits Savage against the MIT he uses information that Rachel had told him in private when they were still going out and tricks her into lying in court. Somebody tips Nick’s wife off about his affair and she throws him out, he changes the locks on the flat he was renting for Rachel and leaves her in a greasy burger bar with her belongings in black bin bags. He thinks that he no longer needs to worry about what Rachel might do or say.
Silly boy!!
A chance meeting in a coffee shop leads Rachel to discover that in a case he tried a few years back, Nick had an affair with one of the jurors whilst the trial was still going on. Now she has him! If Rachel chose to use this information then Savage would be ruined, personally and professionally. So of course she tells him that and the two of them start their affair again, with Rachel trying to convince herself that Nick is a changed man and that he does love her.
Nick, on the other hand, is loosing his grip on Rachel. Nothing he seems to do pleases her and the longer their relationship goes on the more he thinks that maybe she will tell somebody about the affair he had. So he decides that he has to get rid of Rachel once and for all and hires a local thug to kill her by making it look as if she was the victim of a hit and run accident. It all goes wrong and Rachel escapes unhurt but discovers that it is possible that Nick set her up. With a little detective work she manages to link him to both a crime boss (who conveniently taped Nick asking him to kill her) and to the man who tried to kill her.
Nick Savage is a ruined man, his professional life as a barrister is over and he’s likely to endure an unpleasant time in prison for the next few years. Rachel somehow manages to escape with her job intact despite her illegal actions during her harassment of Nick.
*****
Nicholas Savage is a man with few redeeming qualities, no doubt he knows that his looks and his powerful job are an attraction to women and uses that to get what he wants. He admits to having had several affairs whilst still managing to have what appears to be the perfect home life with a loving wife, two children and a big house in the expensive leafy suburbs.
It is hard to like him, which I suppose is the point, because he is a serial user of women and until he meets Rachel Bailey has never had to consider the consequences of his actions. She is probably the first woman who refused to just allow him to walk all over her.
Rupert does a nice job of switching between the loving Nick and the evil scheming bastard Nick, even when the story veered into the silly with him planning to kill Rachel. In some ways the character reminded me of Brendan Block in the David Tennant vehicle - Secret Smile - both creepy manipulative gits who could still charm their way into and out of almost anything.
It probably wasn’t a great acting stretch for Rupert as he’s played both these types of characters before but it was nice to have a change from the wrongly accused brother/husband/etc roles he seemed to have been landed with in recent years (New Tricks, Case Sensitive etc).
On a shallower note - he looked great, had some lovely sets to work on and a nice line in jumpers! There were equal amounts of laughing and frowning a bit of shouty acting and some sweet bumbling (which for a guy who was supposed to be a top QC was a little out of character) all of which made for an enjoyable two days of watching these DVD’s.
I kind of liked the concept of two strong women leads but I’m not sure that will be enough to bring me back for another series. Although for me, by far and away the MOST galling thing about Scott & Bailey was that if you drew a circle 3 miles wide from where I work you would encompass most of the locations used in this show.
To think….Rupert Graves could have been within spitting distance of me and I was didn’t even KNOW WHO HE WAS!!!
Ain’t life a ……?