Guest Author - Joseph Cianchi
Armando Ianucci’s ‘The Thick of It’, Britain’s most biting political satire, recently concluded its third series on BBC2. A devastating take on the role of spin and the media in contemporary politics, the show has been alternately praised and pilloried for its cynical and uncompromising view of shiftless ministers and tyrannical press secretaries.
The show follows the fortunes of the incompetent ‘Social Affairs’ Secretary Nicola Murray (played by Rebecca Front) and her staff of jaded civil servants: the oily Olly, incompetent Glenn and long-suffering professional Terri. With a collapsing political base and a press pack baying for blood, the show pessimistically depicts the frantic efforts of the government to stay one step ahead of the game.
But by the far the breakaway character of the show is Peter Capaldi’s foul-mouthed and abrasive Malcolm Tucker, a director of communications for Downing Street. A clear take-off of various spin personalities such as Alistair Campbell, Tucker epitomizes the ruthlessness of policy making in the 24 hour news media age. Capaldi’s excellent performance steals every scene; he imbues Tucker with a reprehensible, yet irresistible charisma which reduces even the most seasoned opponent to cringing compliancy.
Shot in a mockumentary style, the show’s abrupt ‘cinéma vérité’ approach provides a sharp contrast with the overbearing fantasy of shows such as ‘The West Wing’, and gives a uniquely British slant on the cut and thrust of government. The script is uniformly excellent: where else on television would you hear a hapless civil servant berated with such epithets as “giant gaystacks”, or Guardian articles described as ‘diarrhoea of a nobody”?
Some however have criticized the sometimes punishing pace of the show. Michael Deacon, writing in the Telegraph, suggests that the characters “[fire] out one-liners at an almost wearying rate”, suggesting that the writers “have started to overdo Tucker slightly”. The constant cruelty and barefaced opportunism of the political world has furthermore been characterized as slighty unrealistic– are we really to believe that a glorified press secretary could make snap policy decisions, or that such decisions are based solely on the caprices of public opinion?
Originally broadcast on BBC4, ‘The Thick of It’s’ transition to mainstream telly comes on the heels of a successful film, ‘In the Loop’. Given the political changes that have occurred in Britain since the first series aired in 2005, it has remained remarkably fresh and highly relevant – a fitting successor to ‘Yes Minister’ tradition of political pastiche. However, the latest series ends on a precarious note, as Tucker and his lackeys struggle for survival in a deteriorating political climate. Given the looming general election, it will be interesting to see whether the show can do the same.
