Peter Flannery wrote one of the finest dramatic accounts of recent history, the epic television series 'Our Friends in the North', but sadly, his attempt to write about the English Civil War is a far inferior affair. To me, the essence of good historical drama is that it distances us from our own times, and allows us to see how others could have held positions that seem to us indefensible; but 'The Devil's Whore' invents a fictitious female heroine, beautiful and anachronistically feisty (and involved in a story line that could have been borrowed from 'Thelma and Lousie'!) who seems to exist for the sole purpose of allowing us to judge the past through a modern pair of eyes. The writer also clearly wanted a share of the market for posh-frock romances, and the possibility of a happy end, while also putting this unlikely figure on the "right" side of the conflict - hence, wholly implausibly, our heroine is rendered as an aristocratic Leveller. The drama's general sympathy for the Levellers (and associated proto-socialist movements) is also overdone, in that the characters with attractive politics are consistently shows to be morally superior, and more likable, than those without. Against, the contrast with 'Our Friends', whose general sympathies for the Labour cause did not reduce the story to a black and white tale, is clear. The only really interesting character in this story is the Charles I, knowledge of whose execution perhaps invokes a certain involuntary sympathy on the part of the viewer, and who is suavely played by Peter Capaldi. But overall, 'The Devils Whore' is part Hollywood narrative , part Jane Austen and a sprinkling of socialism: an odd combination, and a disappointment compared with Flannery's best.
Review of The Devil's Mistress
