Press

The Sydney Morning Herald
20 January 2007
by Ruth Ritchie
Source

Blunder in the tundra

Thank God nobody at the ABC can spell ratings. How else could we explain the wonderful Shakespeare Retold series? Much Ado About Nothing (last Sunday’s series) isn’t anybody’s favourite Shakespeare, so playing fast and loose with the material shouldn’t hurt feelings, especially when the result is so good.

Getting two of Britain’s hardest- working actors to play presenters of a bad regional current-affairs program is a great start. Sarah Parish and Damian Lewis bring subtle flavours to every role, but here as perfectly drawn two-dimensional TV “personalities” duped into falling for each other, they’ve thrown in the entire spice rack. They’re funny. They romp. Parish hisses for most of the performance. As Lewis sweats and chats to himself through sit-ups on an enormous blue Swiss ball, it is almost possible to forget his thoroughly grim Soames in The Forsyte Saga. Billie Piper turns in a fine performance, building on her impressive body of work portraying the Slapper With A Heart of Gold.