Last week's account in PostScript of the painfully slow horse I bet on at the Epsom Derby back in the Dark Ages prompted a reader to enquire if I had seen the British television series Slow Horses. I'm pleased to say I have and for those who are unfamiliar with the production I should point out that it has nothing do with the equine world but is an absorbing British spy thriller laced with dark humour.
It deals with a unit of MI5 operatives who have all messed up badly in the past and have ended up in the backwater of Slough House from which the expression "slow horses" is derived. They are regarded as failures, not fit for any serious espionage work and invariably find themselves handling boring administrative work or inconsequential cases. But they still occasionally get involved in some really serious stuff.
The appeal for viewers is a sharp script based on the novels by Mick Herron with brilliant acting from Gary Oldman who plays the slovenly, extremely rude, whisky drinking, cigarette-smoking, flatulent leader of the dysfunctional unit. His outdoor wear is a grubby-looking raincoat and he offends just about everybody. But beneath his unpleasant demeanour there lies a fountain of knowledge.
Oldman's meetings with his female boss played by the elegant Kristin Scott Thomas are something to savour as she unsuccessfully tries to ignore his off-putting unkempt persona.
The theme song for the series is Strange Game written and performed by Mick Jagger. A bluesy number, its opening lines set the tone nicely: "Surrounded by boozers/Misfits and losers/Hanging by your fingernails…"
It's the most enjoyable British spy series I've seen since the days of Alec Guinness in his prime portraying George Smiley in John Le Carrier's Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and Smiley's People.
Backing the wrong horse
Also concerning last week's column another observant reader asked how Crutch, as a mere student in the 1960s, could afford to lash out the considerable sum of a fiver (five pounds) on a horse. The answer is that I couldn't and I spent the next few weeks on bread and water bemoaning my ill-advised punt.
It turned out to be a salutary lesson on the perils of gambling and the golden rule of never putting money on a horse just because you like its name. I think I got carried away simply because it was the Derby, one of Britain's great sporting events.
Incidentally the only casino I have ventured into was in Macau many years later and that was in search of a journalist friend who enjoyed an occasional flutter. One look at the blank faces of the customers hunched around the baccarat and blackjack tables was enough to indicate which side was winning.
From Sid to Smiley
Back to the world of espionage. It is not the first time Oldman has played a spy. In 2012 I went along to the old Scala cinema in Siam Square to watch a new version of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy with Oldman playing Smiley. He was pretty good in that too. It was a slow-moving film relying on atmosphere and accomplished acting rather than car chases or special effects which seem compulsory these days.
Oldman is a versatile actor. The first time I saw him in a film was the 1986 production Sid and Nancy in which he played Sid Vicious the troubled bassist of the Sex Pistols. Oldman took the role reluctantly saying he wasn't interested in punk but he was widely praised for his performance which included a wild rendition of My Way, which couldn't be more different than the Frank Sinatra version.
The next Bond
While on the subject of spy films it is interesting to see the James Bond franchise has been taken over by Amazon. This has naturally sparked all sorts of speculation as to who could be the new 007 to take over from Daniel Craig who had the iconic role for the last five films. I must admit to quite enjoying Craig as Bond. He's got a great face, looking like someone who has just remembered he left the kettle on at home.
Just about any actor you can think of has been tipped as the new Bond although according to an online survey, leading by a nose is Englishman Henry Cavill. Some might argue that the Bond franchise has had its day and should be put out to pasture, but the films make so much money that is unlikely to happen.
Working class spy
The early days of the Cold War sparked dozens of intriguing spy novels from the likes of Graham Greene, Len Deighton and Le Carre. These in turn led to many films which kept Michael Caine very busy for a while portraying English spy Harry Palmer in The Ipcress File (1965), Funeral in Berlin (1966) and Billion Dollar Brain (1967). Strangely, some of the biggest fans of Caine's spy films were reportedly the Soviet security agency, the KGB.
Caine was proud of his Palmer character, seeing him as a much more realistic spy than Bond. He once stated "007 was so obvious he couldn't possibly be a spy as he drew so much attention to himself. My spy is the ordinary guy doing his own shopping in the supermarket".
I bet he was a great fan of "buy one, get one ..."
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