TRIAL AND RETRIBUTION : SINS OF THE FATHER

13 January, 2007 by The_Boss

ITV1 Sunday 14th and Monday 15th January 2007 9:00pm to 10:30pm

Lynda La Plante presents Trial & Retribution – Sins of the Father, a highly-charged and psychologically complex story which reveals tragic flaws and failures hidden beneath the familiar veneer of family relationships.

Young Emily Harrogate, the clever daughter of an apparently happily married middle class couple, is found dead in the family home by her parents, John (Greg Wise) and Deidre (Nadia Cameron Blakey).
As DCI Roisin Connor (Victoria Smurfit) and DS Satchell (Dorian Lough) pick their way through the tricky investigation, the façade of this supposedly stable family crumbles. It emerges that John is having an affair with his co-worker and that John’s teenage son, James cannot provide an alibi for his whereabouts on the night of Emily’s death. Connor is desperate for a lead on the case, and appeals to DCS Mike Walker (David Hayman) for back up. To her surprise, he opens up about the major problems he is trying to tackle with his own son, Richard. Walker can’t seem to bring himself to acknowledge that his son may actually be seriously disturbed and in need of professional help. A break through on the murder case comes when an eyewitness leads the police to a young electrician, Michael Summerby, who, unknown to the Harrogate family, was Emily’s boyfriend. Michael’s flimsy alibi results in his being charged with murder.

Even with defence barrister Douglas Nesbitt (Michael Fassbender) working hard for his client, Michael’s already thin defence crumbles. But it is clear that this is a miscarriage of justice. A fragile professional relationship is tested, a secret is shared between father and son, a family is torn apart and an innocent man’s life is destroyed.

Trial and Retribution- Sins of the Father is produced by La Plante Productions, is commissioned by Nick Elliott Director of Network Drama for ITV, produced by Christopher Hall (The Lost World, The Hound of the Baskervilles), is Executive Produced and written by Lynda La Plante and directed by Andy Hay. La Plante International holds worldwide distribution rights.


GREG WISE IS JOHN HARROGATE

Greg Wise is one of the UK’s most familiar actors, and has played a variety of different roles both for film and television. But was this the first time that he had worked with Lynda?

“Yes it was and I have enjoyed it immensely. It tends to be the quality of the writing that attracts me to a script. Lynda has been at the top of her profession for many years and she is consistently good and never repetitive. What I particularly love about her is that she uses stories taken from real life and makes them into drama.

I am generally more astonished by documentary than drama. True stories seem to me many times more extraordinary than fiction. Lynda bases her characters and situations on fact, so they feel closer to reality than a lot of drama.”

So what was it about the script that Greg found so interesting?

“I think the subject matter is intriguing and quite disquieting. It’s about disturbed youth and parents’ responsibility for the emotional and mental stability of their offspring. But it’s also about the culpability of everyone concerned: the way in which one deed can spread out to all around and all involved have responsibility for what has happened. Like a Greek tragedy, one fatal flaw and the thing careers out of control!”

As a father himself, how did he find playing the father of such a dysfunctional family?

“It was fascinating. But, when it comes down to it, all families are really pretty dysfunctional and strange to some extent. And the way the story unfolds is exceptionally clever. The Harringtons seem fairly normal at the start of the story. When I first read the script I was totally unsure how it was going to turn out – and that is how the audience is going to feel.”

In this particular film, Wise plays a father of considerably older children, but as a parent of a young child himself, how did he find the experience?

“It was quite difficult at first to think of myself as the father of teenagers! But very interesting to see how you fit into your children’s lives when they are older. When your children are young the relationship is all-consuming on both sides, but, as they get older – and certainly once they are in their teens – you inevitably play a very different part in their lives.”


GLYNIS BARBER IS DORA HILLS

Helped by the considerable charms of her rather dashing co-star, Glynis Barber reveals how easy it was to play a nastier role:

“Well I play the mistress of John Harrogate who is played by Greg Wise. He was great fun to work with and made it so much easier for me to play a not-so-nice character! But I didn’t have to do much research for the role as I’ve played quite a few nasty characters in my time!

I remember thinking it was quite strange that I was playing the mistress as I’m a bit older than the actress playing his wife, and I thought ‘why has this man got an older mistress?!’ But who am I to complain when Greg Wise is the guy who you’re supposed to be having an affair with!”

Talking about the film itself and where it fits into the Trial series as a whole, Glynis says:

“Well I think this one is slightly different because the crime isn’t as dark and gruesome as they often are. It is very much focused on the relationships between parents and children throughout the story. The death was a consequence of all the secrets and the lies, rather than the usual dark forces that are so often at play in Lynda’s stories.”

And on her experience of working with the iconic writer and her team, Glynis has nothing but the utmost praise:

“I have to say that Lynda’s production company and the whole Trial set up was a real pleasure to be a part of. There is a real family atmosphere to it and it was just wonderful to work in an environment with an old-fashioned ethos. The Trial set is a place where people are really respected and looked after and no amount of detail is over looked.”

It’s impossible to ignore the success of the Trial series and Glynis is quick to point out just what she thinks its secret is:

“I’m such a fan of Lynda’s work and I’ve loved all the Trial and Retribution films that I’ve seen. She is a wonderful writer and comes up with such incredible scripts with such depth. There’s always another layer to play even if you playing a cameo, and that’s always satisfying for any actor.

Sometimes you can get scripts that aren’t as well written, but if they are fantastically directed and acted then you can bring something to the table. But Lynda not only writes fantastically well, she also casts very well. At the end of the day, the public knows quality when they see it.”

And in keeping with the family atmosphere on set, no sooner had Glynis finished filming her role for Sins of the Father, than her husband Michael Brandon was offered a part in Closure, the subsequent instalment in the forthcoming Trial series. Barber explains how that came about:

“Michael and I are fortunate to know Lynda and she mentioned that she had wanted Michael in a Trial film for quite a while. But because he’s American she wasn’t sure how she could write him in. So true to form that got her thinking and consequently, his role as an American profiler was born! She has created such a phenomenal part for him.”

While they appear in the same series, Glynis and Michael don’t share any screen together, but that’s not to say it won’t happen in the future. It seems that fans of Dempsey and Makepeace should keep their eyes open:

“I hope Michael and I work together in something again. If something comes up that we’d both like to do then absolutely, I’d love to. Actually, we are talking to a producer about doing an updated version of Dempsey & Makepeace! A kind of ‘where are they now’ series. Fingers crossed that will happen.”