Television: Nowhere to Rome

Published on Friday 20 June 2008 19:59

Empire - Thursday, Sky One, 10pm Upstairs Downstairs Love - Monday, Channel 4, 9pm Snowdon and Margaret: Inside a Royal Marriage - Wednesday, Channel 4, 9pm

THERE'S LITTLE I ENJOY MORE than a cheesy historical mini-series and Sky One – the channel which brought us big Irish-American lug Brian Dennehy playing Genghis Khan in Marco Polo – has succeeded again in bringing over another corny classic in Empire. It's a blatant attempt to cash in on the success of the series Rome, with added bits from the movie Gladiator, and I knew it was going to be a treat when the first five minutes was full of dialogue like this: "Marc Antony!" "Octavius?" "Noble Cicero – just read your latest." "Ah, wise Cassius." "Triumphant Caesar!" "Most excellent Senator Brutus." Fantastic! Not at all an awkward way to introduce characters, because as we all know, in Ye Olden Tymes people spoke differently, especially in ancient Latin, and were constantly reminding each other who they were.

They might as well have renamed them Pat, Jeff and Kevin, though, because Empire is to historical accuracy what Katie Price is to privacy. Julius Caesar, generally regarded as the world's first dictator, here becomes a hero of the common man, a friend to the slave and a kindly uncle. He's opposed by those nasty senators who just want to stop all his great reforms, so they do him in. As he expires, stabbed to bits on the ides of March, ol' Jools (played by Colm Feore) utters his famous dying words to his traitorous friend Brutus: "And you, my child?"

Come again? Yes, the writers of Empire – whose credits include episodes of Beverly Hills 90210 and House – have managed to improve upon Shakespeare's rubbish "Et tu, Brute?" which isn't even English, for goodness's sake. Rumours that an early draft of the script by a Scottish screenwriter read "Aw naw, no you as well!" are surely false.

The series reveals that Caesar's bodyguard – clearly not great at his job – was a terribly manly gladiator called Tyrannus. Father to a murdered son, husband to a murdered wife … oh, no, wait, that was Maximus. Tyrannus's wife and son still seem to be alive, although probably not for long. Tyrannus has slaughtered several thousand men in the arena, because he's that hard, but all he really wants is a quiet life. Isn't that always the way?

Having screwed up on saving his boss, Tyrannus seeks vengeance, in this life or the next … I mean, now he has to look after Caesar's nephew Octavius and help him become a man and save the empire from the nasty senators. The gladiator is played by ex-Milk Tray advert man Jonathan Cake – and all because the lady loves a man in a toga. Emily Blunt also stars, lumbered with a dud role as a prissy vestal virgin.

Empire is derivative, inaccurate and downright silly. But how can you beat a mini-series so naff it presents gladiatorial combat as a boxing match, complete with booming-voiced announcer hailing the "undefeated champion"?

For some real – if unexpected – history, there's a peculiar but compelling documentary on Channel 4 this week about an unconventional Victorian couple. When Arthur Munby, respectable gent who lusted after strapping working-class women, met Hannah Cullick, hard-working servant who was turned on by chimney soot, it was strange Upstairs Downstairs Love at first sight. The pair both gloried in a bit of rough and their long and highly secret relationship was documented in letters and diaries which are shocking even now.

Cross-class relationships in those times were a taboo, and one tends to assume that if they happened they were based on exploitation: the arrogant lord of the manor seducing and abandoning the poor scullery maid. Arthur and Hannah's wasn't exactly like that. Worshipping her strength and her callused hands, he was determined to marry her (and did, secretly), but she gloried in the idea of being his "slave", insisting on calling him 'Massah' and licking his boots. It sounds terrible, but one thing this documentary makes clear, through her own words, is that it wasn't a simple relationship of victim and sadist. Hannah thoroughly resisted Arthur's attempts to "raise" her up to a lady's status, enjoying the independence of her working life even in its "lowest" aspects. And in the rituals and photos they created, they challenged the hypocrisies of the age in a way that was decades ahead of its time. It's a disturbing programme, certainly, but not salacious and the reconstructions and talking heads put things in context.

A very different coupling – although also sexually unconventional – is examined in Snowdon and Margaret: Inside a Royal Marriage which aims to show he was more to blame for their divorce, scandalous at the time, than previously thought. But with so many ever more sleazy Royal scandals since, I wonder if anyone really still cares?