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here to watch a clip from Ashes to Ashes
When Gene Hunt steps out of his Audi Quattro and into Ashes to Ashes, the
first thing we see is a snakeskin cowboy boot. It slaps onto the concrete
outside a derelict industrial building, then stands as the camera crawls up
the solid, nononsense frame above its pointy toe and cuban heel. Finally,
the lens comes to rest on Hunt’s stern, craggy face, and his laconic
Manchester drawl rings out across the car park: “Today, my friend, your
diary entry will read, ‘Took a prozzie hostage and was shot by three armed
bastards.’ ”
It’s beautiful timing. Until Hunt’s arrival, the sequel to Life on Mars has
been more than slightly upsetting. The effervescent Keeley Hawes plays Alex
Drake, a police psychologist who receives a tape from an officer – Sam Tyler
– who has just committed suicide. (Okay, wait: if you didn’t see the hit BBC
series Life on Mars, here’s what you need to know. Tyler had an accident and
woke up in 1973. Was he mad, or in a coma, or had he been taken back in
time? Whatever happened, it was as if he had landed on a different planet.
He thought that maybe, if he could work out the reason he was there, he
could get home. Then he killed himself.)
Drake has a daughter, and is driving her to school when she gets involved in a
hostage situation with a gunman who has asked for her by name. Awful things
happen, and her poor daughter seems in terrible jeopardy. Then Drake takes a
bullet to the head and wakes up on a boat on the Thames. Before she can say
“Why am I dressed as a prostitute at a party where the only music they are
playing is from 1981?”, she’s in a scuffle with a posh drug-dealer, and we
don’t know why, what’s happened to her daughter, whether she’s dying or what
on earth she’s doing in 1981. Then Gene Hunt arrives, and we know
everything’s going to be all right.
The Manchester DCI, played by Philip Glenister, has already passed into
television folklore. There are websites devoted to his one-liners: “She’s as
nervous as a very small nun at a penguin shoot” and “He’s got fingers in
more pies than a leper on a cookery course” are popular. But most people’s
favourite seems to be this exchange with John Simm, as Tyler:
Hunt: I think you’ve forgotten who you’re talking to.
Tyler: An overweight, over-the-hill, nicotine-stained, borderline-alcoholic
homophobe with a superiority complex and an unhealthy obsession with male
bonding?
Hunt: You make that sound like a bad thing.
With his 1973 standard-police-issue nonPC attitude, he was an overnight hit
with viewers, critics and the meat-eating end of the tabloid market. He also
acquired a huge fan base among coppers and the ladies. So, when Simm decided
that two series of Life on Mars was enough, the BBC begged its creators,
Ashley Pharoah and Matthew Graham, to keep Hunt alive. Given that he existed
only in Tyler’s mind, this proved something of a problem, until Graham hit
on the idea of the tape and the psychologist – essentially, Drake is so
intrigued by Tyler’s case that her mind summons up his characters in her
moment of crisis.
The demand for Hunt doesn’t surprise Glenister. “As soon as I picked up the
script, I loved this guy and knew how to play him,” he grins, sitting back
in his chair in a room above a Soho street market. “The estate agent down
the road used to tell me that every Tuesday morning, people would be coming
in, saying, ‘Did you see him last night?’ But when Ashes to Ashes came
around, my initial reaction was – ooof, not sure. John and I created such
great chemistry on and off screen. I have a huge respect for him, and I
think he thinks I’m all right as well. So, that on-screen crackle between
Tyler and Hunt ... just saying it! It doesn’t sound like a firm of
solicitors any more, it sounds like a crack 1970s cop team. When I heard,
though, that they were casting Keeley, that there was going to be an element
of ‘will they or won’t they?’, a love-hate relationship rooted in masculine
and feminine – well, I was in.”
Glenister chooses his words with care. Masculinity, he believes, is the key to
Hunt. “A lot of people ask me why he appealed to so many people – whether it
be the police force, which is more obvious, or women, when he’s such a
misogynistic dinosaur of a man,” he grins wickedly. “I was chatting to a
mate who’s a writer, and he said, ‘Gene’s lack of self-awareness.’ In an age
when everything is based on image and looks and packaging, this
unreconstructed Neanderthal man comes onto the screen and they go – yes,
thank you, this is how we all feel.”
There is something of Hunt about Glenister. When he swears, his voice has a
slight Cheshire lilt. And he bemoans the excessive choice available in our
age, fearing for his two daughters’ innocence. “My six-year-old is becoming
image-conscious already. Where do they get that? School?” He plays golf,
because “a man should have a hobby”, and he scorns the burden of paperwork
on the police – even though he’s not really a policeman. Yet he is a little
wary of excessive identification. “I don’t think you should push the
character too far, or I’d end up as Del Boy,” he grimaces. “You have to move
on. Playing this character has changed my career – I’m not going to moan
about it. But every time you play anything, you only get called up for
similar parts, and most of what I’m getting at the moment are pale Gene Hunt
scripts.”
He hopes his body of work will stand him in good stead when moving on. Born
the son of a television director, and with his brother Robert an actor, he
thought about going to drama school after a few years as a movie publicist.
“I was working on a film with Richard E Grant, and told him I wanted to go
to drama school. ‘Go for it, you c***,’ he said, and I did. Thank goodness.”
At the Central School of Speech and Drama, in London, he studied with Graham
Norton and Rufus Sewell, then shared a flat with the actor Jamie Glover, who
introduced him to his wife, the actress Beth Goddard. “I’m very happy, but
I’d ban marriage for anybody until they’re 30. That’s what your twenties are
for – to be as hedonistic and crazy as possible. Get it all out of your
system. Have a great time.”
Roles in Clocking Off, State of Play and, recently, as Carter in the BBC’s
Cranford, he believes, show his versatility. “The reason I did Cranford was
that I knew I was going back to Gene,” he explains. “Carter was a man ahead
of his time, rather than stuck in his time. It was a reminder to people that
I can do other parts. My next job is an American vampire-slayer – which, you
have to confess, is against Hunt’s type.” He still sounds a little
regretful, though, as he dismisses a sequel to Ashes. “But you couldn’t move
Gene to the 1990s.” He shakes his head. “What are you going to have him do?
Arrest Noel Gallagher for drugs?”
Ashes to Ashes starts on BBC1 in February
