Shame about the 'Scottish' accents: Lockerbie TV drama comes a cropper
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Less than six months since Sky Atlantic's Lockerbie: A Search for Truth comes another drama, The Bombing of Pan Am 103, starting on BBC One this Sunday.
One can only speculate that the reason for both arriving so close together was the forthcoming - and now postponed - trial in the US of a Libyan man accused of making the bomb.
Sky's A Search for Truth was based on the book by Dr Jim Swire, whose daughter Flora was among the 270 people murdered when Pan Am flight 103 exploded over Lockerbie on December 21, 1988. While Colin Firth turned in a moving and nuanced performance as Swire, the story became lost in a fog of warring theories.
The BBC drama - to be released globally by Netflix at a later date - is a more straightforward police procedural.
The cast is international, but this is very much a Scottish affair. 'Scottish soil. Scottish evidence. Scottish procedure,' growls Peter Mullan's police chief to one of the FBI agents desperate to take over the investigation.
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Mullan might as well have added, 'Scottish cast' to the list. From Mullan and Tony Curran to Phyllis Logan and Kevin McKidd, there can't have been many who did not answer the call to arms.
That Scottishness is reflected well in Jonathan Lee's plainspoken dialogue, as in the exchange between a grieving teenager and the police officer who takes the local lad under his wing. 'How's it going?' asks the copper. 'Fine, aye,' comes the reply.
Scotland in general and Lockerbie in particular come across well, with local people receiving their due for preserving the victims' effects and looking after grieving relatives.
Alas, there is a downside to all this 'putting a kilt on it', and yes, it's the accent thing. Again.
With so many actual Scots around, those acting the part have a tougher task than usual. Here's looking at you, Connor Swindells, playing DI Ed McCusker. At any other time, the star of SAS Rogue Heroes might have got away with what is to the untrained ear a perfectly honourable attempt at a Glaswegian detective. Here, however, it's the accent equivalent of Les Dawson playing the piano.
Swindells is not the only one to come a cropper, though this time it's not a Scottish accent to blame. Eddie Marsan, playing the American explosives expert Tom Thurman, has an accent that wanders from Texas to Tooting in the same sentence. Why put actors and viewers through such grief? Better to stick with your own accent than mangle someone else's.
Lockerbie: A Search for Truth was on earlier this year (Image: free) Clever location choices make up for the low budget (so much for those Netflix big bucks terrestrial broadcasters dream about). The lack of cash pays off in other ways, most notably in opening scenes that are less graphic, and not as intrusive, as those in the Swire drama.
Star of the piece is our man Mullan, a class act on any continent. Here, he comes with a bonus in the shape of Patrick J Adams playing FBI agent Dick Marquise. The star of Suits and the force of acting nature that is Mullan make a dream team.
The BBC drama is the superior piece of the two, but whether it adds anything to our understanding is a question that cannot be answered till the case is closed and everyone accepts the outcome. That, however, is not a date you will find on any calendar.
The Bombing of Pan Am 103 is on BBC One and BBC iPlayer from 9pm, Sunday 18 May
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