Reviewed by Rama Gaind.
Directors: Christopher Menaul, John Strickland, David Drury, John Madden, Sarah Pia Anderson, Paul Marcus, Via Vision Entertainment.
Cast: Helen Mirren, John Benfield, Tom Bell.
British police procedural television drama, Prime Suspect is a tense, inflexible drama written by the distinguished dramatist and novelist Lynda La Plante.
It stars Mirren (The Queen, Red, Calendar Girls) as a police detective who investigates a series of serial murders while dealing with sexist hostility from her male comrades. Detective Chief Inspector Jane Tennison is assigned to Southampton Row Police Station in Central London.
Jackie Malton (born 1951) is a UK television script consultant and former senior police officer best known for being the inspiration for the character of DCI Jane Tennison.
The tough, canny and determined Tennison is a skilled, top class detective. Though gracefully portrayed, the plotlines can be depressing and cruel.
Series 1 comprises two episodes titled ‘Price to Pay’. Tennison is repeatedly passed over for major cases but, following the death of Senior Investigating Officer, DCI Shefford, she is given the opportunity to take over his latest homicide investigation. The crime involves the brutal murder of a young woman whose body has been badly mutilated and her hands have been tied behind her back.
Another two-parts comprise Series 2 titled ‘Operation Nadine’ when the skeletal remains of a teen girl are found in the backyard of a house in a predominantly Afro-Caribbean neighborhood of London. Tennison is assigned to the case and she must tread carefully, due to racial tensions surrounding unsolved crimes in the area.
Part 1 and 2 of ‘Keeper of Souls’ in Series 3 has Tennison sensing undercurrents of corruption. Investigating the murder of a 17-year-old ‘rent boy’, Colin ‘Connie’ Jenkins. The investigation leads to a centre for homeless boys, run by Edward Parker-Jones. The operation’s prime suspect is James Jackson, a ruthless procurer of children for prostitution.
Series 4 has three engrossing episodes including ‘The Lost Child’ where a child’s death points to a convicted child molester, who has completed his prison sentence.
What is the name of the former senior police officer best known for being the inspiration for the character of DCI Jane Tennison? If your answer is correct, then you could win one of three, six-disc DVDs of Prime Suspect, Series 1-4. Entries should be sent to [email protected] by Monday, 3 August 2020. Names of the winners will be announced in Frank Cassidy’s PS-sssst…! column on 4 August 2020.
