The Cutprice Guignol

Ah, the end of a long day. You settle down with your cup of tea, a nice book – the litter trays have been emptied, the cats have been fed, maybe there’s a nice wee treat in the fridge for later. Everything’s perfect. Until – what’s that? Some sort of scrabbling, in the walls? Your head snaps up, and there I am, dangling from a light fixture, telling you, once again, to watch Wolf Hall.

Look, am I eight years late with this article? Yes, I am. But the best I can do in penance for how bloody long it took me to get to Wolf Hall is to write an article imploring everyone who’s been tragically pulled into my blogging orbit to watch it, God, please watch it.

The 2015 adaptation of Hilary Mantel’s book trilogy of the same name follows Thomas Cromwell (Mark Rylance) as he navigates the halls of power in Tudor England; specifically, the first divorce of King Henry (Damien Lewis) and his re-marriage to Anne Boleyn (Claire Foy).

Now, anyone with taste is already getting the first episode queued up based on that cast alone, but let me get into the hard sell. I skipped out on Wolf Hall for a while because it all just felt a bit long-winded, you know – even though the season is only six episodes long, the historical setting and dense source material made me think of this as a bit of a slog, which I now see as completely unfair, especially considering that I, Claudius is one of my favourite shows of all time.

But let me tell you: Wolf Hall is none of the things I was worried it would be. It’s packed with action, intrigue, and a constant forward momentum towards a hideous and inevitable climax for Anne Boleyn; there isn’t a scene here, a line, even, that doesn’t feed in to the broader plot. It’s totally absorbing and so damn compelling, Peter Straughan’s excellent dialogue focused while still feeling natural. I really love how the show is so confident in this writing and these performances as to have virtually no action outside of conversations – but when the conversations feel this important, they’re downright white-knuckle.

And those performances – oh, those performances. Mark Rylance as my main man Tommy Crommy himself is fucking unbelievable, an incredibly nuanced, intelligent, and incisive take on the character that takes every opportunity to fill in the corners of who he is and what drives him. Claire Foy is outstanding as Anne Boleyn (I could listen to her say “cruemwell” in that French accent till the end of time, too), and a short-lived by impactful turn from Johnathan Pryce is a treat for all of us who, like me, never got over Brazil. Damien Lewis as Henry is particularly impressive to me, given that this figure is so caught up in the contemporary cliché that’s developed around him as to almost obscure his actual historical importance and power – Lewis finds a way to cut through that, a sublime turn that gives the lovestruck Henry claws beneath the softness.

If, like me, you have been foolishly putting off watching Wolf Hall for whatever reason, this is your sign to get your ass up and watch it. It’s unbelievably good, a total treat in writing, acting, and execution (excuse the pun), and I’m still kind of in awe of just how bloody brilliant it really is.

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(header image via PBS)