David Tennant talks about his role in the new BBC Two series The Politician's Husband. Read what he has to say below about researching the role, the relationships within the story and his love of political drama:
The Politician's Husband
David Tennant plays Aiden Hoynes
Paula Milne was really the first thing that drew me to The
Politician’s Husband. I mean, she’s sort of television royalty, isn’t she? I
just think she writes characters assiduously well, and she puts them in
situations that are so dramatically delicious.
Also, I love a bit of political drama; The West Wing is
probably my favourite television series of all time. There’s just something
about that world. There are very few areas in life where the stakes are so
high; where the power struggles influence not just the lives of the people
involved, but also the lives of everyone they represent. It’s almost Greek in
that way, in terms of the stakes being so monumental and the power struggles
going on in that world being so petty – and yet so universally important.
I also remembered The Politician’s Wife being a really big
deal when it came out in 1995. I came back to it before we started filming The
Politician’s Husband and it was fantastically juicy to watch. Paula really
caught that moment in time when a certain echelon of the ruling classes began
to realise, perhaps, that they weren't able to get away with whatever the hell
they liked anymore. It was the beginning of the end for a certain type of
politics – or at least of a certain type of public life, anyway. And I think
she told that story very well. The Politician’s Husband isn't a straight
sequel. It’s inspired by similar territory, I suppose, but the story is very
much drawn from today’s world.
The character I play in the drama is Aiden Hoynes. He’s a
member of the cabinet and he’s very well regarded. He’s clearly seen as a
potential leader of the future. It’s probably not helpful to find real-life
political candidates to cast him as – I didn't base him on one particular
individual (which is probably just as well because I don’t think that would
have done anyone any favours!). But he’s certainly a man who’s doing very well
for himself.
So at the start of the story he feels that his moment has
come, that the Prime Minister of the day is not performing as he might, and
that this is his moment. He stands up in the House and argues that the Prime
Minister’s immigration policies are xenophobic and that the PM’s position is
effectively untenable. How much of that is driven by ideology, and how much of
it is a power play? That’s a very grey area, really – it’s hard to say where
one ends and the other begins. But the policy may be slightly less important
than what he’s trying to achieve by wielding it.
Aiden has a very solid marriage with Freya, played by the
magnificent Emily Watson. She’s also an MP and doing quite well for herself,
though she’s playing second fiddle to Aiden, who is the high flier. But they
work very well together and they've always supported each other. In fact we
learn quite early on that she writes Aiden’s speeches. They have two kids, Noah
and Ruby, and a very happy family life. It’s made slightly difficult by the
fact that Noah has Asperger’s and struggles a little bit with his parents’
public, high-stress lifestyle, but they manage to cope and they have a support
network around them. But when the wave of support they expected to carry Aiden
to his coronation evaporates in front of him, the roles are reversed. Aiden
loses his frontbench job and Freya finds herself brought into the cabinet. And
a marriage which had seemed so strong and impregnable suddenly finds that its
fault lines have been exposed, and they have to cope with this very different
power structure within their relationship.
There is an aggressive streak in Aiden that emerges too. But
then again he’s a man who is pushed quite far. He has had everything, and
suddenly he has nothing. So I think it’s quite understandable that when he’s
pushed into a corner, he comes out snarling and biting. As things go on,
however, we find that Aiden and Freya aren't quite the golden couple they
believed themselves to be, and that comes out quite violently within their
relationship at one point, and in quite a shocking way.
Another key character is a politician called Bruce Babbish,
played by Ed Stoppard. He and Aiden have known each other for many, many years. They've come up through the ranks together, though Aiden is certainly seen as
the senior of the two. And Bruce is apparently right behind him, fully expected
to serve in an Aiden Hoynes cabinet and to be part of his inner circle. So at
the start of the story, it’s very much Bruce and Aiden who are preparing for
this big moment – this moment of assassination. But, as with many things in
politics, Aiden quite quickly discovers that Bruce’s friendship and loyalty aren't necessarily all they seem. It becomes clear quite quickly that Bruce has
leadership ambitions of his own, which have been subsumed in the wake of
Aiden’s much more obvious route to power. It all happens within the first few
minutes of the series so I don’t think it’s giving too much away to say that
Bruce ends up backstabbing Aiden.
Before filming began, I tried to do as much research as I
could. There were a few different elements to delve into. Firstly, there was
Noah’s Asperger’s condition. We were helped brilliantly by people coming and
talking to us. I wouldn't want to betray any confidences by going into that too
much, but people were very honest with us, which was hugely humbling, actually,
and very helpful for the roles. When you have a child with Asperger’s, you
can’t always communicate in the way that you would normally expect. It can rob
people of a normal life – and that is a huge part of the story here.
And then of course there was the political world. Over the
years I've talked to many politicians about what their lives are like. But for
this I just decided to let the production team gather our sources. I didn't want to use or abuse any social links, I suppose. So we had some people come in
to talk to us, and they were very honest about their experiences. What I found
fascinating to imagine was the sheer stress of that life – the burden of it, I
suppose. But at the same time you could sense the buzz that people get out of
it, too; the high that you get when you deliver something well in the House is
like having a fantastic first night on stage and getting all the best reviews.
It gives you that kind of a hit. And that’s what they’re chasing, a lot of the
time. There’s something quite egotistical about that. But if it comes from a sense
where they’re trying to change things for the better, I suppose it can be a
pure and virtuous thing as well.
I had a certain amount of say in Aiden’s look. Looking at a
lot of the political faces we see regularly on the news, I was struck by how
coiffed they are. They often seem to go for a sort of Eighties soap star kind
of look. But then of course that’s what is expected, isn't it? You’re expected
to look sleek and slick. And I guess you also need a look that you can contain
through a day when you’re doing four different things at once. So I wanted to
find something that gave a sense of that.
Filming the drama certainly gave me an insight into why
politics appeals to people – particularly that sense of the intoxication of
power. And the fact that you’re making decisions that will change people’s
lives. I can see why people are drawn to it. I can see why people devote their
lives to it. There are such huge opportunities there, and such crushing
disappointments, too. It’s sort of Shakespearian in that way. It’s like a
history play in the making.
What will real MPs make of the drama? I think they’ll love
it. They’ll love it because at the end of the day it’s a great bit of drama.
It’s got all the hooks and surprises of a thriller, but with the depth and the
texture of a quality character piece – because it’s written by Paula Milne, and
she knows what she’s doing. So I think everyone will love it. But I dare say
politicians will love it all the more because they’ll see their own world
reflected back at them. It’s a really fascinating and intriguing series.
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The Politician's Husband, written by Paula Milne and
directed by Simon Cellan-Jones, is a companion piece to the multi-award-winning
The Politician's Wife.
The Politician's Husband was commissioned by Janice Hadlow
Controller, BBC Two and Ben Stephenson, Controller, BBC Drama Commissioning.
This is a Daybreak Pictures production, executive producer
for Daybreak Pictures are David Aukin (The Promise, Endgame, Hyde Park On
Hudson), and Paula Milne, the director is Simon Cellan Jones and producer is
Hal Vogel (The Promise, Endgame, The Trial Of Tony Blair). The executive
producer for the BBC is Lucy Richer.
The Politician's Husband begins on BBC Two at 9pm on Thursday 25th April (tbc)
With thanks to the BBC Media Centre
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