Geroge Gently Great Northern Soul

The first four new episodes of George Gently was screened last night on BBC1 and it one of the best if not the best of this five series drama about which I have written extensively in the past including three of his early books, disappointing only because they are set in East Anglia the home of the author with the TV series set in Northumbria.

Great Northern Soul

is about race bigotry fuelled by the infamous Enoch Powell Rivers of Blood Speech of April 1968. While the character of Gently is played by the likeable Martin Shaw (Judge Deed) also as Lewis Collins News Avengers, Inspector Dalgliesh - PD James and The Chief, Rhodes and Cranford whereas his Sergeant is a weasel young man full of prejudices about everyone and everything.

The scene is set in a 1960’s all nighter to records held at a local hall where 45 play records are also traded, and unlicensed, the only drink on sale is orangeade. The popular club is used by some of the then few black/mixed race young people in the North East which until as late as the eighties racism was rampant at all levels within the regional society and where tribalism still remains a significant feature. The introduction suggests that two men brothers, one who acts as the DJ and another who rents the building for the event, fancy one of two girls, one of whom has West Indian parents with the father settling in the UK after serving in the airforce in World War II. The father is played Ambrose Kenny is played by Eastender Eamonn Walker.

When the girl is found with her head battered in an area known for “working girls” to take their clients Gently’s sidekick assumes she was a Black Prostitute which he leaks to a local press contact to the horror of Gently who was a supporter of the assassinated Marin Luther King. Suspicion causing the death of the girl falls on five men and one woman.

The man who organises these weekly events runs a fish and chip van by day and is the son of a notorious hard man loan shark and white supremacist. This son has a history of GBH. However the most likely candidate is the DJ younger brother who was having an affair with the girl and although the elder brother implied he had sex with the girl, this was talk. The girl was one of those selling drugs at the event to earn money to go to America with her friend wanting to make a career for herself as a singer. Other suspects are the girl’s father and her brother as well as an former variety artist who runs an guest house with a notice saying No Dogs and Whites only and who lives around the corner from the family and who is proved to have sent a note to her father saying the death was good riddance and they all should leave. Gently threatens to close her down once the race relations Act comes into operation.

It with great difficulty the truth is uncovered in part when the Sergeant goes uncover to the all nighter and befriends the best friend of the killed girl as well as the DJ son of the racist criminal. He forms an emotional attachment with the young woman which alters his prejudices. It emerges that the dead girl was pregnant and that on the night of her death the young brother DJ had been told to end the relationship by his father and had become incensed when seeing the girl with the older brother who claimed to have had a sexual relationship with her as well. He had in fact given her £20 from his father to arrange an abortion. The girl had resisted his advances to take her home.

She was also upset on seeing her boyfriend make a successful pass at her best friend and she had set off alone to walk home in the middle of the night. The girl’s father turned out to be different from the story he had presented of himself claiming to have been a pilot with medals when he had remained in a desk job having been refused permission to switch to an active service role. Later he explains he had adopted the role to try and counter the aggro the children were getting at school because of the colour of their skin. The brother is turning to the militant black movement as a reaction to the passivity of his father and the reaction of the white community.

In fact the daughter was not murdered as such but died as a result of a hit and run accident by a drunk driver who was taking a prostitute to the area she used. She came forward after reading that Gently had reminded that the dead girl was someone’s daughter whatever in reality were her true circumstances. Before this is communicated the fascist father of the brothers organises an attack on a vigil being held for the girl and in the ensuing mêlée the older brother is stabbed to death. It emerges that the death was caused by the younger brother. This occurs after the girl’s father tried to confess to this crime after seeing that the knife belonged to his son. The Rivers of Blood speech fuels the feelings in the local community finding support in the police. The guest house owner puts back her sign saying Whites only and the henchmen of the Fascist and now grieving father wreck the home of the West Indian background family. The father gets his war time weapon to kill the Fascist racist but is persuaded by his son and Gently to hand it over. This first of four episodes was made sometime ago, before the Olympic Games when one long distance runner Mohammed Farah and one 30 year old female Boxer Nicola Adams changed the position of migrant and non white citizens in the UK, hopefully for the better and for all time. This proved to be an excellent and potentially significant programme.