![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
franceslievensThose of you that read my LJ on its own webpage instead of browsing through their friendslists might have noticed the prevalence of Jonathan Coe related material in my sidebar. For those of you that don't frequently visit my LJ: I use the sidebar to let the world know which reading, listening and viewing material I'm currently enjoying. At the moment I'm literature-wise immersed in The Closed Circle, Jonathan Coe's follow-up for the wonderful The Rotters' Club. The title of that second book isn't sitting under the heading of current reading material, because the last three weeks I've been watching the miniseries made after the book.
In three episodes we get a look into the lives of three teenage boys growing up in Birmingham in the seventies. Central is the character of Benjamin Trotter, would-be writer and/or musician (preferably both) with a heartaching infatuation for the gorgeous Cicely Boyd. With his two friends Philip Chase and Doug Anderton he attends King William's School where they, well, try to grow up and find their place in life. In the background hoovers seventies music, IRA-terrorism, strikes and redundancies (Longbridge anyone?), and the electoral swing towards nationalism and rightwing politics. This whole timescape provides the setting for the television series, but isn't more than that: a setting in front of which lives unfold, hearts get broken, people die and disappear. We can see the periodic statement in the dreadful outfits the protagonists wear, in the music they listen to. But sometimes it nonetheless shifts to the foreground, when for instance Lois Trotter, Ben's sister, is a victim in an IRA-bombing in a local pub. We see how the tragedy is dealt with, how things seem to lose meaning, but also how life goes on. Benjamin is still besotted with Cicely, and you wonder if she ever will fall for him, or if he will ever find out what an airhead she actually is.
When I first heard about the adaptation of The Rotters' Club, back in November 2004, I wondered how they'd do it. How would one translate a complex time document like this onto the small screen? Jonathan Coe is a master in making the detail count. Read his What a Carve Up!, set in Britain under Tatcherism. All the stupid little details you thought were only there to deepen the reader's pleasure and give her a better view of the surroundings, in the end they mattered and were so much more important than at first glance.
The Rotter's Club doesn't really end until you've read The Closed Circle. It's then that the details start to matter. Long lost school mates suddenly find eachother again in a Britain that's 20 years older, but still strugling with redundancies (Longbridge anyone?), nationalists and rightwingers, and big marches for work and against capitalism. With wonderment I watched the three-parter on the telly, because it were these details that were missing, the details that made the second book possible.
It's easy to dismiss the adaptation because I would have done it differently. I'm not a scriptwriter and one mustn't forget that when the script was written The Closed Circle probably hadn't come out yet! So you cut and file and bring to the fore what is important in The Rotters' Club. And that is Ben, Phil and Doug. The whole feel of the series was great: seventies all throughout, but what got to me most was that it stayed a bit fragmented. This happened, that happened, but nothing happened throughout the three parts. A coherent storyline that would keep viewers going was missing. It was just three boys growing up and one of them pining away at the sight of a gorgeous blonde. That storyline was the only recurring one, and unfortunately one that couldn't keep my attention. Cicely is such an airhead. What the hell does Benjamin Trotter see in her? It's a question you can actually ask as well when you read the book, but there her presence isn't so all-absorbing and her hair-tossing so time-consuming.
Maybe the adaptation stayed too close to the original storyline of the book. I went to look for the book in the series (which you never ever should do, but will always do), because I saw and heard the book in it. The series is nice, a well-brought picture of a time before I was born. The actors, costumes and music are wonderful, but it all lacks the spark and the flow a good miniseries should have. It's become a timescape, not a story.
Of course this doesn't mean you shouldn't watch the series, because no-one can bring Sam Chase (Phil's father) to life like Mark Williams, and Julian Rhind-Tutt's angelic blonde curls for art teacher Nigel Plumb make the womanizer a bit less repulsive, but the more excentric. The Rotters' Club is a miniseries to like. It isn't the best book adaptation ever made, but it's a deserving try and one of the rare pieces of well-made and not overly simplified good television we get these days.
In three episodes we get a look into the lives of three teenage boys growing up in Birmingham in the seventies. Central is the character of Benjamin Trotter, would-be writer and/or musician (preferably both) with a heartaching infatuation for the gorgeous Cicely Boyd. With his two friends Philip Chase and Doug Anderton he attends King William's School where they, well, try to grow up and find their place in life. In the background hoovers seventies music, IRA-terrorism, strikes and redundancies (Longbridge anyone?), and the electoral swing towards nationalism and rightwing politics. This whole timescape provides the setting for the television series, but isn't more than that: a setting in front of which lives unfold, hearts get broken, people die and disappear. We can see the periodic statement in the dreadful outfits the protagonists wear, in the music they listen to. But sometimes it nonetheless shifts to the foreground, when for instance Lois Trotter, Ben's sister, is a victim in an IRA-bombing in a local pub. We see how the tragedy is dealt with, how things seem to lose meaning, but also how life goes on. Benjamin is still besotted with Cicely, and you wonder if she ever will fall for him, or if he will ever find out what an airhead she actually is.
When I first heard about the adaptation of The Rotters' Club, back in November 2004, I wondered how they'd do it. How would one translate a complex time document like this onto the small screen? Jonathan Coe is a master in making the detail count. Read his What a Carve Up!, set in Britain under Tatcherism. All the stupid little details you thought were only there to deepen the reader's pleasure and give her a better view of the surroundings, in the end they mattered and were so much more important than at first glance.
The Rotter's Club doesn't really end until you've read The Closed Circle. It's then that the details start to matter. Long lost school mates suddenly find eachother again in a Britain that's 20 years older, but still strugling with redundancies (Longbridge anyone?), nationalists and rightwingers, and big marches for work and against capitalism. With wonderment I watched the three-parter on the telly, because it were these details that were missing, the details that made the second book possible.
It's easy to dismiss the adaptation because I would have done it differently. I'm not a scriptwriter and one mustn't forget that when the script was written The Closed Circle probably hadn't come out yet! So you cut and file and bring to the fore what is important in The Rotters' Club. And that is Ben, Phil and Doug. The whole feel of the series was great: seventies all throughout, but what got to me most was that it stayed a bit fragmented. This happened, that happened, but nothing happened throughout the three parts. A coherent storyline that would keep viewers going was missing. It was just three boys growing up and one of them pining away at the sight of a gorgeous blonde. That storyline was the only recurring one, and unfortunately one that couldn't keep my attention. Cicely is such an airhead. What the hell does Benjamin Trotter see in her? It's a question you can actually ask as well when you read the book, but there her presence isn't so all-absorbing and her hair-tossing so time-consuming.
Maybe the adaptation stayed too close to the original storyline of the book. I went to look for the book in the series (which you never ever should do, but will always do), because I saw and heard the book in it. The series is nice, a well-brought picture of a time before I was born. The actors, costumes and music are wonderful, but it all lacks the spark and the flow a good miniseries should have. It's become a timescape, not a story.
Of course this doesn't mean you shouldn't watch the series, because no-one can bring Sam Chase (Phil's father) to life like Mark Williams, and Julian Rhind-Tutt's angelic blonde curls for art teacher Nigel Plumb make the womanizer a bit less repulsive, but the more excentric. The Rotters' Club is a miniseries to like. It isn't the best book adaptation ever made, but it's a deserving try and one of the rare pieces of well-made and not overly simplified good television we get these days.
