Two Weeks In August (BBC1)
Rating: Four out of five stars
Burned onto my retinas is a picture of an old editor of mine, from long before I joined the Daily Mail, photographed on holiday with his friends at a rented chateau.
Mercifully, it was snapped from behind, because he was stark naked. Somehow, it found its way into office circulation. Everyone saw it, of course.
The lesson is: don’t go on vacation with friends unless you’re absolutely, completely certain they really are your friends. This, it turns out, is a precaution observed by none of the couples sharing a Greek villa in Two Weeks In August.
Jessica Raine and Damien Molony play Zoe and Dan, bringing their two young children for a fortnight in the sunshine with friends they’ve mostly known since university.
They can’t afford the holiday, and their marriage is at breaking point, but they’re here anyway because, as Zoe says, ‘It’ll be fun.’
Dan, a depressive recovering from a suicide attempt after his business went bust, grumbles, ‘Nothing fun ever happens when someone says, “It’ll be fun”.’
Jessica Raine as Zoe and Damien Molony as Dan, who bring their children for a fortnight’s holiday in Two Weeks in August
Leila Farzad plays Nat, Zoe’s oldest friend, while Hugh Skinner plays Jacob, who arranges for his new boyfriend to join the group
But he’s the one who gets into the holiday spirit quickest, once the children are in bed.
After a night of wine, retsina, larks in the pool and mild hallucinogens, Dan’s up on the roof snogging another of the party.
Next morning, Zoe’s in a filthy temper and it takes him a while to work out she’s not just hungover. He was seen.
Raine is a champion at tight, humourless smiles and cheery chat that emphasise rather than disguise her aching sadness and suppressed loneliness.
Zoe, bitter and angry, is easy to pity but harder to like.
She turns for support to her oldest friend, Nat (Leila Farzad), but Nat is a spiteful gossip, brimful of resentment because her gay best friend, Jacob (Hugh Skinner), has accidentally-on-purpose arranged for his new boyfriend to join them.
Kicking off with a double episode, the show began as a comedy with undertones of menace.
Dan buys frozen fish because the fresh seafood for sale by the beach is madly expensive but, trying to defrost it, he ends up incinerating it.
One of the couples has brought a sulky French nanny who ignores the children and sunbathes topless, though everyone is too polite to do much about it.
Writer Catherine Shepherd skewers the atmosphere of self-indulgent middle-class guilt, with everyone worrying about the plight of migrants on the island while they’re sunning themselves.
As the depth of Zoe’s unhappiness becomes obvious, though, the drama takes a darker twist.
She starts having morbid visions. One of the children bites another, drawing blood.
The story becomes uneven in tone, veering into melodrama and back to romcom, and though the pacing is good, it’s difficult to know if we’re meant to be entertained or disturbed.
One thing’s sure: I wouldn’t want to go on holiday with any of them.
