To Play the King

This entire BBC series is well worth watching. The screenplay is literate and hilarious. All the actors are wonderful, the script is great, and they've spared no expense with locations! This is an exciting series and I can't recommend it highly enough. Too bad in the United States we don't have actors talented enough to pull of a series such as this one. Diane Fletcher and Ian Richardson are perfect! All the actors in this were first rate and I certainly hope to see more of all of them in the future.

Although weaker than House of Cards, To Play the King is consistently entertaining, perhaps more so than the other parts of the trilogy, which ended with The Final Cut.

Francis Urquhart has been PM (played by the wonderful Ian Richardson) for some time now, and he now faces a challenge in the new King (a compelling impersonation of Princes Charles by Michael Kitchen), who's views on Britain conflict wildly with Urquhart's. Added to this, Urquhart is engaging in an affair with Sarah Harding (Kitty Aldridge), a pollster, and seriously getting on the wrong side of his oldest friend and Chief Whip/Party Chairman Tim Stamper (played by Colin Jeavons, who almost steals the show from Richardson), who has incriminating evidence concerning Urquhart's involvement in the death of journalist Mattie Storin.

To Play the King carries on the Urquhart trilogy with great confidence. Despite the fact that it came three years after House of Cards, all of the recurring cast slip back into their roles with ease. The location work and music are also outstanding. However, the real weakness with this production is that Andrew Davies' script goes over old ground. The dialogue is naturally superb, but Urquhart's relationship with Harding is thin compared to the one between him and Mattie, and the ending strangely lacks the emotional edges of the other two in the series.

That said, To Play the King is highly enjoyable, and worth checking out if you were a fan (and who wasn't) of House of Cards.

Prime Minister Francis Urqhart will stop at nothing in his bid to gain ultimate control over Great Britain. Now, he is threatening to expose some of the royal families most scandalous secrets if the king continues to stand in his way. The media explodes as the two men go head to head in their efforts to gain the upper hand. Stories of sexual escapades, economic fiascos and more flood TV, magazines, the internet and newspapers. It appears that Urqhart just may succeed in his attempt to overthrow the monarchy.

Underhanded, dirty, low down politics (are we sure this isn't the U.S?) take center stage in this story of ego and the ultimate bid for supremacy.

There is much more drama here, much deeper character development and, of course, the whole story has a whole new depth than that of its predecessor 'House of Cards', which everyone seems to prefer. That was mostly humorous, very light entertainment.

I found this one far more rewarding due to the above. Gone was the inevitability and lack of challenge of 'H.O.C.'. Here the main character has to plum to real depths to achieve his aims.

Onto the gripes: Primarily, the pacing is a real problem. It struck me that the first three episodes were little more than exposition, establishing the situations of the story, a three-hour Act One. Nothing really happens, story-wise, until the final episode.

The presentation of the homeless was at times a little trite, although it was amusing to confirm my suspicions about Emma Bunton's acting skills.

I did not find the ending forced at all. In fact, the means are far more convincing and difficult to pull off than any of the maneuverings of 'H.O.C.'

What carries this serial through really is the relationship between Urquhart and Harding. Although clearly an echo of that of with Storrin in 'H.O.C', it does not seem out of place; here is something with strange, emotional, dark and disturbing undertones.

Following his appointment as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Francis Urquhart is rather plagued by guilt over the actions that got him there, while at the same time lacking a challenge to stimulate him in the way his political rivalries once did. This changes as the new King of England decides to throw his social conscience into the political ring, and as FU takes on a new 'slave' to inspire him and to tutor. The King's simplistic sentimentalizing of the plight of the poor leads FU to perhaps underestimate him, while he also remains unaware of the presence of a tape of his rooftop meeting that ended the previous series.

There is a certain meanness and cynicism in this BBC film that is perhaps lacking in the US version, and this second part of the House of Cards trilogy continues with that. The viewer remains drawn into FU's world and decisions in a way where we are confronted by his cold maneuvering, and this continues throughout the episodes. This time the opponent is the new King – a very thinly veiled version of Prince Charles; the reality of this power struggle is perhaps not totally convincing, but to be fair the previous episodes were fine to play up the cynicism in return for giving up a bit of realism. The plot plays out quite nicely, although it must be said that the show does benefit from only having 4 episodes and not the longer run that the US version has.

Outside of this, the series does rather repeat the model of the previous serial in that it places a young woman in FU's circle, sees an influential Afro-Caribbean woman playing a key role and also has a vulnerable male press role. It does have a certain familiarity to it, although mostly it does work on its own rights. The various plot twists and turns do not always convince; in particular the frequent bombings and the fate of some characters and devices go a little further than fits even the internal logic, but these are held together by the consistent spirit of meanness it has. A big part of that is Richardson's performance, which is attractive while also being repellant – much like his to-camera discussions which challenge the viewer to judge him. Equally good are Kitchen, Aldridge, King, and Farrrell – albeit that they have shadows of the previous series in their characters. Jeavons plays it well so that he builds from his position gradually and in a way that makes sense.

Generally the series works well because of how nicely scripted it is with a cynicism that applies across the political spectrum of all those involved. This is delivered with a certain drollness and a narrative that engages even if aspects of it feel repeated from the previous series.