"If something is not what it claims to be, what is it?"
This is a 1991 television adaptation of Alan Bennett's stage play from 1988, when Spycatcher had recently been all the rage and there was a great deal of interest in Philby, Maclean, Burgess and all that. Not that the whole affair is any less fascinating today, of course, but it must be borne in mind that Blunt had been dead for a mere five years at the time of the stage play, whereas Philby's drab, dreary Muscovite existence drew to a melancholy close that same year. This was hardly ancient history.
Given the writer, the director and the cast, this is obviously superb. It could hardly fail to be, although it's a bit of a slow burner. It's very Alan Bennett- silences, talking around the subject, the things that are not said, and those that are said are said obliquely or in a nice, safe little metaphor. It isn't the parallel that's drawn between attribution of an artist and the attribution of a spy that's clever, as it's a fairly straightforward conceit- it's the wit, elegance and artistry of how it's done. A lesser writer could easily have hit upon the idea, but it takes an Alan Bennett to execute it this well.
The cast is superb. Prunella Scales, of course, steals the show as the Queen, in a deliciously nuanced and masterly written scene which absolutely nails the themes at play here. Yet James Fox is utterly sublime as Anthony Blunt, a highly cultured man, a snob, and a man who has not yet fully come to terms with the enormity of his reason. It's hard not to see a link between his callous snobbery towards Arthur Chubb and the callousness with which he betrayed those who died because of his youthful treason, sins for which his refusal to name the "Fifth Man" shows he has not fully repented. Yes, he can be kind when he wishes to be, taking young Colin under his wing, but his downfall is utterly deserved.
The twist involving Geoffrey Palmer's character may be a little dated now that we know who the Fifth Man was (John Cairncross), but it's nicely done. Overall, this is vintage, exquisite Bennett. It's philosophical, very English, in the way of that generation- emotions are understated to the point of near-invisibility but far from absent. Beneath the stiff upper lip lies deep emotion, and few show that the way Bennett does.
It's weird that this features none of the regulars- personally I wasn't too perturbed as this was just one short episode and I'm aware it's just a prologue to the forthcoming epic. But I wonder if the contemporary viewers would have been aware of this.