Morning:
6°c
There are many reasons to look forward to In the Loop, Armando Iannucci's cinematic extrapolation of his brilliant TV series The Thick of It.
There's the biting satire on international politics. The finely observed, semi-improvised performances. But above all we're champing at the proverbial bit to see and hear Peter Capaldi's sardonic Scottish spin doctor Malcolm Tucker in full, furious, four-letter flow on the other side of the Atlantic.
Critics are already raving about Tucker's salty aphorisms, such as his observation that a colleague is “as leaky as a leek and potato soup without the potato or the soup”. Or the time he destroys a woman who uses the term “purview” with the finely judged riposte: “Fucking purview'?!? Fuck off back to Cranford.”
Tucker is the ultimate embodiment of the office monster, the anti-hero we hate ourselves for loving. He's Alan Sugar with balls, more likely to tell you to “come the fuck in or fuck the fuck off” than to utter a mimsy little “you're fired”.
Tucker uses language like a Glasgow kiss and always thinks three moves ahead: workplace bullying as chess. His female equivalents are the manipulative, belittling, shamelessly game-playing Joanna Clore and Sue White in Green Wing. He's the kind of nightmare boss Ricky Gervais's David Brent would like to be. Because unlike Brent, Tucker doesn't want to be liked. Which is why we love him.
There is a reason for Tucker's popularity beyond the elegance of his swearing and the purity of his perpetual rage. Like the adrenaline charge of a horror film, he gives us a cathartic release. He allows us to indulge in masochism by proxy, savouring the humiliation of underlings and supposed masters alike at a safe remove. He is the worst co-worker imaginable, but he is safely trapped behind the screen, like a hornet in a jar.
Capaldi and Iannucci deserve knighthoods, not just because they are masters of their craft, nor because ennoblement from a government they so brilliantly satirise would surely appeal to their sense of irony. No, they deserve the highest honours the land can bestow because they perform a public service. The entire, battered, disheartened British workforce can look at Malcolm Tucker and say: “Well, at least my boss isn't that bad …”
* In the Loop is out on Friday. The Thick of It: the Specials is on sale now.
Reader views (1)
...except my boss really is!!
- Shelley, London, 14/04/2009 14:15
Report abuse
