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The Thick of It returns - but which hapless minister is Rebecca Front portraying?
Anne McElvoy27 Oct 2009
Voters delight, politicians duck for cover: The Thick of It is back. Never can there have been a better time to take apart the preening control freakery of the classe politique.
In the new series, spin doctor Malcolm Tucker (Peter Capaldi) is still screaming and hurling faxes, Terri, the bovine civil servant, is looking after her own interests and Oliver (Chris Addison) is still Whitehall's most irritating smart-aleck.
But the world of male egotism has a new arrival to contend with: a female minister, Nicola Murray, who is earnest enough to join the Cabinet of a government so rubbish that everyone else is rushing to get out of it. "All very positive," as Nicola would say.
I meet Rebecca Front, 44, the comedy stalwart who plays this ingénue in high heels, and ask how possible satire is at a time when politicians have exposed themselves to such ridicule with their flipping, duck-housing and moat-cleaning.
"There's an awful lot of fodder, it's true," she says, "but the series avoids the obvious jibes. Anyway, my character isn't like that at all. She's not a flipper. She's very serious and believes she can get things done. Of course, she is just toast when she comes up against Malcolm."
She says she likes the "Lucille Ball" quality of haplessness in her ministerial alter ego.
Armando Iannucci's creation does come horribly close to the truth, as great comedy always does, with ministers planning announcements only to be undermined by No 10 and the screaming rages of spin doctors out of control.
Front denies she had real-life New Labour women ministers in mind, though that's hard to credit when you watch her.
Nicola has four children and struggles with her public presentation, à la Ruth Kelly, who stood down at last year's Labour conference citing family pressures but made clear she was dissatisfied with Gordon Brown's style.
Caroline Flint, the Don Valley diva, marched out of the Government in June, citing No 10's failure to understand the importance of women in government.
Front's Nicola isn't quite so glam, but tries hard to project a smiling face of the progressive party and never ventures forth without heels and protective red lipstick.
An anonymous female minister told Front: "The best day is when you get promoted to Cabinet and you feel you've really achieved something. It's all downhill from there."
Front toyed with politics herself as a teenager. "Not that I knew what I believed in: I just wanted to rule the world and thought I could do it better than the existing leaders. My character's a bit like the 15-year-old me, just grown up a bit and in charge of a department."
The tragi-comedy is, as Front says, "that she thinks she has been put on earth to do great things".
Yet she ends up, as her character says in a moment of despair, in charge of "a computer and some pens".
"I didn't want to play Nicola as a complete idiot," she adds. "I actually identify quite a lot with some of the things she believes in, like her social mobility drive. And I wanted to sound convincing in the role, so it helped if I could talk about things I might sound sympathetic about myself."
Her deep-throat adviser (who, she adds, has been out of Cabinet for a few years) told her that she always wore heels in public, so as not to be dwarfed by the men around her, but trainers in the office.
So Nicola is trainer-bound for a lot of the scenes when Malcolm towers over her, shouting abuse. "In the office she's a bit under-made-up, to emphasise how wan and exhausted she is," adds Front. "We wanted to pile it all on her plate: kids, problems at home and the work - she's just out of her depth."
The Thick of It is still strong stuff. I bump into Ken Livingstone shortly after the interview, thinking he might like it as a satire on his hated target, New Labour, but he tells me he doesn't. "I can't bear the swearing and the aggression. It's not funny: it just reminds me of too many people I met among the Blairites and I hate the sexually aggressive language."
Front wryly defends the run of profanities as "hand-dredged from the finest mire - it adds to the sense of pressure and menace".
Yet watching the first episode it strikes me that while the series hasn't exactly gone soft, the arrival of Nicola is intended to make us a bit more sympathetic to ministers in the declining years of a government.
Her husband has a dodgy PFI contract, her daughter is about to go to private school, and she's undergoing the terrors of Malcolm. And there's no money left to pursue her cherished crusades anyway.
I call another recently departed minister and ask how accurate that feels. "Spot on," she replies.
I ask Front whether it doesn't further demean the standing of women politicians and put off potential applicants. She looks genuinely worried.
"I am a feminist. I think there should be as many women in politics as possible." Not that The Thick of It is the best recruitment drive. "I'd hate to think it would put women off. Of course it's a hard world and the comedy reflects that but there's also stuff to admire in Nicola's character - she's idealistic, she fights back and she won't take no for an answer. I'd like there to be more politicians like that."
Front insists that The Thick of It isn't topical: "We don't feed in things to be current and we don't do impersonation" - but its strength is that it always reflects the Westminster zeitgeist.
So poor Nicola can't even have a decent office chair because, as Malcolm decrees, "The voters don't like you being comfortable, having expenses or being paid and they'd rather you lived in a ****ing cave."
A comedy fixture since her Oxford days - Front was one of the Patrick Marber set - she was part of the team on The Day Today.
Her back catalogue includes Alan Partridge, Nighty Night and Have I Got News For You, though she has branched out into serious drama with roles in Kavanagh QC and, more recently, Lewis.
But this is the first role she has had to really make her own - and you get the feeling she's relishing being in Nicola's uncomfortable shoes.
When I ask after her own politics she first says that they are "entirely a matter for her" (funny how boring comedians can be on such matters while sending everyone else up).
Then she catches her own pomposity and says, "Well, I write for The Guardian and The Independent so that probably gives you a clue."
She has children at a "very good state school - so I don't lecture anyone about what the right thing to do is".
But she says, of Nicola's dilemma to ditch either the PFI-contract husband or the daughter's posh school: "The idea that anyone can put pressure on you to leave your husband or dictate to you about your family is monstrous. I like to think I'd have told Malcom to... go away. But then, I'm not a politician, so I can't be sure."
Malcolm has long outlived the era of Alastair Campbell and Damian McBride. But Nicola stands for New Labour woman in her declining phase, all empty energy and day-glo jackets.
Gingerly, I mention an observation that is stuck in my mind: Nicola fancies Malcolm, the way a lot of New Labour women had a crush on Alastair Campbell.
"Oh yes," says Front cheerfully, "that was one thing that came out of the semi-improvisation. She quite likes being on Malcolm's radar - even when he's shouting at her. She tries to flirt with him to deflect his rages."
But what will happen to Nicola in what she would doubtless call the "unlikely event of a Labour defeat"? Front says, "I don't see her as the floor-crossing type. That's bad news for me!"
The Thick of It is too good to lose down the plughole of a mere election. We are joined by the producer Adam Tandy, who drops a broad hint that it may not be over if New Labour packs its bags.
"The Thick of It reflects the madness of government, not just New Labour," he says. "I don't think we'd want to let the other side off entirely. We're having a think about that."
Look out, Tory woman, your day will come.
THE MOST LIKELY ROLE MODELS FOR REBECCA
By Victoria Stewart
Barbara Follett, 66, Minister for Culture, Creative Industries & Tourism
Claimed more than £25,000 expenses for security patrols outside her London home. Plans to quit her post at the next election because “I have six grandchildren and I am not seeing much of them”.
Caroline Flint, 48, former Minister of State for Europe
Resigned in June 2009 claiming Brown was running a “two-tier government”, and that she felt like “female window dressing”.
Tessa Jowell, 62, Minister for the Olympics
Separated from lawyer husband David Mills who is under a cloud over his links to Silvio Berlusconi. Very much the Government's driving force on 2012.
Yvette Cooper, 40, Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
Outshone her husband, Ed Balls, who remains as Schools Secretary. Has had three children since being elected and was the first minister to take maternity leave.
Harriet Harman, 59, Labour's Deputy Leader
In 1996 was criticised for sending her three children to selective state schools. Harman's response: “This has got absolutely nothing to do with the fact that I am an MP.”
The Thick of It is on BBC2 on Saturday evenings.
Reader views (1)
No doubt about it. Nicola is Caroline Flint using her femininity to full advantage. But I was absolutely appalled by the behaviour of Malcolm Tucker. If I were Flint, I'd have sacked him Day 1 for his appaalling behaviour and language and bullying manner. Tucker is an absolute disgrace to the Civil Service.
- Dhan Raj, Basildon, 27/10/2009 14:10
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