The opening episode of 5’s John Galsworthy adaptation is a ruthlessly efficient scene-setter
Does anyone read John Galsworthy anymore? Do people remember ITV’s 2002 adaptation of Galsworthy’s The Forsyte Saga, or the BBC’s revered 26-part 1960s version? I doubt it.
In that case, it hardly seems to matter that Debbie Horsfield – the writer of 5’s new adaptation The Forsytes – has taken liberties with the stories, apparently “synthesising Galsworthy, a bit of Age of Innocence and a lot of Dallas”. After all, Horsfield already dared to remake Poldark back in 2015, a then 40-year-old TV drama with a fiercely more loyal fan base than these tales of dynastic rivalry in late Victorian London.
The word “saga” may have been dropped from the title, but a saga this undoubtedly remains, with an awful lot of characters to introduce. This is done with all the subtlety of a telenovela, as the series opens at the 1877 wedding of heir to the Forsyte stockbroker business Jolyon to the widowed socialite Frances (Tuppence Middleton). With most of the cast conveniently gathered in church, it’s left to the Forsyte matriarch, Ann (Francesca Annis), to introduce everyone in a Desperate Housewives-style voiceover.
“There’s Jolyon, returned from his escapades in Europe to take up his role in the family firm, much to the frustration of his cousin Soames… an ambitious sort, unwilling to play second fiddle to anyone,” she begins. “And here comes Frances, newly widowed and hand-picked to cement our status among the London elite”. And so on. Within five minutes, we know who is who and how they feel about each other – a smart move, given our supposedly phone-addled levels of concentration.
Bankrolled by America’s public broadcaster, PBS, which is a faithful importer of a certain type of classy British TV drama, The Forsytes is sumptuously filmed. Everything has a slightly unnatural glossy sheen, especially Danny Griffin as Jolyon, who has been coiffed and styled so that he resembles a handsome prince from a Disney animation. And just in case we didn’t twig that he’s a rotter, Joshua Orpin’s Soames is given a suitably horrid moustache.
A decent cast gives a modicum of depth to some of these characters, especially Eleanor Tomlinson (Demelza in Horsfield’s Poldark) as Irish dressmaker Louisa, a former lover from Jolyon’s “European escapades”. It transpires at the end o f the opening episode that Louisa secretly bore Jolyon twins – and the newly married Jolyon still holds a candle for her. Messy.
Jack Davenport adds some more thespian ballast as Soames’s equally ambitious father, James; Susan Hampshire, who won an Emmy in 1970 for her role in the BBC version of The Forsyte Saga, is rather good as a snobbish neighbour; and Millie Gibson (Ruby Sunday in Doctor Who) plays Irene Heron, a would-be ballerina who catches Soames’s eye. Annis’s Forsyth matriarch, meanwhile, has the haughty disdain and way with acidic observations of Maggie Smith’s dowager in Downton Abbey.
On the evidence of this first episode, however, The Forsytes isn’t a new Downton. As for comparisons to Dallas, another story of feuding families, it’s easier to forget how much of that show’s success rested on Larry Hagman’s portrayal of iconic villain JR Ewing. Joshua Orpin’s Soames will struggle to rival Hagman’s charisma.
Clearly made with an international audience in mind, The Forsytes is about as subtle as a migraine. However, if this ruthlessly efficient scene-setter hasn’t insulted your intelligence, it may dig its soapy hooks into you. Or it might just tempt you to look at Galsworthy’s source novels to discover why this saga won him the Nobel Prize for Literature.
The Forsytes continues next Monday at 9pm on 5
