As Christina Fitzsimmons (Anna Friel) gets her kids ready for school in episode one of Broken, she talks her son through his maths homework by breaking a complex problem into individual sums. Christina’s whole life is sums – the oppressive mental arithmetic of not-enough. Not enough time (when we meet her she’s forty minutes late for work) and not enough money (she’s borrowed sixty pounds from the till and is sacked as a result).
This is Jimmy McGovern’s latest series for the BBC, a moving six-part drama about characters criss-crossed with the fault lines of their past and present circumstances, and threatening to break apart. As a Catholic priest, Father Michael is an authority to his parish, but he wields that power gently. He listens, reassures and offers help rather than standing in judgment or doling out discipline. Going by the flashbacks he suffers to his traumatic childhood—beaten by a teacher, cruelly chastised by his mother—Father Michael has had quite enough of punishment. Thankfully, children no longer have to confess their sins at mass, he says with a gentle smile. That was the old days. The old days, though, are still here for Bean’s character, in whose past is a pivotal, as-yet unexplained transgression (“I’ve done one or two decent things in my life but I never flashback to them” he tells a fellow priest played by Adrian Dunbar). He’s tormented, still the little boy upbraided by a furious mother, even when that mother is now aged, bird-light and bed-ridden. A poem by Gerard Manley Hopkins (who served as a priest in Liverpool) featured in Bean’s highest achievement in 2012’s Accused: Tracie’s Story, the actor’s previous collaboration with McGovern for which he was rightly rewarded by award nominations and wins. As Tracie, the transvestite alter-ego of English teacher Simon, Bean gave a transcendent recital of No Worst, There Is None. “People know Sean’s a good actor,” McGovern told the Radio Times this year, “But I know he’s a great actor.” Accused was proof of that, and so is Broken. Bean wears Father Michael’s pain lightly – it’s always there but tamped down underneath the character’s kindness and vocation. His gentleness stops this mournful drama from becoming overwhelmingly bleak. You could say the same for Friel’s gutsiness as Christina. Her situation may be desperate, but her love for her kids shines spots of light on the shadow. The music, mostly vintage piano blues, does the same. Nina Simone’s voice adds a sense of glamour to locations that are anything but. It’s not always subtle – Unforgettable plays as the adult Michael sleeps on the floor next to his mother’s bed, its lyrics emphasising his inability to forget the pain she caused him as a child – but it’s effective. As strong as Friel is, Broken belongs to Bean. As Father Michael, he’s a rare thing on gritty TV drama, a good priest and a good man, played by an undeniably great actor. Broken continues next Tuesday the 6th of June on BBC Two.
