Brian and Maggie

Walter certainly delivers a more rounded Thatcher than we’re used to, although any 80s nostalgia is limited to the lost art of the unspun, in-depth political interview. Brian and Maggie illustrates the kind of political interview (not to mention honesty) of which we are we’re being deprived.

Crucially, Maggie herself doesn’t collapse into caricature. Walter doesn’t resemble Thatcher – not the tiniest bit – but she somehow makes you feel her, warts and all.

He [Steve Coogan] inhabits Walden’s stolid lack of glamour (a trait shared by great interviewers of this ilk, from Robin Day to Andrew Neil), allowing only his eyes to speak the truth of his ambition. Walter’s Thatcher, on the other hand, feels slightly off. .... Even though the work is more politically equivocal than might be expected from the triumvirate of Frears, Graham and Coogan, it is still effectively polemical.

A drama that is worth your time – an absorbing study of politics, class and conflicted loyalties.

Episode two is markedly better than episode one (both are available) as we see him effectively “betraying” the trust she had in him with artful interview sucker punches. (Quite right: he was paid to be a journalist, not a chum.) .... Both performances are masterly.

Is Brian and Maggie a cautionary tale about the dangers of getting too close to your subject? A round of applause for a reporter who stuck to his guns even at the cost of a dear friendship? A wistful sigh for bygone days when a politician might actually feel obligated to subject herself to such an ordeal? I suspect the answer to all of those questions is yes. I also suspect all of those themes would have landed more forcefully had the show borrowed a bit of Brian’s doggedness, and interrogated its own intentions with a bit more rigor.