Edge of Darkness
Encyclopedia
Edge of Darkness is a British television
drama
serial
, produced by BBC Television
in association with Lionheart Television International and originally broadcast in six fifty-five minute episodes in late 1985. A mixture of crime drama
and political
thriller, it revolves around the efforts of policeman Ronald Craven (played by Bob Peck
) to unravel the truth behind the brutal killing of his daughter Emma (played by Joanne Whalley
). Craven's investigations soon lead him into a murky world of government and corporate cover-ups and nuclear espionage, pitting him against dark forces that threaten the future of life on Earth.
Writer Troy Kennedy Martin
was greatly influenced by the political climate of the time, dominated by the Thatcher
government, regarded by many on the left as reactionary, and the aura of secrecy surrounding the nuclear industry
– and by the implications of the Gaia hypothesis
of environmentalist James Lovelock
; these combined to his crafting a thriller that mingled real world concerns with mythic and mystical elements. Kennedy Martin's original ending was more fantastic than that eventually used in the finished serial: he had proposed that Craven would turn into a tree but this was vetoed by members of the cast and crew.
First broadcast on BBC2
, Edge of Darkness was met with such widespread critical acclaim that within days it had earned a repeat on BBC1
. Winner of several prestigious awards, it remains highly regarded to this day, often cited as one of the best and most influential pieces of British television drama ever made. The series' director, Martin Campbell
, filmed a remake, released in January 2010, starring Mel Gibson
.
police officer Ronald Craven (Bob Peck
) and his daughter Emma (Joanne Whalley
), a scientist and environmental activist, are confronted by a man with a shotgun just outside Craven's home. The gunman fatally shoots Emma with both barrels, then escapes. Because Craven is a detective involved in many ongoing criminal investigations and has conducted many other investigations in the past, his colleagues almost immediately conclude that he had been the target, and that the shooter was one of the men Craven had put away years earlier. Emma is immediately deemed to have been an innocent bystander. Soon, Craven discovers clues suggesting that Emma was indeed the target. Going through Emma's belongings, Craven discovers a geiger counter and a gun - the gun clearly registering on the geiger counter, as does a lock of Emma's hair that he'd clipped in the morgue. He also finds a radiation badge marked 'IIF' - 'International Irradiated Fuels Ltd' - a British company contracted to store radioactive waste at a low level radioactive waste facility known as 'Northmoor'.
Emma's body and her possessions are found to be radioactive. Craven begins experiencing visions of his daughter, but it is unclear whether she is a ghost or a figment of his imagination. Convincing his boss that the killer will end up in London, Craven heads for the city. In London, Craven is contacted by Pendleton (Charles Kay
) a polished official attached to the Prime Minister's office, who informs him that Emma was known to the government as a terrorist. Pendleton later receives a visit from CIA agent Darius Jedburgh (Joe Don Baker
), an associate who is aware of Emma's previous activities. In contrast to Pendleton, Jedburgh is played as a hard-hitting professional with a wry sense of humour and an incongruous passion for golf
, music and watching ballroom dancing on television.
. Along with Harcourt and Pendleton, Jedburgh is keen to find the source and purpose of the plutonium, but there are signs that he has his own plans for Northmoor.
- driving Craven into a breakdown. Briefly hospitalized, Craven returns home and resumes his investigation. He finds a list apparently of London Underground stations written by Emma - possibly the names of tunnels providing a 'back door' into Northmoor. Meanwhile, Harcourt and Pendleton investigate the recovery of a woman's body from a reservoir near Northmoor. Though the cause of death was drowning, the body is irradiated. A pathologist will later testify that the body shows signs of having been in proximity to concentrated fissile
material, of the kind found in a reprocessing plant, and that this coincided with an exposure to a "criticality accident". With the help of a colleague, Craven uses a terminal connected to the MI5
computer to find information on GAIA, Northmoor and Emma. Computer records show that McCroon was acting on the orders of Northmoor Security. He also obtains a three-dimensional map of Northmoor from the computer, and narrowly avoids arrest with Clemmy's help when police investigate the security breach. Craven also confronts Godbolt, a mining union functionary Craven had already begun investigating for rigging a union election. Confident at first, Godbolt wilts when Craven tells him of his investigations of Northmoor. Godbolt, knowing that disclosure of Northmoor will ruin him, confesses his role in IIF and Emma's death, and reveals the origins of Northmoor. Craven reunites with Jedburgh (who is just returning from a mission in El Salvador
) and learns that the American spy's role in creating GAIA resulted from his country's policy in limiting the worldwide production of plutonium - a policy reversed (according to Jedburgh) during the Carter Administration. The episode ends with Craven broaching to Jedburgh his idea of breaking into Northmoor.
. Back at Northmoor, as the two intruders escape the hot cell and flee from IIF security forces, Jedburgh gives Ronnie some of the plutonium as evidence, then orders Craven to split from him. Craven - having been warned by Godbolt to stay on his guard about Jedburgh - wants to know what the CIA man intends to do with the rest of the material. Jedburgh, telling Craven that he plans to go to Scotland, reiterates his order at gun point and the two part ways. Craven flees for a bunker - a disused nuclear weapons fire control site. Now feeling the effects of the radiation, and with the IIF forces flooding the bunker with gas, Craven desperately seeks out a working telephone - the only one he can find dials directly to a disused basement at 10 Downing Street
. A bemused security guard answers the call as Craven screams "Get me Pendleton!"
, and may be becoming delusional. Rather than golf, Jedburgh's plans in Scotland involve an appearance at a NATO conference on directed energy weapons held at the Gleneagles Hotel
in Scotland. Also present at the conference is Grogan who arrives with the news that the British government has approved the purchase of IIF. Before a roused audience, Grogan delivers a coldly passionate address on the power of fusion, invoking the spirit of historic explorers and boldly proclaiming man's destiny to become a "celestial warrior" and establish a "solar empire". The audience of military and civilian officials applauds but Jedburgh, in U.S. Army uniform, takes the podium to denounce Grogan's vision for a nuclear state. Finishing his speech, he gleefully reveals two bars of the plutonium stolen from Northmoor, yelling "Get it while it's hot". The audience, bemused at first, breaks into a panic and flees the room. With only Grogan left, Jedburgh brings together the two bars, causing a criticality
incident and irradiating Grogan.
With Clemmy's car, Craven drives to Scotland. His sickness worsening, Craven stops near a stream, where Emma appears. She tells Craven of a time in Earth's distant and frigid past when black flowers grew, warming the Earth and preventing life from becoming extinct
. These same black flowers have returned, she says, to save Earth from its latest enemy - mankind. Once the flowers have spread, the absorbed heat will melt the polar icecaps, washing mankind away. Tracking Jedburgh down to a remote country house, Craven learns that the American has weaponized the remaining plutonium by wrapping it around a plastic explosive core, it can be detonated even at the bottom of a loch by shooting it with a plutonium bullet. Craven tells Jedburgh that Grogan had expected the inquiry to block his acquisition of Northmooor; his mission to steal the plutonium was set up by the CIA to ensure the industrialist kept control of the material. Unbeknownst to both men, a hit squad is nearing the house. Among other things, they carry a coffin shaped box carrying radiation warning labels. Inside the house, the pair have a final rambling conversation - touching the appearance of the black flower, the song "Time of the Preacher" and the likely victor in the battles of good and evil, and between Earth and mankind; The black flower is real, Jedburgh tells Craven - he's seen it in Afghanistan. The American is convinced that mankind will find a way to survive, but Craven doubts this, and declares that if it comes to war between mankind and the planet he's on the side of the planet. Jedburgh, expecting the assassins, leaves Craven when they break into the house, determined to get as many as he can. Ultimately killing Jedburgh, the team spares Craven, the squad leader pointing out to the others that Craven's "on our side". Outraged, Craven bellows "I am not on your side!" as they leave.
In the final scene, Pendleton and Harcourt observe IIF's retrieval of the plutonium from a nearby loch
, where Jedburgh had hidden it. A voiceover by Harcourt, in the form of a letter to Clemmy concerning the events, reveals that Grogan is also dying from the radiation exposure he received at the hotel. Pendleton and Harcourt spot Craven watching the retrieval operation from a nearby hill. Harcourt laments his inability to comfort Craven, wanting to reassure the detective that Gaia will be safe and that good will triumph over evil - knowing that Craven simply would not believe it. As he watches the recovery team leave the area, and knowing his life is at an end, Craven wails Emma's name one last time.
Time passes. The waves lap against a nameless shore over nights and days. The camera pans against the side of snow covered hill where black flowers bloom, harbingers of Gaia's coming war against mankind.
for the Royal Shakespeare Company
. Notable roles after Edge of Darkness included On the Black Hill
(1987), Slipstream
(1989), Natural Lies (1992) and Jurassic Park
(1993). He died in 1999.
Joanne Whalley
, who played Emma Craven, began acting during childhood, appearing in the long-running soap opera
Coronation Street
(1960–present) in 1976 at the age of 10. She had also appeared in supporting roles in several series including Juliet Bravo
(1980–1985), Bergerac
(1981–1991) and Reilly, Ace of Spies
(1983). Following Edge of Darkness, Whalley was cast in the equally well regarded BBC television serial The Singing Detective
(1986), written by Dennis Potter
. Moving to Hollywood, she appeared in such films as Willow
(1988), Scandal (1989) and Shattered (1991) as well as television mini-series such as Scarlett
(1994) and Jackie Bouvier Kennedy Onassis (2000). During her eight year marriage to the actor Val Kilmer
, between 1988 and 1996, she was often credited as Joanne Whalley-Kilmer.
Cast as Darius Jedburgh was Joe Don Baker
, who had been acting since the 1960s and was known for his roles in Westerns
such as Gunsmoke
(1955–1975) and as the lead in the detective series Eischied
(1979–1980). He also starred as Sherriff Buford Pusser in the original 1972 film Walking Tall
. The script of Edge of Darkness so impressed him that he agreed to take the part at lower than his usual fee. He was later cast, by Edge of Darkness director Martin Campbell, as CIA agent Jack Wade in the James Bond
film GoldenEye
(1995), a role he reprised in Tomorrow Never Dies
(1997).
Charles Kay, who played Pendleton, was a well established character actor who had appeared in Fall of Eagles
(1974), I, Claudius
(1976) and The Devil's Crown (1978). He has since acted in many television productions such as Fortunes of War
(1989), The Darling Buds of May
(1991–1993), Jonathan Creek
(1997–2004) and Midsomer Murders
(1997–present).
Edge of Darkness was an early role for Ian McNeice, who played Harcourt. He went on to act in a wide variety of film and television parts including The Englishman Who Went Up a Hill But Came Down a Mountain
(1995), Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls
(1995) and Frank Herbert's Dune
(2000) as well as regular roles in Doc Martin
(2004–present) and Rome
(2005–2007).
Several other familiar faces to British viewers appeared during the course of the episodes, including John Woodvine
(as Craven's superior DCS Ross), Tim McInnerny
(as Emma's boyfriend Terry Shields), Hugh Fraser
(as IIF chief executive Robert Bennett), Zoë Wanamaker
(as intelligence agent Clementine) and Blake's 7
cast members David Jackson
(as Colonel Lawson) and Brian Croucher
(as Northmoor security chief Connors). Playing themselves were television reporters Sue Cook
and Kenneth Kendall
, weatherman Bill Giles
and Labour MP
Michael Meacher
. Long-standing BBC visual effects designer Mat Irvine
, who contributed visual effects to the series, received a brief cameo as a police diver in 'Breakthrough'.
was the creator of the long-running BBC police drama Z-Cars
(1962–1978). He also wrote the screenplay for the films The Italian Job
(1969) and Kelly's Heroes
(1970) and scripts for television series such as Colditz
(1972–1974), The Sweeney
(1975–1978) (which was created by his brother Ian Kennedy Martin
) and Reilly, Ace of Spies (1983). Following Edge of Darkness, he wrote the screenplays for the films Red Heat
(with Walter Hill) (1988) and Bravo Two Zero
(1999). He died in September 2009.
Director Martin Campbell
had developed a reputation for handling action thrillers with credits including The Professionals
(1977–1983), Minder
(1979–1994) and Shoestring (1979–1980). A few years after Edge of Darkness, Campbell moved into feature films, directing the James Bond films GoldenEye (1995) and Casino Royale
(2006) as well as The Mask of Zorro
(1998), Vertical Limit
(2000) and The Legend of Zorro
(2005).
Producer Michael Wearing
had worked on Play for Today
for which he had produced Alan Bleasdale
's The Black Stuff (1978) and which he and Bleasdale subsequently spun off into the highly acclaimed Boys from the Blackstuff
(1982). He also produced the conspiracy thriller Bird of Prey
(1982). Following Edge of Darkness he continued to be one of British television's most high profile and successful producers, appointed Head of Serials at the BBC between 1989 and 1998 where he was responsible for such programmes as Pride and Prejudice
(1995), Our Friends in the North
(1996) and Dennis Potter's final two plays Karaoke
(1996) and Cold Lazarus
(1996).
Walt Patterson
, who acted as series adviser, was a leading commentator on nuclear affairs, best known for his book Nuclear Power (Penguin, 1976–1986). Following Edge of Darkness, he acted as specialist adviser to the British House of Commons Select Committee on Environment for their 1986 study, Radioactive Waste. He continues to contribute to the policy debate about energy and environmental issues. Advice on the policing aspects of the serial was provided by the West Yorkshire Police
and former Scotland Yard
detective Jack Slipper
, famous for his pursuit of the train robber
Ronnie Biggs
.
was provided by Eric Clapton
and Michael Kamen
. Clapton was approached to provide the score by producer Michael Wearing. Shortly afterwards, when Michael Kamen brought Clapton to a screening of Brazil
(1985), which he, Kamen, had scored, Eric suggested a collaboration between the two on Edge of Darkness. Kamen became one of Hollywood's most successful film composers, writing the scores for many blockbuster films including the Lethal Weapon
series (1987–1998) (with Eric Clapton), the first three Die Hard
films (1988, 1990, 1995), Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves
(1991) and X-Men
(2000). He died in 2003.
Aside from the Clapton/Kamen soundtrack, Willie Nelson
's "The Time of the Preacher", New Model Army
's "Christian Militia", and Tom Waits
' "16 Shells From A Thirty-Ought-Six" are featured in the series. "Christian Militia" is on the record player when Terry's body is found. Craven listens to "The Time of the Preacher" when he is in Emma's room in the first episode. It later emerges Jedburgh is familiar with the song and both he and Craven sing it on two occasions, the lyrics being significant.
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation
used the music to illustrate stories on the Chernobyl disaster
the following year. Eric Clapton and Michael Kamen performed the movie's main theme with the National Philharmonic Orchestra
during the 24 Nights
period in 1990 and 1991.
as President of the United States
had brought about a major shift in the global political landscape and Kennedy Martin was motivated to write out of concern arising from such issues as the Greenham Common protests
, the Falklands War
, unrest among the miners and, arising out of the escalation of the Cold War
, the fear that “born-again Christians and Cold War warriors appeared to be running the United States”.
By 1983, Kennedy Martin had written the first draft of what would eventually become Edge of Darkness – at this stage it was called Magnox (a reference to the Magnox
type of nuclear reactor
) and was about trade union
problems in the nuclear industry. The script was given to BBC Head of Drama Series & Serials, Jonathan Powell, who encouraged Kennedy Martin to continue its development. The script would go though many changes and revisions before reaching its final form.
A particular influence was the speech made by President Ronald Reagan on 23 March 1983 announcing the Strategic Defense Initiative
(SDI) which, using ground-based and space-based systems, proposed protecting the United States from attack by nuclear missiles
. One of the supporters of SDI was one-time US presidential candidate Lyndon LaRouche
, on whom Kennedy Martin based the character of Jerry Grogan, owner of the Fusion Corporation of Kansas. Kennedy Martin was also influenced by the culture of secrecy surrounding the UK's policy regarding nuclear power in light of the inquiry into the construction of the Sizewell B nuclear power station and the concerns about the safety record of the Sellafield
nuclear power plant; this led him to conceive International Irradiated Fuels and its chief executive Robert Bennett.
The other major influence was the Gaia hypothesis, that the Earth is a single living system that self-regulates to maintain the optimum conditions for life, formulated by climate scientist James Lovelock and popularised in his 1979 book Gaia: A new look at life on Earth. Kennedy Martin used the name GAIA for the environmental organisation Emma Craven was involved in and drew the notion for the black flowers seen at the serial's conclusion from a passage in Lovelock's book that describes a dark marsh grass that grew on the surface of the Earth trapping heat during a time when the planet was too cold to sustain life.
Although Kennedy Martin's notion for the serial was influenced by real political events, he had for a long time railed against naturalism
in television drama – most notably in a 1964 article for the theatre magazine Encore, titled “Nats Go Home. First Statement of a New Drama for Television”, in which he sought “to free the camera from photographing dialogue, to free the structure from natural time and to exploit the total and absolute objectivity of the television camera”. Edge of Darkness producer Michael Wearing has noted that “there is a mystical dimension to Troy's imagination. His instincts are visual and non-naturalistic”. Kennedy Martin, therefore, crafted a serial that on the one hand placed its events squarely within the real, present day world but on the other also placed itself within the realm of the mystical and the mythic. Realism and authenticity was provided by the appearances of real life television presenter Sue Cook and Labour MP Michael Meacher. There was also use of contemporary stock footage, such as Robin Day
's interview with Margaret Thatcher and references to real persons like Michael Heseltine
and places such as Sellafield, alongside the references to fictitious characters and places contained in the plot. The mystical dimension is provided by Emma's ghost while the mythic is provided by Craven himself and by Jedburgh and Grogan. Kennedy Martin, influenced by John Darragh
's The Real Camelot (Thames and Hudson, 1981) which examined the pagan origins of the Arthurian legend
, saw Craven as a modern day Green Man
who would confront the threats to the Earth on behalf of Gaia. Jedburgh was conceived by Kennedy Martin as a Knight of the Marches, one of the Teutonic Knights
who defended the borders of Eastern Europe
, opposed to Grogan, who Kennedy Martin saw as a descendant of the Knights Templar
who, according to legend, had guarded a special wisdom in the Temple of the Dome of the Rock
in Jerusalem. These aspects would reach their apotheosis in the serial's conclusion in which Kennedy Martin envisaged that Craven, having found the plutonium stolen by Jedburgh, would be shot by a sniper
and would be transformed into a tree.
Shooting on Edge of Darkness began on 9 July 1984 and ran for five months until 5 December 1984. Location filming took place in London (including the Barbican Arts Centre, BBC Television Centre
and the Hilton International Kensington
), Yorkshire (including the headquarters of the West Yorkshire Police in Bradford
, the headquarters of Systime Computers {now the O2 building} in Leeds
where Craven hacks into the MI5 computer and at Westwood Cottage, Ilkley
for Craven's home), Scotland (including the Gleneagles Hotel, where Jedburgh addresses the NATO conference and also where President Reagan's Reykjavík policy
was formulated) and Wales
(including Clogau Gold Mine and Manod, Blaenau Ffestiniog
doubling as Northmoor with the hot cell a set constructed at a factory in Penygroes). Throughout the entire shoot, the production continued to be known as Magnox; the title Dark Forces was briefly considered before the serial was renamed Edge of Darkness in April 1985. As the shoot progressed it became apparent to the cast and crew that they had a potential hit on their hands; Bob Peck recalled, “I think we knew when we were making it that it was a good piece of work” while Kennedy Martin told reporters “I haven't had this feeling about something for 20 years. It's wonderful, after all this time, to get something that actually works”.
and was broadcast on Monday nights on BBC2 at 9:30pm, beginning 4 November 1985. The serial averaged an audience of 4 million viewers over its run. The critical response was generally positive with most commentators concentrating their praise on Peck's performance as Craven and the scale of the programme's political themes. “A good television thriller is very hard to find but Edge of Darkness promises to be one of the best”, wrote Celia Brayfield in The Times
, “The central character is played by Bob Peck, who has the gift of looking tragic and intelligent simultaneously. [...] There was humour to lift the gloom and superb characterisation to flesh out the stock situation”. Ruth Baumgarten, in The Listener, praised the serial as “a grandiosely ambitious and compelling piece of fiction”. Speaking on the BBC's review programme Did You See...?
, the writer Sarah Dunant
said, “this is a very classy piece of television drama, on all levels, I think on the plot level, I think on the level of emotion and I think stylistically [...] it looks absolutely wonderful, it's shot like a feature film”. Not so impressed was Byron Rogers
, television critic of The Sunday Times
, who initially hailed the series as one that “stayed in the mind and will stay there long [...] because of its portrayal of human grief” but later felt he was “beginning to find Edge of Darkness slightly irritating” and decried the final episode as “an insult to its considerable following”.
Aware of the critical buzz surrounding the show, BBC1 Controller, Michael Grade
, quickly announced that the series would be repeated on BBC1, stating, “I think it will reach a wider audience and it deserves it”, and so Edge of Darkness was duly shown, in double episodes, over three consecutive nights between 19 December and 21 December 1985, the fastest time between original broadcast and repeat in the BBC's history. These repeats were accompanied by a disclaimer that the GAIA organisation depicted in the programme was not connected with the Gaia publishing company supported by Prince Philip
. It was a move that paid off – Edge of Darkness doubled its audience on BBC1 to 8 million viewers.
of concern about nuclear power and nuclear warfare in the early to mid nineteen-eighties. In 1980, current affairs programme Panorama
broadcast “If The Bomb Drops”, a documentary that examined how well prepared Britain was for a nuclear attack; in 1983, The Day After
an American TV movie about a nuclear war aired; in 1984, the BBC broadcast On the Eighth Day, a documentary about the effects of a nuclear winter
and Threads
, a drama about a nuclear attack on Sheffield
while 1985 saw the first screening of Peter Watkins
' nuclear war television film The War Game
, banned on television since 1965. Edge of Darkness also rode on a wave of preoccupation with the secretive nature of the State in both fact (e.g. This Week
’s “Death on the Rock
” (1988) about the deaths of three Provisional IRA members in Gibraltar
and Secret Society (1987) about undisclosed matters of public interest which led to the sacking
of BBC Director General Alasdair Milne
) and fiction (e.g. the films Defence of the Realm
(1985) and The Whistle Blower (1987) and the television serials A Very British Coup
(1988) and Traffik
(1989)).
Edge of Darkness continues to be well regarded to this day. When it was repeated on BBC2 in 1992, Sean Day-Lewis wrote in The Daily Telegraph
, “Edge of Darkness is a masterpiece. It is one of those very rare television creations so rich in form and content that the spectator wishes there was some way of prolonging it indefinitely”. Andrew Lavender, writing in British Television Drama in the 1980s, has said that Edge of Darkness “captured the spirit of its age but went far beyond the drama of its time. [...] It pushed against expectations attaching to the thriller form, often transcending the limits of the genre”. Fred Inglis
, in his analysis of the serial in Formations: 20th Century Media Studies, takes it “as one of the most remarkable works of art made for British television”. According to Lez Cooke, in British Television Drama: A History, “In a reactionary climate, when the possibilities for the production of 'social issue' drama were limited, Edge of Darkness proved that, by adapting to changed circumstances and adopting a serialised thriller format, it was still possible to produce ambitious and progressive television drama in Britain in the mid-1980s”, a view echoed by Sean Cubit in EcoMedia who notes that “the series neatly echoed the chill that descended on radical politics in the Thatcher years in the United Kingdom”. The television historian Andrew Pixley has described the series as “possibly the finest BBC drama ever made” and “one of the few television programmes where every element can be said to have worked to complete effect”.
Edge of Darkness was placed fifteenth (fourth position out of the dramas featured on the list) on the British Film Institute
's list of the 100 Greatest British Television Programmes
in 2000, the BFI describing it as “a gripping, innovative six-part drama which fully deserves its cult status and many awards.”. Radio Times television editor Alison Graham listed it as one of the forty greatest television programmes ever made in 2003. It was one of only seven dramas listed in Broadcast
magazine's list of the fifty most influential television programmes, published in July 2004. In March 2007, Edge of Darkness was placed third in Channel 4
's list of the Greatest TV Dramas
. Also on Channel 4, Darius Jedburgh was listed eighty-fourth in their list of the One Hundred Greatest TV Characters in 2001.
At the 1986 Broadcasting Press Guild
television critics' awards, Edge of Darkness won two awards:
videotape
by the BBC in 1987. There was also a release from CBS/Fox Video in North America at the same time. The soundtrack was also released as an album entitled Edge of Darkness
.
Troy Kennedy Martin's original script for episode one and the final scripts for episodes two to six of the serial were published by Faber and Faber
in 1990; the script book also included an introduction by Kennedy Martin and two appendices – the first giving background to the story and the main characters and the second giving comments on the script by experts on nuclear power and police procedures.
The serial was re-issued on VHS in 1998 by Revelation Films who also issued the serial on DVD in 1999. In 2003, BBC Worldwide
re-issued Edge of Darkness on DVD (encoded for both regions 2 and 4) with several extra features including Magnox: The Secrets of Edge of Darkness, a specially made “making-of” documentary; an isolated soundtrack of Eric Clapton and Michael Kamen's score; a Bob Peck interview from BBC Breakfast Time
; a contemporary report on the programme's BAFTA wins and coverage of the programme's wins at the Broadcasting Press Guild awards. A Region 1 DVD set was released on 3 November 2009.
British television
Public television broadcasting started in the United Kingdom in 1936, and now has a collection of free and subscription services over a variety of distribution media, through which there are over 480 channelsTaking the base Sky EPG TV Channels. A breakdown is impossible due to a) the number of...
drama
Drama
Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance. The term comes from a Greek word meaning "action" , which is derived from "to do","to act" . The enactment of drama in theatre, performed by actors on a stage before an audience, presupposes collaborative modes of production and a...
serial
Serial (radio and television)
Serials are series of television programs and radio programs that rely on a continuing plot that unfolds in a sequential episode by episode fashion. Serials typically follow main story arcs that span entire television seasons or even the full run of the series, which distinguishes them from...
, produced by BBC Television
BBC Television
BBC Television is a service of the British Broadcasting Corporation. The corporation, which has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a Royal Charter since 1927, has produced television programmes from its own studios since 1932, although the start of its regular service of television...
in association with Lionheart Television International and originally broadcast in six fifty-five minute episodes in late 1985. A mixture of crime drama
Crime fiction
Crime fiction is the literary genre that fictionalizes crimes, their detection, criminals and their motives. It is usually distinguished from mainstream fiction and other genres such as science fiction or historical fiction, but boundaries can be, and indeed are, blurred...
and political
Political drama
A political drama can describe a play, film or TV program that has a political component, whether reflecting the author's political opinion, or describing a politician or series of political events. Dramatists who have written political dramas include Aaron Sorkin, Robert Penn Warren, Sergei...
thriller, it revolves around the efforts of policeman Ronald Craven (played by Bob Peck
Bob Peck
Bob Peck was an English stage, television and film actor.-Early life:He went to Leeds Modern School in Lawnswood...
) to unravel the truth behind the brutal killing of his daughter Emma (played by Joanne Whalley
Joanne Whalley
-Early life:Whalley was born in Salford but brought up in Stockport where she studied at the Braeside School of Speech and Drama, Marple.Whalley first appeared as a child in How We Used To Live and bit parts in soap operas, especially Coronation Street and Emmerdale...
). Craven's investigations soon lead him into a murky world of government and corporate cover-ups and nuclear espionage, pitting him against dark forces that threaten the future of life on Earth.
Writer Troy Kennedy Martin
Troy Kennedy Martin
Troy Kennedy Martin was a Scottish-born film and television screenwriter best known for creating the long running BBC TV police series Z-Cars, and for the award-winning 1985 anti-nuclear drama Edge of Darkness...
was greatly influenced by the political climate of the time, dominated by the Thatcher
Margaret Thatcher
Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher, was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990...
government, regarded by many on the left as reactionary, and the aura of secrecy surrounding the nuclear industry
Nuclear power
Nuclear power is the use of sustained nuclear fission to generate heat and electricity. Nuclear power plants provide about 6% of the world's energy and 13–14% of the world's electricity, with the U.S., France, and Japan together accounting for about 50% of nuclear generated electricity...
– and by the implications of the Gaia hypothesis
Gaia hypothesis
The Gaia hypothesis, also known as Gaia theory or Gaia principle, proposes that all organisms and their inorganic surroundings on Earth are closely integrated to form a single and self-regulating complex system, maintaining the conditions for life on the planet.The scientific investigation of the...
of environmentalist James Lovelock
James Lovelock
James Lovelock, CH, CBE, FRS is an independent scientist, environmentalist and futurologist who lives in Devon, England. He is best known for proposing the Gaia hypothesis, which postulates that the biosphere is a self-regulating entity with the capacity to keep our planet healthy by controlling...
; these combined to his crafting a thriller that mingled real world concerns with mythic and mystical elements. Kennedy Martin's original ending was more fantastic than that eventually used in the finished serial: he had proposed that Craven would turn into a tree but this was vetoed by members of the cast and crew.
First broadcast on BBC2
BBC Two
BBC Two is the second television channel operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It covers a wide range of subject matter, but tending towards more 'highbrow' programmes than the more mainstream and popular BBC One. Like the BBC's other domestic TV and radio...
, Edge of Darkness was met with such widespread critical acclaim that within days it had earned a repeat on BBC1
BBC One
BBC One is the flagship television channel of the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It was launched on 2 November 1936 as the BBC Television Service, and was the world's first regular television service with a high level of image resolution...
. Winner of several prestigious awards, it remains highly regarded to this day, often cited as one of the best and most influential pieces of British television drama ever made. The series' director, Martin Campbell
Martin Campbell
-Life and career:Campbell was born in Hastings, New Zealand. He directed two James Bond films, 1995's GoldenEye, starring Pierce Brosnan, and 2006's Casino Royale, starring Daniel Craig, and was the first Bond director since John Glen to direct more than one film, as well as the oldest director in...
, filmed a remake, released in January 2010, starring Mel Gibson
Mel Gibson
Mel Colm-Cille Gerard Gibson, AO is an American actor, film director, producer and screenwriter. Born in Peekskill, New York, Gibson moved with his parents to Sydney, Australia when he was 12 years old and later studied acting at the Australian National Institute of Dramatic Art.After appearing in...
.
"Compassionate Leave"
On a rainy night, YorkshireYorkshire
Yorkshire is a historic county of northern England and the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its great size in comparison to other English counties, functions have been increasingly undertaken over time by its subdivisions, which have also been subject to periodic reform...
police officer Ronald Craven (Bob Peck
Bob Peck
Bob Peck was an English stage, television and film actor.-Early life:He went to Leeds Modern School in Lawnswood...
) and his daughter Emma (Joanne Whalley
Joanne Whalley
-Early life:Whalley was born in Salford but brought up in Stockport where she studied at the Braeside School of Speech and Drama, Marple.Whalley first appeared as a child in How We Used To Live and bit parts in soap operas, especially Coronation Street and Emmerdale...
), a scientist and environmental activist, are confronted by a man with a shotgun just outside Craven's home. The gunman fatally shoots Emma with both barrels, then escapes. Because Craven is a detective involved in many ongoing criminal investigations and has conducted many other investigations in the past, his colleagues almost immediately conclude that he had been the target, and that the shooter was one of the men Craven had put away years earlier. Emma is immediately deemed to have been an innocent bystander. Soon, Craven discovers clues suggesting that Emma was indeed the target. Going through Emma's belongings, Craven discovers a geiger counter and a gun - the gun clearly registering on the geiger counter, as does a lock of Emma's hair that he'd clipped in the morgue. He also finds a radiation badge marked 'IIF' - 'International Irradiated Fuels Ltd' - a British company contracted to store radioactive waste at a low level radioactive waste facility known as 'Northmoor'.
Emma's body and her possessions are found to be radioactive. Craven begins experiencing visions of his daughter, but it is unclear whether she is a ghost or a figment of his imagination. Convincing his boss that the killer will end up in London, Craven heads for the city. In London, Craven is contacted by Pendleton (Charles Kay
Charles Kay
Charles Kay is an English actor.Kay was born in Coventry, West Midlands, the son of Frances and Charles Beckingham Piff....
) a polished official attached to the Prime Minister's office, who informs him that Emma was known to the government as a terrorist. Pendleton later receives a visit from CIA agent Darius Jedburgh (Joe Don Baker
Joe Don Baker
Joe Don Baker is an American film actor, perhaps best known for his roles as a Mafia hitman in Charley Varrick, deputy sheriff Thomas Jefferson Geronimo III in Final Justice, real-life Tennessee Sheriff Buford Pusser in Walking Tall, brute force with a badge detective Mitchell in Mitchell, James...
), an associate who is aware of Emma's previous activities. In contrast to Pendleton, Jedburgh is played as a hard-hitting professional with a wry sense of humour and an incongruous passion for golf
Golf
Golf is a precision club and ball sport, in which competing players use many types of clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a golf course using the fewest number of strokes....
, music and watching ballroom dancing on television.
"Into the Shadows"
Staying in London, Craven has more intense visions of Emma to which he voices his frustration. The police find the killer's getaway car. Fingerprints on the car belong to Lowe, a man Craven had arrested ten years earlier. Meanwhile, Pendleton introduces Craven to his colleague, Harcourt (Ian McNeice), who informs him that Emma was a member of a subversive anti-nuclear group called 'GAIA'. A team of six GAIA members led by Emma broke into Northmoor on 8 May 1985; all of whom are now either dead or missing. Craven meets Emma's boyfriend, Terry 'Tel' Shields (Tim McInnerny), a political agitator who is under surveillance. Shields - more a socialist than environmentalist - tells Craven that Emma was investigating a "hot cell" in Northmoor. When Craven looks up his file on computer he finds it is restricted, leading him to speculate that Shields is an informer who passed information about the GAIA raid to the authorities. Seeing Craven make a televised appeal for information about Emma's killer, Jedburgh contacts him and shows Craven the CIA's file on Emma's activities. The file describes how GAIA and the CIA became suspicious of Northmoor when a nearby reservoir became contaminated with radioactive material, leading them to believe Northmoor was illegally storing plutoniumPlutonium
Plutonium is a transuranic radioactive chemical element with the chemical symbol Pu and atomic number 94. It is an actinide metal of silvery-gray appearance that tarnishes when exposed to air, forming a dull coating when oxidized. The element normally exhibits six allotropes and four oxidation...
. Along with Harcourt and Pendleton, Jedburgh is keen to find the source and purpose of the plutonium, but there are signs that he has his own plans for Northmoor.
"Burden of Proof"
The police close in on their suspect, Lowe (Roy Heather). Although successfully apprehended, Lowe manages to break free, jumping from the window of his building. Lowe dies in his hospital bed, but not before he tells Craven that he was working with McCroon, whom Craven had convicted while in Northern Ireland. Ironically, this only strengthens the official theory that Ronald had been the target. Meanwhile, Jedburgh goes to Shields's home, and finds that he was murdered - as was the occupant of a van that had been surveilling Shields's home. Craven meets Harcourt and Pendleton at the British House of Commons where an inquiry is taking place into the sale of IIF to 'The Fusion Corporation of Kansas', owned by Jerry Grogan (Kenneth Nelson). Pendleton tells Craven that he believes Grogan was behind Emma's death. Craven refuses to testify in the IIF inquiry, but his presence there clearly unsettles Robert Bennet (Hugh Fraser), IIF's managing director. Outside of the hearings, Craven is introduced to Clementine (Zoë Wanamaker), with whom Jedburgh worked in the past. It is 'Clemmy' who informs an incredulous Craven that Jedburgh created GAIA. Jedburgh confronts Grogan, warning him to stay out of Northmoor. It is clear both men know each other on hostile terms. Returning to Yorkshire for Emma's funeral, Craven is refused permission to seek a warrant to enter Northmoor - his superiors stubbornly adhere to the theory that Emma was killed by Lowe and McCroon, and suspect Craven of cracking. Returning home, Craven is observed by McCroon (Sean Caffrey)."Breakthrough"
McCroon, as Craven had expected, breaks into Craven's house intent on killing him. McCroon, with a shotgun to Craven's head, insists that it was Ronnie and not Emma who had been targeted - revenge for Craven's work exploiting and then abandoning informers in Northern Ireland. Craven appears unafraid, certain he can get McCroon to tell him who he is working for. Cryptically, McCroon says they were both "marked" for death but is then shot by a police marksmanMarksman
A marksman is a person who is skilled in precision, or a sharpshooter shooting, using projectile weapons, such as with a rifle but most commonly with a sniper rifle, to shoot at long range targets...
- driving Craven into a breakdown. Briefly hospitalized, Craven returns home and resumes his investigation. He finds a list apparently of London Underground stations written by Emma - possibly the names of tunnels providing a 'back door' into Northmoor. Meanwhile, Harcourt and Pendleton investigate the recovery of a woman's body from a reservoir near Northmoor. Though the cause of death was drowning, the body is irradiated. A pathologist will later testify that the body shows signs of having been in proximity to concentrated fissile
Fissile
In nuclear engineering, a fissile material is one that is capable of sustaining a chain reaction of nuclear fission. By definition, fissile materials can sustain a chain reaction with neutrons of any energy. The predominant neutron energy may be typified by either slow neutrons or fast neutrons...
material, of the kind found in a reprocessing plant, and that this coincided with an exposure to a "criticality accident". With the help of a colleague, Craven uses a terminal connected to the MI5
MI5
The Security Service, commonly known as MI5 , is the United Kingdom's internal counter-intelligence and security agency and is part of its core intelligence machinery alongside the Secret Intelligence Service focused on foreign threats, Government Communications Headquarters and the Defence...
computer to find information on GAIA, Northmoor and Emma. Computer records show that McCroon was acting on the orders of Northmoor Security. He also obtains a three-dimensional map of Northmoor from the computer, and narrowly avoids arrest with Clemmy's help when police investigate the security breach. Craven also confronts Godbolt, a mining union functionary Craven had already begun investigating for rigging a union election. Confident at first, Godbolt wilts when Craven tells him of his investigations of Northmoor. Godbolt, knowing that disclosure of Northmoor will ruin him, confesses his role in IIF and Emma's death, and reveals the origins of Northmoor. Craven reunites with Jedburgh (who is just returning from a mission in El Salvador
El Salvador
El Salvador or simply Salvador is the smallest and the most densely populated country in Central America. The country's capital city and largest city is San Salvador; Santa Ana and San Miguel are also important cultural and commercial centers in the country and in all of Central America...
) and learns that the American spy's role in creating GAIA resulted from his country's policy in limiting the worldwide production of plutonium - a policy reversed (according to Jedburgh) during the Carter Administration. The episode ends with Craven broaching to Jedburgh his idea of breaking into Northmoor.
"Northmoor"
Over breakfast, Grogan informs Bennet of Jedburgh's plan to break into Northmoor. With the help of Godbolt, Craven and Jedburgh penetrate Northmoor through old mines. Tipped off, IIF security try to flood the tunnels, apparently as they had with GAIA. This requires tons of water already needed to cool their reactor rods. Surviving the floods, Jedburgh and Craven proceed to Northmoor - on the way, they stumble on the irradiated bodies of the missing members of the GAIA team. Reaching the "hot cell", which sends Craven's geiger counter into a frenzy, the two find the signs of a horrific radiation accident. The bodies of fatally irradiated personnel still lie where they died. Jedburgh, under orders from the CIA, enters the hot cell and steals the plutonium. Meanwhile, at the House of Commons inquiry, Bennett is forced to admit the presence of plutonium at Northmoor and the deaths of the GAIA team. He had informed neither the police nor the civilian nuclear regulatory authorities of this - in violation of regulations and IIF's charter - because, he says, the plutonium belonged to the Ministry of DefenceMinistry of Defence (United Kingdom)
The Ministry of Defence is the United Kingdom government department responsible for implementation of government defence policy and is the headquarters of the British Armed Forces....
. Back at Northmoor, as the two intruders escape the hot cell and flee from IIF security forces, Jedburgh gives Ronnie some of the plutonium as evidence, then orders Craven to split from him. Craven - having been warned by Godbolt to stay on his guard about Jedburgh - wants to know what the CIA man intends to do with the rest of the material. Jedburgh, telling Craven that he plans to go to Scotland, reiterates his order at gun point and the two part ways. Craven flees for a bunker - a disused nuclear weapons fire control site. Now feeling the effects of the radiation, and with the IIF forces flooding the bunker with gas, Craven desperately seeks out a working telephone - the only one he can find dials directly to a disused basement at 10 Downing Street
10 Downing Street
10 Downing Street, colloquially known in the United Kingdom as "Number 10", is the headquarters of Her Majesty's Government and the official residence and office of the First Lord of the Treasury, who is now always the Prime Minister....
. A bemused security guard answers the call as Craven screams "Get me Pendleton!"
"Fusion"
Craven wakes up in a hospital on an American Air Force base - showing signs of massive radiation poisoning. Jedburgh has not been found, and Craven cannot tell them where to look. Harcourt reports to the Minister, but finds his boss already knows the truth about Northmoor. The IIF plutonium was created by a secret laser process for the Ministry of Defence: the investigation was simply to divert American suspicions. The Americans are searching for Jedburgh as well - but he kills at least four American agents sent to get him. In Scotland, Jedburgh is also suffering from radiation poisoningRadiation poisoning
Acute radiation syndrome also known as radiation poisoning, radiation sickness or radiation toxicity, is a constellation of health effects which occur within several months of exposure to high amounts of ionizing radiation...
, and may be becoming delusional. Rather than golf, Jedburgh's plans in Scotland involve an appearance at a NATO conference on directed energy weapons held at the Gleneagles Hotel
Gleneagles Hotel
The Gleneagles Hotel is a luxury hotel near Auchterarder, Perth and Kinross, Scotland.- History :The hotel was built by the former Caledonian Railway Company and opened in 1924, originally with its own railway station...
in Scotland. Also present at the conference is Grogan who arrives with the news that the British government has approved the purchase of IIF. Before a roused audience, Grogan delivers a coldly passionate address on the power of fusion, invoking the spirit of historic explorers and boldly proclaiming man's destiny to become a "celestial warrior" and establish a "solar empire". The audience of military and civilian officials applauds but Jedburgh, in U.S. Army uniform, takes the podium to denounce Grogan's vision for a nuclear state. Finishing his speech, he gleefully reveals two bars of the plutonium stolen from Northmoor, yelling "Get it while it's hot". The audience, bemused at first, breaks into a panic and flees the room. With only Grogan left, Jedburgh brings together the two bars, causing a criticality
Criticality accident
A criticality accident, sometimes referred to as an excursion or a power excursion, is an accidental increase of nuclear chain reactions in a fissile material, such as enriched uranium or plutonium...
incident and irradiating Grogan.
With Clemmy's car, Craven drives to Scotland. His sickness worsening, Craven stops near a stream, where Emma appears. She tells Craven of a time in Earth's distant and frigid past when black flowers grew, warming the Earth and preventing life from becoming extinct
Extinction
In biology and ecology, extinction is the end of an organism or of a group of organisms , normally a species. The moment of extinction is generally considered to be the death of the last individual of the species, although the capacity to breed and recover may have been lost before this point...
. These same black flowers have returned, she says, to save Earth from its latest enemy - mankind. Once the flowers have spread, the absorbed heat will melt the polar icecaps, washing mankind away. Tracking Jedburgh down to a remote country house, Craven learns that the American has weaponized the remaining plutonium by wrapping it around a plastic explosive core, it can be detonated even at the bottom of a loch by shooting it with a plutonium bullet. Craven tells Jedburgh that Grogan had expected the inquiry to block his acquisition of Northmooor; his mission to steal the plutonium was set up by the CIA to ensure the industrialist kept control of the material. Unbeknownst to both men, a hit squad is nearing the house. Among other things, they carry a coffin shaped box carrying radiation warning labels. Inside the house, the pair have a final rambling conversation - touching the appearance of the black flower, the song "Time of the Preacher" and the likely victor in the battles of good and evil, and between Earth and mankind; The black flower is real, Jedburgh tells Craven - he's seen it in Afghanistan. The American is convinced that mankind will find a way to survive, but Craven doubts this, and declares that if it comes to war between mankind and the planet he's on the side of the planet. Jedburgh, expecting the assassins, leaves Craven when they break into the house, determined to get as many as he can. Ultimately killing Jedburgh, the team spares Craven, the squad leader pointing out to the others that Craven's "on our side". Outraged, Craven bellows "I am not on your side!" as they leave.
In the final scene, Pendleton and Harcourt observe IIF's retrieval of the plutonium from a nearby loch
Loch
Loch is the Irish and Scottish Gaelic word for a lake or a sea inlet. It has been anglicised as lough, although this is pronounced the same way as loch. Some lochs could also be called a firth, fjord, estuary, strait or bay...
, where Jedburgh had hidden it. A voiceover by Harcourt, in the form of a letter to Clemmy concerning the events, reveals that Grogan is also dying from the radiation exposure he received at the hotel. Pendleton and Harcourt spot Craven watching the retrieval operation from a nearby hill. Harcourt laments his inability to comfort Craven, wanting to reassure the detective that Gaia will be safe and that good will triumph over evil - knowing that Craven simply would not believe it. As he watches the recovery team leave the area, and knowing his life is at an end, Craven wails Emma's name one last time.
Time passes. The waves lap against a nameless shore over nights and days. The camera pans against the side of snow covered hill where black flowers bloom, harbingers of Gaia's coming war against mankind.
Cast
Ronald Craven was played by Bob Peck, an actor who was well known in theatre but, at the time he was cast as Craven, had appeared in only minor roles on television. In creating the role of Craven, Peck drew upon his experience gained from the two years he played the title role in MacbethMacbeth
The Tragedy of Macbeth is a play by William Shakespeare about a regicide and its aftermath. It is Shakespeare's shortest tragedy and is believed to have been written sometime between 1603 and 1607...
for the Royal Shakespeare Company
Royal Shakespeare Company
The Royal Shakespeare Company is a major British theatre company, based in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England. The company employs 700 staff and produces around 20 productions a year from its home in Stratford-upon-Avon and plays regularly in London, Newcastle-upon-Tyne and on tour across...
. Notable roles after Edge of Darkness included On the Black Hill
On the Black Hill (film)
On the Black Hill is a 1987 film directed by Andrew Grieve and based upon the novel of the same name by Bruce Chatwin.Although Bruce Chatwin initially considered his novel about 80 years of rural family life in the Welsh border country unfilmable, he changed his mind when he saw how keen director...
(1987), Slipstream
Slipstream (1989 film)
Slipstream is a 1989 post-apocalyptic science fiction adventure film. The plot has an emphasis on aviation and contains many common science-fiction themes, such as taking place in a dystopian future in which the landscape of the Earth itself has been changed and is windswept by storms of great power...
(1989), Natural Lies (1992) and Jurassic Park
Jurassic Park (film)
Jurassic Park is a 1993 American science fiction adventure film directed by Steven Spielberg. The film is based on the novel of the same name by Michael Crichton. It stars Sam Neill, Laura Dern, Jeff Goldblum, Richard Attenborough, Martin Ferrero, and Bob Peck...
(1993). He died in 1999.
Joanne Whalley
Joanne Whalley
-Early life:Whalley was born in Salford but brought up in Stockport where she studied at the Braeside School of Speech and Drama, Marple.Whalley first appeared as a child in How We Used To Live and bit parts in soap operas, especially Coronation Street and Emmerdale...
, who played Emma Craven, began acting during childhood, appearing in the long-running soap opera
Soap opera
A soap opera, sometimes called "soap" for short, is an ongoing, episodic work of dramatic fiction presented in serial format on radio or as television programming. The name soap opera stems from the original dramatic serials broadcast on radio that had soap manufacturers, such as Procter & Gamble,...
Coronation Street
Coronation Street
Coronation Street is a British soap opera set in Weatherfield, a fictional town in Greater Manchester based on Salford. Created by Tony Warren, Coronation Street was first broadcast on 9 December 1960...
(1960–present) in 1976 at the age of 10. She had also appeared in supporting roles in several series including Juliet Bravo
Juliet Bravo
Juliet Bravo is a British television series, which ran on BBC1 between 1980 and 1985. The theme of the series concerned a female police inspector who took over control of a police station in the fictional town of Hartley in Lancashire.-Programme name:...
(1980–1985), Bergerac
Bergerac (TV series)
Bergerac was a British television show set on Jersey. Produced by the BBC in association with the Seven Network, and screened on BBC1, it starred John Nettles as the title character Detective Sergeant Jim Bergerac, a detective in "Le Bureau des Étrangers" Bergerac was a British television show...
(1981–1991) and Reilly, Ace of Spies
Reilly, Ace of Spies
Reilly, Ace of Spies is a 1983 television miniseries dramatizing the life of Sidney Reilly, a Russian Jew who became one of the greatest spies to ever work for the British. Among his exploits in the early 20th century were the infiltration of the German General Staff in 1917 and a near-overthrow of...
(1983). Following Edge of Darkness, Whalley was cast in the equally well regarded BBC television serial The Singing Detective
The Singing Detective
The Singing Detective is a BBC television miniseries written by Dennis Potter, which stars Michael Gambon, and was directed by Jon Amiel. The six episodes were "Skin", "Heat", "Lovely Days", "Clues", "Pitter Patter" and "Who Done It"....
(1986), written by Dennis Potter
Dennis Potter
Dennis Christopher George Potter was an English dramatist, best known for The Singing Detective. His widely acclaimed television dramas mixed fantasy and reality, the personal and the social. He was particularly fond of using themes and images from popular culture.-Biography:Dennis Potter was born...
. Moving to Hollywood, she appeared in such films as Willow
Willow (film)
Willow is a 1988 American fantasy film directed by Ron Howard and produced/co-written by George Lucas. Warwick Davis stars in the film, as well as Val Kilmer, Joanne Whalley, Jean Marsh, and Patricia Hayes...
(1988), Scandal (1989) and Shattered (1991) as well as television mini-series such as Scarlett
Scarlett (TV miniseries)
Scarlett is a 1994 six hour miniseries loosely based on the sequel to Margaret Mitchell's novel, Gone with the Wind, written by Alexandra Ripley...
(1994) and Jackie Bouvier Kennedy Onassis (2000). During her eight year marriage to the actor Val Kilmer
Val Kilmer
Val Edward Kilmer is an American actor. Originally a stage actor, Kilmer became popular in the mid-1980s after a string of appearances in comedy films, starting with Top Secret! , then the cult classic Real Genius , as well as blockbuster action films, including a supporting role in Top Gun and a...
, between 1988 and 1996, she was often credited as Joanne Whalley-Kilmer.
Cast as Darius Jedburgh was Joe Don Baker
Joe Don Baker
Joe Don Baker is an American film actor, perhaps best known for his roles as a Mafia hitman in Charley Varrick, deputy sheriff Thomas Jefferson Geronimo III in Final Justice, real-life Tennessee Sheriff Buford Pusser in Walking Tall, brute force with a badge detective Mitchell in Mitchell, James...
, who had been acting since the 1960s and was known for his roles in Westerns
Western (genre)
The Western is a genre of various visual arts, such as film, television, radio, literature, painting and others. Westerns are devoted to telling stories set primarily in the latter half of the 19th century in the American Old West, hence the name. Some Westerns are set as early as the Battle of...
such as Gunsmoke
Gunsmoke
Gunsmoke is an American radio and television Western drama series created by director Norman MacDonnell and writer John Meston. The stories take place in and around Dodge City, Kansas, during the settlement of the American West....
(1955–1975) and as the lead in the detective series Eischied
Eischied
Eischied is an American crime drama broadcast on NBC from September 21, 1979 to January 20, 1980. It was based on the starring character from the 1978 miniseries To Kill a Cop, which was based on the novel by Robert Daley.-Snyopsis:...
(1979–1980). He also starred as Sherriff Buford Pusser in the original 1972 film Walking Tall
Walking Tall
Walking Tall is a 1973 semi-biopic of Sheriff Buford Pusser, a former professional wrestler-turned-lawman in McNairy County, Tennessee. It starred Joe Don Baker as Pusser...
. The script of Edge of Darkness so impressed him that he agreed to take the part at lower than his usual fee. He was later cast, by Edge of Darkness director Martin Campbell, as CIA agent Jack Wade in the James Bond
James Bond
James Bond, code name 007, is a fictional character created in 1953 by writer Ian Fleming, who featured him in twelve novels and two short story collections. There have been a six other authors who wrote authorised Bond novels or novelizations after Fleming's death in 1964: Kingsley Amis,...
film GoldenEye
GoldenEye
GoldenEye is the seventeenth spy film in the James Bond series, and the first to star Pierce Brosnan as the fictional MI6 agent James Bond. The film was directed by Martin Campbell and is the first film in the series not to take story elements from the works of novelist Ian Fleming...
(1995), a role he reprised in Tomorrow Never Dies
Tomorrow Never Dies
Tomorrow Never Dies is the eighteenth spy film in the James Bond series, and the second to star Pierce Brosnan as the fictional MI6 agent James Bond. Bruce Feirstein wrote the screenplay, and it was directed by Roger Spottiswoode. It follows Bond as he tries to stop a media mogul from engineering...
(1997).
Charles Kay, who played Pendleton, was a well established character actor who had appeared in Fall of Eagles
Fall of Eagles
Fall of Eagles is a 13-part British television drama aired by the BBC in 1974. The series was created by John Elliot and produced by Stuart Burge....
(1974), I, Claudius
I, Claudius (TV series)
I, Claudius is a 1976 BBC Television adaptation of Robert Graves' I, Claudius and Claudius the God. Written by Jack Pulman, it proved one of the corporation's most successful drama serials of all time...
(1976) and The Devil's Crown (1978). He has since acted in many television productions such as Fortunes of War
Fortunes of War (tv series)
Fortunes of War is a 1987 BBC television adaptation of Olivia Manning's cycle of novels Fortunes of War. It stars Kenneth Branagh as Guy Pringle, lecturer in English Literature in Bucharest during the early part of the Second World War, and Emma Thompson as his wife Harriet...
(1989), The Darling Buds of May
The Darling Buds of May
The Darling Buds of May is a British comedy drama which was first broadcast between 1991 and 1993 produced by Yorkshire Television for the ITV Network. It is set in an idyllic rural 1950s Kent, among a large, boisterous family. The three series were based on the novels by H. E. Bates. Originally...
(1991–1993), Jonathan Creek
Jonathan Creek
Jonathan Creek is a British mystery series produced by the BBC and written by David Renwick. Primarily a crime drama, the show is also peppered with broadly comic touches...
(1997–2004) and Midsomer Murders
Midsomer Murders
Midsomer Murders is a British television detective drama that has aired on ITV since 1997. The show is based on the books by Caroline Graham, as originally adapted by Anthony Horowitz. The lead character is DCI Tom Barnaby who works for Causton CID. When Nettles left the show in 2011 he was...
(1997–present).
Edge of Darkness was an early role for Ian McNeice, who played Harcourt. He went on to act in a wide variety of film and television parts including The Englishman Who Went Up a Hill But Came Down a Mountain
The Englishman Who Went Up a Hill But Came Down a Mountain
The Englishman Who Went Up a Hill But Came Down a Mountain is a 1995 film written by Ivor Monger and directed by Christopher Monger. It was screened in the Un Certain Regard section at the 1995 Cannes Film Festival....
(1995), Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls
Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls
Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls is the sequel to Ace Ventura: Pet Detective . Jim Carrey reprises his role as the title character Ace Ventura, a detective who specializes in retrieval of tame or captive animals. This is the only sequel to a film starring Carrey in which Carrey reprised his role...
(1995) and Frank Herbert's Dune
Frank Herbert's Dune
Frank Herbert's Dune is a 2001 3D video game based on the 2000 Sci Fi Channel miniseries of the same name. The game was not a commercial or critical success, and was the last product by Cryo Interactive, which went bankrupt shortly after the game's failure.As Paul, the son of the Duke Atreides's...
(2000) as well as regular roles in Doc Martin
Doc Martin
Doc Martin is a British television comedy drama series starring Martin Clunes in the title role. It was created by Mark Crowdy, Craig Ferguson and Dominic Minghella. The show is filmed on location in the fishing village of Port Isaac, Cornwall, United Kingdom, with filming of most interior scenes...
(2004–present) and Rome
Rome (TV series)
Rome is a British-American–Italian historical drama television series created by Bruno Heller, John Milius and William J. MacDonald. The show's two seasons premiered in 2005 and 2007, and were later released on DVD. Rome is set in the 1st century BC, during Ancient Rome's transition from Republic...
(2005–2007).
Several other familiar faces to British viewers appeared during the course of the episodes, including John Woodvine
John Woodvine
John Woodvine is an English stage and screen actor who has appeared in more than 70 theatre productions, as well as a similar number of television and film roles.-Early life:...
(as Craven's superior DCS Ross), Tim McInnerny
Tim McInnerny
Tim McInnerny is an English actor. He is known for his role as Percy in Blackadder and Blackadder II, and as Captain Darling in Blackadder Goes Forth...
(as Emma's boyfriend Terry Shields), Hugh Fraser
Hugh Fraser (actor)
Hugh Fraser is an English actor and theatre director.-Early life:Born in London but raised in the East Midlands, Fraser studied acting at the Webber Douglas Academy of Dramatic Art and the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art...
(as IIF chief executive Robert Bennett), Zoë Wanamaker
Zoe Wanamaker
Zoë Wanamaker, CBE is an American-British actress. She has performed with the Royal Shakespeare Company; in films, including the Harry Potter series; and in a number of television productions, including a long-time role as Susan Harper in the sitcom My Family.-Early life and family:Wanamaker was...
(as intelligence agent Clementine) and Blake's 7
Blake's 7
Blake's 7 is a British science fiction television series produced by the BBC for its BBC1 channel. The series was created by Terry Nation, a prolific television writer and creator of the Daleks for the television series Doctor Who. Four series of Blake's 7 were produced and broadcast between 1978...
cast members David Jackson
David Jackson (British actor)
David Jackson was a British actor best known for his role as Olag Gan in the Blake's 7 first two seasons and as Detective Constable Braithwaite in Z Cars from 1972-1978...
(as Colonel Lawson) and Brian Croucher
Brian Croucher
Brian Croucher is an English actor and director perhaps best known for his role as Ted Hills, which he played from 1995 to 1997, in the soap opera EastEnders....
(as Northmoor security chief Connors). Playing themselves were television reporters Sue Cook
Sue Cook
Sue Cook is a British broadcaster and author.-Early life:Her father, William, worked for the Commission on Industrial Relations . She has two younger brothers, and lived on Burnham Avenue...
and Kenneth Kendall
Kenneth Kendall
Kenneth Kendall is a retired British broadcaster. He was a contemporary of Richard Baker and Robert Dougall...
, weatherman Bill Giles
Bill Giles
William George Giles OBE is a former British weather forecaster and television presenter.-Early life:...
and Labour MP
Member of Parliament
A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...
Michael Meacher
Michael Meacher
Michael Hugh Meacher is a British Labour politician, who has been the Member of Parliament for Oldham West and Royton since 1997. Previously he had been the MP for Oldham West, first elected in 1970. On 22 February 2007 he declared that he would be standing for the Labour Leadership, challenging...
. Long-standing BBC visual effects designer Mat Irvine
Mat Irvine
Mat Irvine was born on 7 July 1948. He was a Technical Consultant and Visual Effects Designer who worked on television, primarily for the BBC, from the 1970s to the 1990s....
, who contributed visual effects to the series, received a brief cameo as a police diver in 'Breakthrough'.
Crew
Writer Troy Kennedy MartinTroy Kennedy Martin
Troy Kennedy Martin was a Scottish-born film and television screenwriter best known for creating the long running BBC TV police series Z-Cars, and for the award-winning 1985 anti-nuclear drama Edge of Darkness...
was the creator of the long-running BBC police drama Z-Cars
Z-Cars
Z-Cars is a British television drama series centred on the work of mobile uniformed police in the fictional town of Newtown, based on Kirkby in the outskirts of Liverpool in Merseyside. Produced by the BBC, it debuted in January 1962 and ran until September 1978.-Origins:The series was developed by...
(1962–1978). He also wrote the screenplay for the films The Italian Job
The Italian Job
The Italian Job is a 1969 British caper film, written by Troy Kennedy Martin, produced by Michael Deeley and directed by Peter Collinson. Subsequent television showings and releases on video have established it as an institution in the United Kingdom....
(1969) and Kelly's Heroes
Kelly's Heroes
Kelly's Heroes is an offbeat 1970 comedy/war film about a group of World War II soldiers who go AWOL to rob a bank behind enemy lines. Directed by Brian G...
(1970) and scripts for television series such as Colditz
Colditz (TV series)
Colditz is a British television series co-produced by the BBC and Universal Studios and screened between 1972 and 1974.The series deals with Allied prisoners of war imprisoned at the supposedly escape-proof Colditz Castle when designated Oflag IV-C during World War II, and their many attempts to...
(1972–1974), The Sweeney
The Sweeney
The Sweeney is a 1970s British television police drama focusing on two members of the Flying Squad, a branch of the Metropolitan Police specialising in tackling armed robbery and violent crime in London...
(1975–1978) (which was created by his brother Ian Kennedy Martin
Ian Kennedy Martin
Ian Kennedy Martin is a British television scriptwriter. He is best known for his creation of the popular 1970s police drama series The Sweeney, produced by Euston Films for Thames Television, which ran on the ITV network from 1975 to 1978. It also spawned two feature film spin-offs...
) and Reilly, Ace of Spies (1983). Following Edge of Darkness, he wrote the screenplays for the films Red Heat
Red Heat
Red Heat is a 1988 buddy cop film directed by Walter Hill. The film stars Arnold Schwarzenegger, as Moscow narc Ivan Danko, and James Belushi, as Chicago detective Art Ridžić...
(with Walter Hill) (1988) and Bravo Two Zero
Bravo Two Zero (film)
Bravo Two Zero is a 1999 two hour television miniseries , based on the book of the same name by Andy McNab. The film covers real life events - from the perspective of Andy McNab, patrol commander of Bravo Two Zero, a British SAS patrol , tasked to find Iraqi Scud missile launchers during the Gulf...
(1999). He died in September 2009.
Director Martin Campbell
Martin Campbell
-Life and career:Campbell was born in Hastings, New Zealand. He directed two James Bond films, 1995's GoldenEye, starring Pierce Brosnan, and 2006's Casino Royale, starring Daniel Craig, and was the first Bond director since John Glen to direct more than one film, as well as the oldest director in...
had developed a reputation for handling action thrillers with credits including The Professionals
The Professionals (TV series)
The Professionals was a British crime-action television drama series produced by Avengers Mk1 Productions and London Weekend Television that aired on the ITV network from 1977 to 1983. In all, 57 episodes were produced, filmed between 1977 and 1981. It starred Martin Shaw, Lewis Collins and Gordon...
(1977–1983), Minder
Minder (TV series)
Minder is a British comedy-drama about the London criminal underworld. Initially produced by Verity Lambert, it was made by Euston Films, a subsidiary of Thames Television and shown on ITV...
(1979–1994) and Shoestring (1979–1980). A few years after Edge of Darkness, Campbell moved into feature films, directing the James Bond films GoldenEye (1995) and Casino Royale
Casino Royale (2006 film)
Casino Royale is the twenty-first film in the James Bond film series and the first to star Daniel Craig as fictional MI6 agent James Bond...
(2006) as well as The Mask of Zorro
The Mask of Zorro
The Mask of Zorro is a 1998 American swashbuckler film based on the Zorro character created by Johnston McCulley. It was directed by Martin Campbell and stars Antonio Banderas, Anthony Hopkins, Catherine Zeta-Jones, and Stuart Wilson...
(1998), Vertical Limit
Vertical Limit
Vertical Limit is a 2000 thriller action film directed by New Zealander Martin Campbell starring, among others, Chris O'Donnell, Bill Paxton, Robin Tunney and Scott Glenn...
(2000) and The Legend of Zorro
The Legend of Zorro
The Legend of Zorro is a 2005 sequel to The Mask of Zorro , both directed by Martin Campbell. Antonio Banderas and Catherine Zeta-Jones reprise their roles as the titular hero and his spouse, and Rufus Sewell stars as the villain...
(2005).
Producer Michael Wearing
Michael Wearing
Michael Wearing is a British television producer, who has spent much of his career working on various drama productions for the BBC. He is best known as the producer of the highly-acclaimed serials Boys from the Blackstuff and Edge of Darkness , which created for him a reputation as one of...
had worked on Play for Today
Play for Today
Play for Today is a British television anthology drama series, produced by the BBC and transmitted on BBC1 from 1970 to 1984. During the run, more than three hundred programmes, featuring original television plays, and adaptations of stage plays and novels, were transmitted...
for which he had produced Alan Bleasdale
Alan Bleasdale
Alan Bleasdale is an English television dramatist, best known for writing several social realist drama serials based on the lives of ordinary people.The Bleasdales live in prescot,liverpool,wales and london.-Early life:Bleasdale is an only child; his father worked in a food factory and his mother...
's The Black Stuff (1978) and which he and Bleasdale subsequently spun off into the highly acclaimed Boys from the Blackstuff
Boys from the Blackstuff
Boys from the Blackstuff is a British television drama series of five episodes, originally transmitted from 10 October to 7 November 1982 on BBC2....
(1982). He also produced the conspiracy thriller Bird of Prey
Bird of Prey (TV serial)
Bird of Prey is a British television serial produced by the BBC in 1982.The series starred Richard Griffiths as humble civil servant Henry Jay, who finds himself drawn into a strange conspiracy involving the mysterious Le Pouvoir organisation. A sequel, Bird of Prey 2 followed in 1984...
(1982). Following Edge of Darkness he continued to be one of British television's most high profile and successful producers, appointed Head of Serials at the BBC between 1989 and 1998 where he was responsible for such programmes as Pride and Prejudice
Pride and Prejudice (1995 TV serial)
Pride and Prejudice is a six-episode 1995 British television drama, adapted by Andrew Davies from Jane Austen's 1813 novel Pride and Prejudice. Jennifer Ehle and Colin Firth starred as Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy. Produced by Sue Birtwistle and directed by Simon Langton, the serial was a BBC...
(1995), Our Friends in the North
Our Friends in the North
Our Friends in the North is a British television drama serial, produced by the BBC and originally broadcast in nine episodes on BBC Two in early 1996...
(1996) and Dennis Potter's final two plays Karaoke
Karaoke (play)
Karaoke is a British television drama written by Dennis Potter with the knowledge that he was dying from cancer of the pancreas.It forms a pair with the serial Cold Lazarus...
(1996) and Cold Lazarus
Cold Lazarus
Cold Lazarus is a four-part British television drama written by Dennis Potter with the knowledge that he was dying of cancer of the pancreas....
(1996).
Walt Patterson
Walt Patterson
Walter C Patterson is a UK-based Canadian physicist and widely-published writer and campaigner on energy.Patterson was born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, and educated there at the University of Manitoba. Patterson arrived in the United Kingdom in 1960. Trained as a nuclear physicist, Patterson...
, who acted as series adviser, was a leading commentator on nuclear affairs, best known for his book Nuclear Power (Penguin, 1976–1986). Following Edge of Darkness, he acted as specialist adviser to the British House of Commons Select Committee on Environment for their 1986 study, Radioactive Waste. He continues to contribute to the policy debate about energy and environmental issues. Advice on the policing aspects of the serial was provided by the West Yorkshire Police
West Yorkshire Police
West Yorkshire Police is the territorial police force responsible for policing West Yorkshire in England. It is the fourth largest force in England and Wales by number of officers, with 5671 officers....
and former Scotland Yard
Scotland Yard
Scotland Yard is a metonym for the headquarters of the Metropolitan Police Service of London, UK. It derives from the location of the original Metropolitan Police headquarters at 4 Whitehall Place, which had a rear entrance on a street called Great Scotland Yard. The Scotland Yard entrance became...
detective Jack Slipper
Jack Slipper
Jack Kenneth Slipper was a Detective Chief Superintendent in the Metropolitan Police in London. He was known as "Slipper of the Yard"...
, famous for his pursuit of the train robber
Great Train Robbery (1963)
The Great Train Robbery is the name given to a £2.6 million train robbery committed on 8 August 1963 at Bridego Railway Bridge, Ledburn near Mentmore in Buckinghamshire, England. The bulk of the stolen money was not recovered...
Ronnie Biggs
Ronnie Biggs
Ronald Arthur "Ronnie" Biggs is an English criminal, known for his role in the Great Train Robbery of 1963, for his escape from prison in 1965, for living as a fugitive for 36 years and for his various publicity stunts while in exile. In 2001, he voluntarily returned to the United Kingdom and...
.
Music
The musical scoreEdge of Darkness (soundtrack)
Edge of Darkness is the 1985 soundtrack by Eric Clapton and Michael Kamen for the British television series Edge of Darkness. The soundtrack's theme won the Ivor Novello Award for songwriting and composing, besides winning the 1986 BAFTA Award for Best Music.-Background:For Clapton, it was his...
was provided by Eric Clapton
Eric Clapton
Eric Patrick Clapton, CBE, is an English guitarist and singer-songwriter. Clapton is the only three-time inductee to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame: once as a solo artist, and separately as a member of The Yardbirds and Cream. Clapton has been referred to as one of the most important and...
and Michael Kamen
Michael Kamen
Michael Arnold Kamen was an American composer , orchestral arranger, orchestral conductor, song writer, and session musician.-Background:...
. Clapton was approached to provide the score by producer Michael Wearing. Shortly afterwards, when Michael Kamen brought Clapton to a screening of Brazil
Brazil (film)
Brazil is a 1985 British science fiction fantasy/black comedy film directed by Terry Gilliam. It was written by Gilliam, Charles McKeown, and Tom Stoppard and stars Jonathan Pryce. The film also features Robert De Niro, Kim Greist, Michael Palin, Katherine Helmond, Bob Hoskins, and Ian Holm...
(1985), which he, Kamen, had scored, Eric suggested a collaboration between the two on Edge of Darkness. Kamen became one of Hollywood's most successful film composers, writing the scores for many blockbuster films including the Lethal Weapon
Lethal Weapon
Lethal Weapon is a 1987 American buddy cop action film and the first in a series of films, all directed by Richard Donner and starring Mel Gibson and Danny Glover as a mismatched pair of LAPD detectives, and Gary Busey as their primary adversary...
series (1987–1998) (with Eric Clapton), the first three Die Hard
Die Hard
Die Hard is a 1988 American action film and the first in the Die Hard film series. The film was directed by John McTiernan and written by Jeb Stuart and Steven E. de Souza. It is based on a 1979 novel by Roderick Thorp titled Nothing Lasts Forever, itself a sequel to the book The Detective, which...
films (1988, 1990, 1995), Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves
Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves
Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves is a 1991 American adventure film directed by Kevin Reynolds. Kevin Costner heads the cast list as Robin Hood...
(1991) and X-Men
X-Men (film)
X-Men is a 2000 superhero film based on the fictional Marvel Comics characters of the same name. Directed by Bryan Singer, the film stars Patrick Stewart, Hugh Jackman, Ian McKellen, Anna Paquin, Famke Janssen, Bruce Davison, James Marsden, Halle Berry, Rebecca Romijn, Ray Park and Tyler Mane...
(2000). He died in 2003.
Aside from the Clapton/Kamen soundtrack, Willie Nelson
Willie Nelson
Willie Hugh Nelson is an American country music singer-songwriter, as well as an author, poet, actor, and activist. The critical success of the album Shotgun Willie , combined with the critical and commercial success of Red Headed Stranger and Stardust , made Nelson one of the most recognized...
's "The Time of the Preacher", New Model Army
New Model Army (band)
New Model Army are an English rock band, who were formed in Bradford, West Yorkshire in 1980. They have been variously classified by Allmusic as post-punk and alternative rock.-Overview:...
's "Christian Militia", and Tom Waits
Tom Waits
Thomas Alan "Tom" Waits is an American singer-songwriter, composer, and actor. Waits has a distinctive voice, described by critic Daniel Durchholz as sounding "like it was soaked in a vat of bourbon, left hanging in the smokehouse for a few months, and then taken outside and run over with a car."...
' "16 Shells From A Thirty-Ought-Six" are featured in the series. "Christian Militia" is on the record player when Terry's body is found. Craven listens to "The Time of the Preacher" when he is in Emma's room in the first episode. It later emerges Jedburgh is familiar with the song and both he and Craven sing it on two occasions, the lyrics being significant.
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation, commonly referred to as "the ABC" , is Australia's national public broadcaster...
used the music to illustrate stories on the Chernobyl disaster
Chernobyl disaster
The Chernobyl disaster was a nuclear accident that occurred on 26 April 1986 at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Ukraine , which was under the direct jurisdiction of the central authorities in Moscow...
the following year. Eric Clapton and Michael Kamen performed the movie's main theme with the National Philharmonic Orchestra
National Philharmonic Orchestra
The National Philharmonic Orchestra was a British orchestra created exclusively for recording purposes. It was founded by RCA producer Charles Gerhardt and orchestra leader / contractor Sidney Sax due in part to the requirements of the Reader's Digest-History:...
during the 24 Nights
24 Nights
24 Nights is a live album by Eric Clapton, recorded at the Royal Albert Hall in London, England in 1990 and 1991. It was released on October 8, 1991. The album is a "best of" from the 42 concerts Eric Clapton did at the Royal Albert Hall in those two years...
period in 1990 and 1991.
Origins
“I am writing this story about a detective who turns into a tree” was what writer Troy Kennedy Martin told his colleagues when asked what he was working on during the early nineteen-eighties. Kennedy Martin had become frustrated that “at the BBC there was no political dimension to their drama whatsoever” but had chosen to write a political story anyway, not really believing it would ever get made. The election of Margaret Thatcher as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Ronald ReaganRonald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....
as President of the United States
President of the United States
The President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....
had brought about a major shift in the global political landscape and Kennedy Martin was motivated to write out of concern arising from such issues as the Greenham Common protests
Greenham Common Women's Peace Camp
Greenham Common Women's Peace Camp was a peace camp established to protest at nuclear weapons being sited at RAF Greenham Common in Berkshire, England. The camp began in September 1981 after a Welsh group, Women for Life on Earth, arrived at Greenham to protest against the decision of the British...
, the Falklands War
Falklands War
The Falklands War , also called the Falklands Conflict or Falklands Crisis, was fought in 1982 between Argentina and the United Kingdom over the disputed Falkland Islands and South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands...
, unrest among the miners and, arising out of the escalation of the Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
, the fear that “born-again Christians and Cold War warriors appeared to be running the United States”.
By 1983, Kennedy Martin had written the first draft of what would eventually become Edge of Darkness – at this stage it was called Magnox (a reference to the Magnox
Magnox
Magnox is a now obsolete type of nuclear power reactor which was designed and is still in use in the United Kingdom, and was exported to other countries, both as a power plant, and, when operated accordingly, as a producer of plutonium for nuclear weapons...
type of nuclear reactor
Nuclear reactor
A nuclear reactor is a device to initiate and control a sustained nuclear chain reaction. Most commonly they are used for generating electricity and for the propulsion of ships. Usually heat from nuclear fission is passed to a working fluid , which runs through turbines that power either ship's...
) and was about trade union
Trade union
A trade union, trades union or labor union is an organization of workers that have banded together to achieve common goals such as better working conditions. The trade union, through its leadership, bargains with the employer on behalf of union members and negotiates labour contracts with...
problems in the nuclear industry. The script was given to BBC Head of Drama Series & Serials, Jonathan Powell, who encouraged Kennedy Martin to continue its development. The script would go though many changes and revisions before reaching its final form.
A particular influence was the speech made by President Ronald Reagan on 23 March 1983 announcing the Strategic Defense Initiative
Strategic Defense Initiative
The Strategic Defense Initiative was proposed by U.S. President Ronald Reagan on March 23, 1983 to use ground and space-based systems to protect the United States from attack by strategic nuclear ballistic missiles. The initiative focused on strategic defense rather than the prior strategic...
(SDI) which, using ground-based and space-based systems, proposed protecting the United States from attack by nuclear missiles
Nuclear weapon
A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either fission or a combination of fission and fusion. Both reactions release vast quantities of energy from relatively small amounts of matter. The first fission bomb test released the same amount...
. One of the supporters of SDI was one-time US presidential candidate Lyndon LaRouche
Lyndon LaRouche
Lyndon Hermyle LaRouche, Jr. is an American political activist and founder of a network of political committees, parties, and publications known collectively as the LaRouche movement...
, on whom Kennedy Martin based the character of Jerry Grogan, owner of the Fusion Corporation of Kansas. Kennedy Martin was also influenced by the culture of secrecy surrounding the UK's policy regarding nuclear power in light of the inquiry into the construction of the Sizewell B nuclear power station and the concerns about the safety record of the Sellafield
Sellafield
Sellafield is a nuclear reprocessing site, close to the village of Seascale on the coast of the Irish Sea in Cumbria, England. The site is served by Sellafield railway station. Sellafield is an off-shoot from the original nuclear reactor site at Windscale which is currently undergoing...
nuclear power plant; this led him to conceive International Irradiated Fuels and its chief executive Robert Bennett.
The other major influence was the Gaia hypothesis, that the Earth is a single living system that self-regulates to maintain the optimum conditions for life, formulated by climate scientist James Lovelock and popularised in his 1979 book Gaia: A new look at life on Earth. Kennedy Martin used the name GAIA for the environmental organisation Emma Craven was involved in and drew the notion for the black flowers seen at the serial's conclusion from a passage in Lovelock's book that describes a dark marsh grass that grew on the surface of the Earth trapping heat during a time when the planet was too cold to sustain life.
Although Kennedy Martin's notion for the serial was influenced by real political events, he had for a long time railed against naturalism
Naturalism (literature)
Naturalism was a literary movement taking place from the 1880s to 1940s that used detailed realism to suggest that social conditions, heredity, and environment had inescapable force in shaping human character...
in television drama – most notably in a 1964 article for the theatre magazine Encore, titled “Nats Go Home. First Statement of a New Drama for Television”, in which he sought “to free the camera from photographing dialogue, to free the structure from natural time and to exploit the total and absolute objectivity of the television camera”. Edge of Darkness producer Michael Wearing has noted that “there is a mystical dimension to Troy's imagination. His instincts are visual and non-naturalistic”. Kennedy Martin, therefore, crafted a serial that on the one hand placed its events squarely within the real, present day world but on the other also placed itself within the realm of the mystical and the mythic. Realism and authenticity was provided by the appearances of real life television presenter Sue Cook and Labour MP Michael Meacher. There was also use of contemporary stock footage, such as Robin Day
Robin Day
Sir Robin Day, OBE was a British political broadcaster and commentator. His obituary in the Guardian stated that "he was the most outstanding television journalist of his generation...
's interview with Margaret Thatcher and references to real persons like Michael Heseltine
Michael Heseltine
Michael Ray Dibdin Heseltine, Baron Heseltine, CH, PC is a British businessman, Conservative politician and patron of the Tory Reform Group. He was a Member of Parliament from 1966 to 2001 and was a prominent figure in the governments of Margaret Thatcher and John Major...
and places such as Sellafield, alongside the references to fictitious characters and places contained in the plot. The mystical dimension is provided by Emma's ghost while the mythic is provided by Craven himself and by Jedburgh and Grogan. Kennedy Martin, influenced by John Darragh
John Darragh
John Darragh was a U.S. politician. He served as the Mayor of Pittsburgh from 1817 to 1825.-Early life:Darragh was born in Ireland and early in life immigrated to Pittsburgh. He began his career as a merchant on Fourth Avenue between Wood Street and Smithfield Street in the city...
's The Real Camelot (Thames and Hudson, 1981) which examined the pagan origins of the Arthurian legend
Matter of Britain
The Matter of Britain is a name given collectively to the body of literature and legendary material associated with Great Britain and its legendary kings, particularly King Arthur...
, saw Craven as a modern day Green Man
Green Man
A Green Man is a sculpture, drawing, or other representation of a face surrounded by or made from leaves. Branches or vines may sprout from the nose, mouth, nostrils or other parts of the face and these shoots may bear flowers or fruit...
who would confront the threats to the Earth on behalf of Gaia. Jedburgh was conceived by Kennedy Martin as a Knight of the Marches, one of the Teutonic Knights
Teutonic Knights
The Order of Brothers of the German House of Saint Mary in Jerusalem , commonly the Teutonic Order , is a German medieval military order, in modern times a purely religious Catholic order...
who defended the borders of Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe is the eastern part of Europe. The term has widely disparate geopolitical, geographical, cultural and socioeconomic readings, which makes it highly context-dependent and even volatile, and there are "almost as many definitions of Eastern Europe as there are scholars of the region"...
, opposed to Grogan, who Kennedy Martin saw as a descendant of the Knights Templar
Knights Templar
The Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and of the Temple of Solomon , commonly known as the Knights Templar, the Order of the Temple or simply as Templars, were among the most famous of the Western Christian military orders...
who, according to legend, had guarded a special wisdom in the Temple of the Dome of the Rock
Dome of the Rock
The Dome of the Rock is a shrine located on the Temple Mount in the Old City of Jerusalem. The structure has been refurbished many times since its initial completion in 691 CE at the order of Umayyad Caliph Abd al-Malik...
in Jerusalem. These aspects would reach their apotheosis in the serial's conclusion in which Kennedy Martin envisaged that Craven, having found the plutonium stolen by Jedburgh, would be shot by a sniper
Sniper
A sniper is a marksman who shoots targets from concealed positions or distances exceeding the capabilities of regular personnel. Snipers typically have specialized training and distinct high-precision rifles....
and would be transformed into a tree.
Production
By 1983, Jonathan Powell was keen to put the serial into production and offered the scripts to producer Michael Wearing who was immediately impressed by the scenes in the first episode, “Compassionate Leave”, depicting Craven's reaction to Emma's death, describing them as “the most sustained evocation of individual grief in bereavement that I can remember”. The budget was set at £2 million, of which £400,000 came from an American co-producer, Lionheart Television International. Director Martin Campbell came on board shortly afterwards and soon clashed with Troy Kennedy Martin, demanding rewrites, in particular to the notion that Craven had known about Emma's involvement with GAIA right from the start; this was removed at Campbell's behest. Further clashes over the script occurred between Kennedy Martin and star Bob Peck over the conclusion in which his character would turn into a tree; Peck recalled that “it didn't seem to be working in script terms, it seemed as though we wouldn't be able to make it work for the audience”, a view echoed by Michael Wearing who felt that it was “likely not to come off as an effect”. Kennedy Martin capitulated, introducing instead the concept of the black flowers seen in the finished production. However, some elements of Kennedy Martin's original vision persist in the final script: for example, in episode three, “Burden of Proof”, the ghost of Emma urges Craven, as he undergoes a breakdown, to be strong, like a tree.Shooting on Edge of Darkness began on 9 July 1984 and ran for five months until 5 December 1984. Location filming took place in London (including the Barbican Arts Centre, BBC Television Centre
BBC Television Centre
BBC Television Centre at White City in West London is the headquarters of BBC Television. Officially opened on 29 June 1960, it remains one of the largest to this day; having featured over the years as backdrop to many BBC programmes, it is one of the most readily recognisable such facilities...
and the Hilton International Kensington
Kensington
Kensington is a district of west and central London, England within the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. An affluent and densely-populated area, its commercial heart is Kensington High Street, and it contains the well-known museum district of South Kensington.To the north, Kensington is...
), Yorkshire (including the headquarters of the West Yorkshire Police in Bradford
Bradford
Bradford lies at the heart of the City of Bradford, a metropolitan borough of West Yorkshire, in Northern England. It is situated in the foothills of the Pennines, west of Leeds, and northwest of Wakefield. Bradford became a municipal borough in 1847, and received its charter as a city in 1897...
, the headquarters of Systime Computers {now the O2 building} in Leeds
Leeds
Leeds is a city and metropolitan borough in West Yorkshire, England. In 2001 Leeds' main urban subdivision had a population of 443,247, while the entire city has a population of 798,800 , making it the 30th-most populous city in the European Union.Leeds is the cultural, financial and commercial...
where Craven hacks into the MI5 computer and at Westwood Cottage, Ilkley
Ilkley
Ilkley is a spa town and civil parish in West Yorkshire, in the north of England. Ilkley civil parish includes the adjacent village of Ben Rhydding and is a ward within the metropolitan borough of Bradford. Approximately north of Bradford, the town lies mainly on the south bank of the River Wharfe...
for Craven's home), Scotland (including the Gleneagles Hotel, where Jedburgh addresses the NATO conference and also where President Reagan's Reykjavík policy
Reykjavik Summit
The Reykjavík Summit was a summit meeting between U.S. president Ronald Reagan and Secretary-General of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Mikhail Gorbachev, held in the famous house of Höfði in Reykjavík, the capital city of Iceland, on October 11–12, 1986...
was formulated) and Wales
Wales
Wales is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain, bordered by England to its east and the Atlantic Ocean and Irish Sea to its west. It has a population of three million, and a total area of 20,779 km²...
(including Clogau Gold Mine and Manod, Blaenau Ffestiniog
Blaenau Ffestiniog
Blaenau Ffestiniog is a town in Gwynedd, north-west Wales. It has a population of 5,000, including Llan Ffestiniog, which makes it the third largest town in Gwynedd, behind Caernarfon & Porthmadog. Although the population reached 12,000 at the peak of the slate industry, the population fell due to...
doubling as Northmoor with the hot cell a set constructed at a factory in Penygroes). Throughout the entire shoot, the production continued to be known as Magnox; the title Dark Forces was briefly considered before the serial was renamed Edge of Darkness in April 1985. As the shoot progressed it became apparent to the cast and crew that they had a potential hit on their hands; Bob Peck recalled, “I think we knew when we were making it that it was a good piece of work” while Kennedy Martin told reporters “I haven't had this feeling about something for 20 years. It's wonderful, after all this time, to get something that actually works”.
Broadcast and critical reception
Edge of Darkness was promoted on the cover of the listings magazine Radio TimesRadio Times
Radio Times is a UK weekly television and radio programme listings magazine, owned by the BBC. It has been published since 1923 by BBC Magazines, which also provides an on-line listings service under the same title...
and was broadcast on Monday nights on BBC2 at 9:30pm, beginning 4 November 1985. The serial averaged an audience of 4 million viewers over its run. The critical response was generally positive with most commentators concentrating their praise on Peck's performance as Craven and the scale of the programme's political themes. “A good television thriller is very hard to find but Edge of Darkness promises to be one of the best”, wrote Celia Brayfield in The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
, “The central character is played by Bob Peck, who has the gift of looking tragic and intelligent simultaneously. [...] There was humour to lift the gloom and superb characterisation to flesh out the stock situation”. Ruth Baumgarten, in The Listener, praised the serial as “a grandiosely ambitious and compelling piece of fiction”. Speaking on the BBC's review programme Did You See...?
Did You See...?
Did You See...? was a long-running British television documentary series which began on the BBC in 1980. The programme took a look back at the week's television with a discussion between the presenter and three guests. In the first run there was also an item on related issues...
, the writer Sarah Dunant
Sarah Dunant
Sarah Dunant is the author of many international bestsellers, most recently Sacred Hearts, the completion of her Italian historical trilogy....
said, “this is a very classy piece of television drama, on all levels, I think on the plot level, I think on the level of emotion and I think stylistically [...] it looks absolutely wonderful, it's shot like a feature film”. Not so impressed was Byron Rogers
Byron Rogers (author)
Byron Rogers is a Welsh journalist, essayist and biographer. In August, 2007 the University of Edinburgh awarded him the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for the best biography published in the previous year, for The Man Who Went Into the West: The Life of RS Thomas...
, television critic of The Sunday Times
The Sunday Times
The Sunday Times is a British Sunday newspaper.The Sunday Times may also refer to:*The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times...
, who initially hailed the series as one that “stayed in the mind and will stay there long [...] because of its portrayal of human grief” but later felt he was “beginning to find Edge of Darkness slightly irritating” and decried the final episode as “an insult to its considerable following”.
Aware of the critical buzz surrounding the show, BBC1 Controller, Michael Grade
Michael Grade
Michael Ian Grade, Baron Grade of Yarmouth CBE is a British broadcast executive and businessman. He was BBC chairman from 2004 to 2006 and executive chairman of ITV plc from 2007 to 2009.-Early life:...
, quickly announced that the series would be repeated on BBC1, stating, “I think it will reach a wider audience and it deserves it”, and so Edge of Darkness was duly shown, in double episodes, over three consecutive nights between 19 December and 21 December 1985, the fastest time between original broadcast and repeat in the BBC's history. These repeats were accompanied by a disclaimer that the GAIA organisation depicted in the programme was not connected with the Gaia publishing company supported by Prince Philip
Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh
Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh is the husband of Elizabeth II. He is the United Kingdom's longest-serving consort and the oldest serving spouse of a reigning British monarch....
. It was a move that paid off – Edge of Darkness doubled its audience on BBC1 to 8 million viewers.
Cultural significance
Edge of Darkness tapped into a cultural zeitgeistZeitgeist
Zeitgeist is "the spirit of the times" or "the spirit of the age."Zeitgeist is the general cultural, intellectual, ethical, spiritual or political climate within a nation or even specific groups, along with the general ambiance, morals, sociocultural direction, and mood associated with an era.The...
of concern about nuclear power and nuclear warfare in the early to mid nineteen-eighties. In 1980, current affairs programme Panorama
Panorama (TV series)
Panorama is a BBC Television current affairs documentary programme, which was first broadcast in 1953, and is the longest-running public affairs television programme in the world. Panorama has been presented by many well known BBC presenters, including Richard Dimbleby, Robin Day, David Dimbleby...
broadcast “If The Bomb Drops”, a documentary that examined how well prepared Britain was for a nuclear attack; in 1983, The Day After
The Day After
The Day After is a 1983 American television movie which aired on November 20, 1983, on the ABC television network. It was seen by more than 100 million people during its initial broadcast....
an American TV movie about a nuclear war aired; in 1984, the BBC broadcast On the Eighth Day, a documentary about the effects of a nuclear winter
Nuclear winter
Nuclear winter is a predicted climatic effect of nuclear war. It has been theorized that severely cold weather and reduced sunlight for a period of months or even years could be caused by detonating large numbers of nuclear weapons, especially over flammable targets such as cities, where large...
and Threads
Threads
Threads is a British television drama produced by the BBC in 1984. Written by Barry Hines and directed by Mick Jackson, it is a documentary-style account of a nuclear war and its effects on the city of Sheffield in northern England....
, a drama about a nuclear attack on Sheffield
Sheffield
Sheffield is a city and metropolitan borough of South Yorkshire, England. Its name derives from the River Sheaf, which runs through the city. Historically a part of the West Riding of Yorkshire, and with some of its southern suburbs annexed from Derbyshire, the city has grown from its largely...
while 1985 saw the first screening of Peter Watkins
Peter Watkins
Peter Watkins is an English film and television director. He was born in Norbiton, Surrey, lived in Sweden, Canada and Lithuania for many years, and now lives in France. He is one of the pioneers of docudrama. His movies, pacifist and radical, strongly review the limit of classic documentary and...
' nuclear war television film The War Game
The War Game
The War Game is a 1965 television documentary-style drama depicting the effects of nuclear war on Britain. Written, directed, and produced by Peter Watkins for the BBC's The Wednesday Play anthology series, it caused dismay within the BBC and in government and was withdrawn from television...
, banned on television since 1965. Edge of Darkness also rode on a wave of preoccupation with the secretive nature of the State in both fact (e.g. This Week
This Week (ITV TV series)
This Week was a weekly current affairs series first produced for ITV in January 1956 by Associated-Rediffusion , running until 1978, when it was replaced by TV Eye...
’s “Death on the Rock
Death on the Rock
Death on the Rock is a British Academy Television Award-winning episode of Thames Television's current affairs series This Week, first aired by the British television network ITV on 28 April 1988. On 6 March 1988, three Irish Republican Army members, Danny McCann, Sean Savage and Mairéad Farrell,...
” (1988) about the deaths of three Provisional IRA members in Gibraltar
Gibraltar
Gibraltar is a British overseas territory located on the southern end of the Iberian Peninsula at the entrance of the Mediterranean. A peninsula with an area of , it has a northern border with Andalusia, Spain. The Rock of Gibraltar is the major landmark of the region...
and Secret Society (1987) about undisclosed matters of public interest which led to the sacking
Zircon affair
The Zircon affair was an incident in 1986 that raised many important issues in the British constitution.During the winter of 1985–1986, journalist Duncan Campbell was commissioned by the BBC to make six half-hour television documentaries under the title Secret Society...
of BBC Director General Alasdair Milne
Alasdair Milne
Alasdair David Gordon Milne is a former BBC producer who became Controller of BBC Scotland, the BBC's Director of Programmes and then Director-General of the BBC in July 1982. His resignation was forced by the BBC Governors in January 1987, following pressure from the Thatcher government...
) and fiction (e.g. the films Defence of the Realm
Defence of the Realm
Defence of the Realm is a 1985 political thriller directed by David Drury. Starring Gabriel Byrne, Greta Scacchi and Denholm Elliott...
(1985) and The Whistle Blower (1987) and the television serials A Very British Coup
A Very British Coup
A Very British Coup is a 1982 novel by British politician Chris Mullin. In 1988, the novel was adapted for television, directed by Mick Jackson, with a screenplay by Alan Plater and starring Ray McAnally...
(1988) and Traffik
Traffik
Traffik is a 1989 British television serial about the illegal drugs trade. Its three stories are interwoven, with arcs told from the perspectives of Pakistani growers and manufacturers, German dealers, and British users. It was nominated for six BAFTA Awards, winning three...
(1989)).
Edge of Darkness continues to be well regarded to this day. When it was repeated on BBC2 in 1992, Sean Day-Lewis wrote in The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph is a daily morning broadsheet newspaper distributed throughout the United Kingdom and internationally. The newspaper was founded by Arthur B...
, “Edge of Darkness is a masterpiece. It is one of those very rare television creations so rich in form and content that the spectator wishes there was some way of prolonging it indefinitely”. Andrew Lavender, writing in British Television Drama in the 1980s, has said that Edge of Darkness “captured the spirit of its age but went far beyond the drama of its time. [...] It pushed against expectations attaching to the thriller form, often transcending the limits of the genre”. Fred Inglis
Fred Inglis
Fred Inglis is Emeritus Professor of Cultural Studies at the University of Sheffield in the UK. Previously Professor of Cultural Studies at the University of Warwick, he has been a member of the School of Social Science at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, Fellow-in-Residence at the...
, in his analysis of the serial in Formations: 20th Century Media Studies, takes it “as one of the most remarkable works of art made for British television”. According to Lez Cooke, in British Television Drama: A History, “In a reactionary climate, when the possibilities for the production of 'social issue' drama were limited, Edge of Darkness proved that, by adapting to changed circumstances and adopting a serialised thriller format, it was still possible to produce ambitious and progressive television drama in Britain in the mid-1980s”, a view echoed by Sean Cubit in EcoMedia who notes that “the series neatly echoed the chill that descended on radical politics in the Thatcher years in the United Kingdom”. The television historian Andrew Pixley has described the series as “possibly the finest BBC drama ever made” and “one of the few television programmes where every element can be said to have worked to complete effect”.
Edge of Darkness was placed fifteenth (fourth position out of the dramas featured on the list) on the British Film Institute
British Film Institute
The British Film Institute is a charitable organisation established by Royal Charter to:-Cinemas:The BFI runs the BFI Southbank and IMAX theatre, both located on the south bank of the River Thames in London...
's list of the 100 Greatest British Television Programmes
100 Greatest British Television Programmes
The BFI TV 100 is a list compiled in 2000 by the British Film Institute , chosen by a poll of industry professionals, to determine what were the greatest British television programmes of any genre ever to have been screened....
in 2000, the BFI describing it as “a gripping, innovative six-part drama which fully deserves its cult status and many awards.”. Radio Times television editor Alison Graham listed it as one of the forty greatest television programmes ever made in 2003. It was one of only seven dramas listed in Broadcast
Broadcast magazine
Broadcast is a weekly magazine for the United Kingdom television and radio industry. It covers a wide range of news and issues affecting the professional broadcast market in the UK. Broadcast has regular weekly sections covering News, Commissioning, Facilities, Analysis, Opinion, Interview,...
magazine's list of the fifty most influential television programmes, published in July 2004. In March 2007, Edge of Darkness was placed third in Channel 4
Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British public-service television broadcaster which began working on 2 November 1982. Although largely commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority , the station is now owned and operated by the Channel...
's list of the Greatest TV Dramas
100 Greatest / 100 Worst
100 Greatest is a long-running TV strand on Channel 4 in the United Kingdom that has been broadcasting since 1999. The "list show" programmes are generally public polls, and reflect the votes of visitors to the Channel 4 website. However, the results of some of the polls are determined by experts...
. Also on Channel 4, Darius Jedburgh was listed eighty-fourth in their list of the One Hundred Greatest TV Characters in 2001.
Awards
Edge of Darkness received eleven nominations and won six awards at the 1986 BAFTA Awards:- Won: Best Drama Series/Serial (Martin Campbell & Michael Wearing)
- Won: Best Actor (Bob Peck).
- Nominated: Best Actor (Joe Don Baker).
- Nominated: Best Actress (Joanne Whalley).
- Won: Best Original Television Music (Eric Clapton & Michael Kamen).
- Won: Best Film Cameraman (Andrew Dunn).
- Won: Best Film Editor (Ardan Fisher, Dan Rae).
- Won: Best Film Sound (Dickie Bird, Rob James, Christopher Swantoni, Tony Quinn).
- Nominated: Best Makeup (Daphne Croker).
- Nominated: Best Graphics (Andy Coward, Linda Sherwood-Page).
- Nominated: Best Design (Graeme Thompson).
At the 1986 Broadcasting Press Guild
Broadcasting Press Guild
The Broadcasting Press Guild is a British association of journalists who specialise in writing and broadcasting about television, radio and the media generally....
television critics' awards, Edge of Darkness won two awards:
- Won: Best Actor (Bob Peck) (joint winner with Ben KingsleyBen KingsleySir Ben Kingsley, CBE is a British actor. He has won an Oscar, BAFTA, Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild awards in his career. He is known for starring as Mohandas Gandhi in the film Gandhi in 1982, for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor...
for Silas MarnerSilas MarnerSilas Marner: The Weaver of Raveloe is a dramatic novel by George Eliot. Her third novel, it was first published in 1861. An outwardly simple tale of a reclusive weaver, in its strong realism it represents one of Eliot's most sophisticated treatments of her attitude to religion.-Plot summary:The...
). - Nominated: Best Actor (Joe Don Baker).
- Won: Best Drama Series.
Hollywood adaptation
In 2010, a Hollywood remake of the show was released in cinemas. It was released on 28 January in the UK, 29 January in the US and 4 February in Australia. Mel Gibson plays Detective Craven. The film is directed by Martin Campbell, who also directed the original.Other media
Edge of Darkness was released on VHSVHS
The Video Home System is a consumer-level analog recording videocassette standard developed by Victor Company of Japan ....
videotape
Videotape
A videotape is a recording of images and sounds on to magnetic tape as opposed to film stock or random access digital media. Videotapes are also used for storing scientific or medical data, such as the data produced by an electrocardiogram...
by the BBC in 1987. There was also a release from CBS/Fox Video in North America at the same time. The soundtrack was also released as an album entitled Edge of Darkness
Edge of Darkness (soundtrack)
Edge of Darkness is the 1985 soundtrack by Eric Clapton and Michael Kamen for the British television series Edge of Darkness. The soundtrack's theme won the Ivor Novello Award for songwriting and composing, besides winning the 1986 BAFTA Award for Best Music.-Background:For Clapton, it was his...
.
Troy Kennedy Martin's original script for episode one and the final scripts for episodes two to six of the serial were published by Faber and Faber
Faber and Faber
Faber and Faber Limited, often abbreviated to Faber, is an independent publishing house in the UK, notable in particular for publishing a great deal of poetry and for its former editor T. S. Eliot. Faber has a rich tradition of publishing a wide range of fiction, non fiction, drama, film and music...
in 1990; the script book also included an introduction by Kennedy Martin and two appendices – the first giving background to the story and the main characters and the second giving comments on the script by experts on nuclear power and police procedures.
The serial was re-issued on VHS in 1998 by Revelation Films who also issued the serial on DVD in 1999. In 2003, BBC Worldwide
BBC Worldwide
BBC Worldwide Limited is the wholly owned commercial subsidiary of the British Broadcasting Corporation, formed out of a restructuring of its predecessor BBC Enterprises in 1995. In the year to 31 March 2010 it made a profit of £145m on a turnover of £1.074bn. The company had made a profit of £106m...
re-issued Edge of Darkness on DVD (encoded for both regions 2 and 4) with several extra features including Magnox: The Secrets of Edge of Darkness, a specially made “making-of” documentary; an isolated soundtrack of Eric Clapton and Michael Kamen's score; a Bob Peck interview from BBC Breakfast Time
Breakfast Time
Breakfast Time was British television's first national breakfast show, beating TV-am's flagship programme Good Morning Britain to the air by two weeks.The show was revolutionary for the time...
; a contemporary report on the programme's BAFTA wins and coverage of the programme's wins at the Broadcasting Press Guild awards. A Region 1 DVD set was released on 3 November 2009.
See also
- Edge of DarknessEdge of Darkness (soundtrack)Edge of Darkness is the 1985 soundtrack by Eric Clapton and Michael Kamen for the British television series Edge of Darkness. The soundtrack's theme won the Ivor Novello Award for songwriting and composing, besides winning the 1986 BAFTA Award for Best Music.-Background:For Clapton, it was his...
, the soundtrack album for the series, by Eric Clapton and Michael Kamen.
External links
- Edge of Darkness at the British Film InstituteBritish Film InstituteThe British Film Institute is a charitable organisation established by Royal Charter to:-Cinemas:The BFI runs the BFI Southbank and IMAX theatre, both located on the south bank of the River Thames in London...
's Screenonline - Interview with Troy Kennedy Martin (circa 2004)