News, sport and entertainment from the Bournemouth Echo and Dorset Echo.

The right stuff

From the Echo, first published Thursday 25th Jan 2001.

On the face of it it's a crazy piece casting. Like signing up Arnie Schwarzenegger for a remake of Are You Being Served?

You know: "Don't poosh me Mr Humphries or Mrs Slocombe's poosy gets it."

Yet Richard Briers, that loveable, goody-two-shoes from countless sitcoms is about to go completely against type and play a totally loathsome character.

What's more the play - a new drama called Spike in which Briers plays a fascist car dealer called Vernon King - contains nudity and bad language.

Ooh-er, missus!

The man, who is destined to be remembered forever by the public at large as the environmentally-friendly Tom Good in the seventies TV comedy The Good Life, chuckles at the thought of actually being a baddie.

Taking a break from rehearsals for the play which opens at Southampton's Nuffeld theatre on Thursday he told me: "I'm afraid some of the old dears are going to be a bit shocked to see me, Mr Squeaky Clean, playing such a ghastly man.

"He's a really nasty piece of work, a fascist car dealer who sells very expensive vehicles to Arabs, but it's good to do something new.

"After all I'm 67 now so I think it's about time to tackle something like this."

Briers knows from experience that his fans have strong feelings about his characters.

When he did play a baddie in an episode of Inspector Morse they didn't like it at all.

But he points out that many of his characters have been flawed including Hector in Monarch of the Glen - a role he refers to as "the Scottish job".

He even raises an eyebrow at the notion that Tom Good was a nice person.

In fact he describes the character as "an obsessive and selfish, little man. I'd absolutely hate to live next door to him".

Reassuringly perhaps the creation of Spike has a cosily domestic background.

Its author Simon Day is the boyfriend of Briers' actress daughter Lucy and while writing it he would cycle over to the Briers household in Chiswick virtually daily from his home in nearby Richmond to show the family the work in progress.

Before long Briers was volunteering to play Vernon - "an extremely good vehicle for acting" - while his wife the actress Ann Davies and Lucy are also in the cast.

* Spike opens at The Nuffield Theatre, Southampton on Thursday February 1 and runs until March 3. For tickets and further information, call 023 8067

Archive Home