Reviews
BACK: LUKE VARLEY/SHOWTIME.TelevisionThere is a magnificent economy in Back to
Life, a BBC-produced British series to air on
Showtime. It will get headlines because the
show has some of the same producers as
Amazon’s Fleabag and because it also has an
extremely talented writer and star at its cen-
ter: Daisy Haggard (Episodes).
There is darkness and laughter here, just as
there was in Fleabag, and the two series share
a similar melancholy-filled mysteriousness
— though Back to Life isn’t built to brilliantly
spring a reveal on you at the end, as the first
season of Fleabag did. It’s just a wonderfully
nuanced story that’s both extremely funny
and tragically sad but never leans too hard in
either direction just to get a reaction.
Haggard and Laura Solon (Hot in Cleveland)
wrote all six half-hour episodes, each tight
but rich in meaningful detail. The focus is on
Miri Matteson (Haggard), now 36 years old,
who returns from an 18-year prison sentence
to her small coastal town in Hythe, Kent. The
beauty — and much of the humor — of the
series comes from Miri’s optimism about life.
She’s relentlessly positive and kind and never
once defensively utters that she’s paid her debt
to society.
The past is, in fact, so distant in Miri’s mind
that she has moved almost naively beyond it.
But the town hasn’t, and Back to Life deftly
weaves their bitter memories and fears into
their present-day contact with Miri. It’s an
audacious narrative, and it takes a perfect per-
formance from Haggard to pull it off. If she’s
too upbeat, then the tone veers too heavily
toward the silly. If she’s too downbeat, there’s
no levity at all.
Waiting at home are Miri’s mother, Caroline
(Geraldine James), and father, Oscar (Richard
Durden), whose lives also have been derailed
by her prison sentence. The series is very
good at succinctly suggesting the years lost;a glimpse at the posters in Miri’s room —
Prince, George Michael, David Bowie, all
musical icons who died when she was away
— captures a life a put on hold. Other times,
the story is played for comedy (“Google it —
just do not google yourself,” Miri’s mother
tells her).
Haggard and Solon do an excellent job
handling the nature of Miri’s crime itself,
which is revealed early on though remains the
subject of some uncertainty when it comes to
the exact details and circumstances. But Back
to Life is a show about trying to move forward
and not look back in a small town that refuses
to forget. It all sounds bleak and foreboding,
but don’t let that deter you; this is frequently
hilarious and consistently clever television.
There are a number of excellent sup-
porting turns, including Adeel Akhtar as a
kind neighbor and Jo Martin as Miri’s self-
centered parole officer. Christopher Sweeney
directs all six episodes efficiently, with
cinematic touches.
Back to Life is a real, left-field gem of a series.Back to Life
Showtime’s British series is a sad,
hilarious Fleabag-esque look at a
woman navigating life after prison
By Tim Goodman
AIRDATE 9 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 10 (Showtime)
CAST Daisy Haggard, Geraldine James, Richard Durden,
Adeel Akhtar, Jo Martin, Jamie Michie
CREATORS/WRITERS Daisy Haggard, Laura SolonDaisy Haggard plays a woman who returns to her hometown
after serving time; Adeel Akhtar is her friendly neighbor.Powering
Creativity
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