7 guide 12-18 Aug 2017 televisiontelevisiontelevision
Robert lops off a left
bollock by accident.No matter: it’s all
showmanshipeet Robert Lessing, a
Victorian surgeon who is
lustrous of hair, vast of
ego and handy with a hacksaw.
Robert can amputate a leg in
92 seconds, which is a good
deal longer than it takes him
to relieve a lady of her corsetry
while off his tits on absinthe.
He has performed more than a
thousand procedures in front of
rapt audiences who, in the age of
God-fearing morality, can’t get
enough of squirting pus and the
sound of steel hitting bone.
Robert, played with virtuoso
dickishness by Rory Kinnear,
is one of the gaggle of medics
strutting their surgical stuff
in Quacks (Tuesday, 10pm,
BBC2), a deliciously gruesome
comedy-drama set in 1840s
London. There’s also Tom
Basden’s John, a dentist and
fledgling anaesthetist with
a fondness for liquid opium;
psychiatrist William (The Wrong
Mans’ Mathew Baynton) who
eschews the beatings dispensed
to mental patients in favour of
a revolutionary new treatment
known as “talking”; and Robert’s
wife, Caroline (Lydia Leonard),
a wannabe doctor wrestling
with both the patriarchy and her
own unruly libido.
Quacks is based on a period in
the mid-19th century when huge
strides were made in medicine
and its pioneering young
doctors were treated like rock
stars. This week’s opener finds
Robert operating on a humbleM
haberdasher with a broken leg,
while women furtively clutch
their nether regions in the gallery
and declare the spectacle “more
fun than Madame Tussauds”.
Speed is of the essence with
amputations since the patients
are unanaesthetised – and, really,
there is only so much screaming
an audience can endure. As
the haberdasher flails in agony,
Robert lops off his left bollock
by accident. No matter: it’s
all grist to the mill of surgical
showmanship.
There is a hint of Horrible
Histories in this series, rooted
in historical accuracy and
brilliantly milking it for lols.
Created by James Wood, who
co-wrote Rev, it depicts a society
caught between centuries-
old belief systems and a more
liberal-minded modern age.Thus, dark personal dilemmas
reside between the sight gags
and smart one-liners. Robert
kicks against the medical
establishment but his progressive
nature doesn’t extend to
women: he is exasperated by
his wife’s desire for a career
and disgusted to find Florence
Nightingale opening windows
and cleaning instruments in his
hospital. Meanwhile, William
may be at the bleeding edge of
neuroscience but his prudish
streak means one touch of a
lady’s hand and he’s fleeing the
scene while hiding his boner
behind his medical bag.
Rupert Everett’s Dr Hendrick,
imperious president of the
hospital and physician to the
aristocracy, represents the old
guard here. Rather than examine
his female patients, he hands
them a ceramic figurine in order
that they may point to where
it hurts. Visited by a lady with
an obvious case of cystitis, he
observes: “Clearly you’ve got
this problem because you are
a woman ... You need to fast for
a week, ride a horse for two hours
a day, not Sundays, and place a
freshly cooked baked potato on
the infected area.”
Quacks is my kind of costume
drama: one where bladder
infections are treated with
vegetables, man-baby medics
get twatted on nitrous oxide
and ether cocktails, and the
jokes are so good they might just
prove fatal The other side
Fiona Sturges is left in
stitches by Victorian
medical comedy Quacks
ILLUSTRATION: JULIA SCHEELE