The Responder review: Final performance that shows Bernard Hill’s powerful presence was undimmed, writes CHRISTOPHER STEVENS
The Responder (BBC)
What a way to get his final curtain. Bernard Hill, an actor of unparalleled power, and celebrated by two generations for vastly different roles, died yesterday – hours before his final performance was broadcast.
As loaded brass Chris Carson answered a call to a burglarized house in The Responder, those who (like me) have been fans of Hill since the 1980s took one look at the guy in the battered armchair with the walker and chorused: “ Gissa job!’
Among the fifty-somethings he was perhaps better known as the heroic King Theoden in The Lord Of The Rings. But by the start of the Thatcher years, Hill was Britain’s best-known actor – the face of the recession – playing Yosser Hughes, a Scouse tarmac layer who loses his job, in Boys From The Blackstuff.
Yosser was unemployed, but desperate for work. His catchphrase: ‘Gissa job!’ and ‘I can do that!’ – became national slogans.
Bernard Hill, an actor of unparalleled power, and celebrated by two generations for vastly different roles, died yesterday – hours before his final performance was broadcast
As loaded buyer Chris Carson (right) answered a call to a burglarized house in The Responder, those who (like me) have been fans of Hill since the 1980s took one look at the guy in the battered armchair with the walker and choruses: ‘Gissa job!’
Hill, who was 79, had worked little on television in recent years, choosing his jobs involving clinical care. Until the end, his screen presence was unchanged. Just by sitting in front of the TV and beaming at The Responder, he exuded a malevolent force that far exceeded all the threats and violence of this drugs and corruption drama.
His reunion with the son he hadn’t seen in years was also the foulest scene of a very shouty match. I counted more than 80 F-words per hour, which may be the highest rate since Peter Capaldi’s turn as spin doctor in The Thick Of It.
When Hill, playing a miserable old boy named Tom, protested that he always loved his son, patrol car driver Chris (Martin Freeman) burst out, “Bleep off!” Don’t say that in a squeaky way! Did you love us? I remember you sticking my squeaky head through a door just because I spilled your squeaky baccy on the kitchen linoleum, old squeaky squeak. Squeaky love? Beep!’
This grimly gripping thriller from Tony Schumacher started with the searing intensity of the first series of 2022 and stepped on the accelerator. Chris lives in squalor and is evicted. Chris hates his job catching drunks and crackheads, and constantly fights the temptation to backstabber. At the insistence of his old boss, who promises him a life behind a desk as a reward, he agrees to trap a drug dealer. That goes wrong so quickly that he risks ten years in prison before his service is over.
Hill, who was 79, had worked little on television in recent years, choosing his jobs involving clinical care. Until the end, his screen presence was unchanged. Pictured: Brendan Hill with Martin Freeman (second right) and Myanna Buring (far right)
The allusions to illegal activities of all kinds are so common that viewers need a criminal mind to understand all the implications.
When rookie cop Rachel (Adelayo Adedayo) veers off the road and crashes into a hedge, her partner Eric (Ian Puleston-Davies) responds with bemused gratitude: “You just bought me a new conservatory.”
He’s talking about compensation for fake whiplash injuries.
Such a scam would never have occurred to Yosser Hughes.