TV Pick of the Week: The Gentlemen - review by Yvette Huddleston

Young army officer Eddie Horniman (Theo James) is doing a good job as part of a UN peacekeeping force in an unnamed war zone when he is called back to his aristocratic home of Halstead Manor where his father the Duke of Halstead lays dying. After the funeral comes the reading of the will. Arrogant, dissolute older brother Freddy (Daniel Ings) assumes, not unreasonably given the law of primogeniture, that he will be inheriting the estate. However, their father – presumably trusting his second son as the more reliable option – has other ideas and Eddie is as shocked as Freddy when he inherits the dukedom and the entire estate, lock, stock and barrel (sorry).

Still adjusting to this new reality, Eddie then discovers that his father had ‘a business arrangement’ with a feisty young woman called Susie Glass (Kaya Scodelario). Basically, one of the large barns on the 15,000 acres of land is being used as a cannabis farm, for which the old Duke was receiving a large sum of money from Glass for turning a blind eye. It turns out that Susie is the daughter of notorious gangster Bobby Glass (Ray Winstone, of course) who is currently languishing in prison but still heading up his extensive drugs operation. The upstanding Eddie is none too happy about this but has little choice but to continue with the arrangement, especially as his feckless cocaine and gambling addicted brother is monumentally in debt to some very unpleasant types.

There is much to enjoy here. You can’t fault the pacing, propulsive action and twisting narrative which is all delivered with great panache. There is some outrageous black comedy – including a toe-curling chicken dance (in full costume) that Freddy is required to do for a tough Scouse gangster creditor – and also added into the mix is mysterious American billionaire Stanley Johnston (Giancarlo Esposito) who is keen to buy Halstead Manor. Plus, Vinny Jones as faithful old retainer Geoff the gamekeeper and a coolly aloof Joely Richardson as Lady Sabrina, mother to Eddie and Freddy.