They had to revert to their class; that's why we appeased Hitler. ", The son of a Russian émigré businessman and aristocratic Jewish actor, he was packed off to boarding school in Kent at the age of eight, where he was spectacularly miserable. With so many ideas here, surely no-one could now accuse this writer of being slow to tell a story. The Louis Lester Band manages to get a recurring gig at the Imperial Hotel thanks to the pushy nature of their manager, Wesley (Ariyon Bakare), and also a place to stay there — tucked away, of course. And indeed, some of the good people were antisemitic; I mean, Harold Nicholson was one of the good people agitating on the sidelines to make Churchill prime minister, and was terribly anti-appeasement, and he was a terrible antisemite and a terrible racist. Although almost all of it has enjoyed both popular and critical acclaim, he has also attracted a reputation for arrogance. At 24 he was made writer-in-residence at the National Theatre, and throughout the 70s his plays established him as one of Britain's leading young playwrights. That’s not to say that Dancing on the Edge doesn’t have its charms. Terms with the same meaning include: SKATING ON THIN ICE and LIVING ON THE EDGE. Jennifer Garvey Berger. But to everyone about to fall in love with his latest drama, Poliakoff may well soon be at real risk of becoming a national treasure. The miniseries covers the rise and quick unravelling of the fictional Louis Lester Band from 1932 to 1933. But above all Poliakoff dramatises the turmoil of racism, and the conflicts inspired by skin colour. His reputation certainly precedes him – a great galloping colossus of media folklore, variously casting the writer as a genius, control freak, force of nature or diva, sometimes all at the same time. "People go on and on about my budget, but I don't get any more money than anyone else. © 2020 Collider Cryptomedia, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Dancing also incorporates the overshadowing issue of race during an era where racial tensions were extremely high. He has unparalleled creative freedom within the BBC. You cling to the values that tend to inform you when you're a young adult – and it takes a huge effort of will to shed them. ", This time round, though, faced with making his first ever five-part drama, "the most punishing, demanding" project of his entire career, he did consider sharing directorial duties with someone else. So even if you were rich, and of a liberal bent, you still reverted – as most of Europe did.". What happened afterwards was obviously so awful – the holocaust, world war two, everything. For many years he has directed his own work, and in effect produces, casts and edits it all too. "No, I don't think so. In early episodes the idea is very heavy-handed, but as the show matures the racism becomes more insidious, more sinister, and even more disappointing when it comes from those who Louis and the band befriended and had begun to trust. But, as Stephen Poliakoff's latest lavish drama reaches our screens, what does he make of his reputation for being a control freak? Whenever we discover that this or that person of that time was very antisemitic, people say: 'But everybody was then. It was nominated for three awards at … "But I've got quite a good record of spotting people. But it is not true, he insists, that the BBC writes him a blank cheque. Poliakoff's work is never about just one thing only, though. Because of the history of the 20th century, we tend to think the forces of darkness were unstoppable. Characters who started the series as rough sketches of English manor types end up, for the most part, subverting their character expectations to great success. I ask about the rumours that this will be the first series of an ongoing drama serial, and he stutters and stalls, before admitting: "I feel there's something very potent there. Definition of dance on the razor's edge in the Idioms Dictionary. At the moment I'm obsessed that we get enough trails on BBC1. Besides," he grins, "I just think it's nice to use television like that. "People did say: 'I'll believe it when I see it. We'd all thought you'd gone mad when you cast him. Race and class are largely involved in both, but the miniseries makes this a personal story even though it has, at one point, national implications. A little bit of an uplifting epilogue (which is incredibly rushed given how slow everything else in the miniseries plays out) keeps Dancing from being too melancholy after the fall. The band soon attracts racy, royal fans, and before long fashionable young aristocrats are falling over each other to make friends with the musicians, in some cases falling into bed with them. We'll see how it goes. Many of the central characters are based on real people, and the idea for the drama first came to Poliakoff while he was researching the history of the royal family in the 30s for his earlier drama, The Lost Prince. The hotel serves as the central location for the main cast (which includes a number of great actors like John Goodman as an American billionaire, Jacqueline Bisset as an unexpected jazz enthusiast, and Anthony Head, Joanna Vanderham and Tom Hughes as members of the aristocracy) to meet, greet, break up, and come and go.