"It's gold rush time in Blackpool," he advises his guests at the opening-night party for his gambling den, "and guess who's shitting gold nuggets." Soon, he will be shitting himself, yet, as with Tony Soprano, it is hard to dislike him. I even wonder if David Morrissey's otherwise exemplary performance does not let this lying, adulterous bully off the hook a little too easily.

Holden knows his customers: the "Priest", who is praying to a higher power for luck; the "Ghost", palely loitering behind other players and judging when their machine is likely to pay out; "Pythagoras", calculating the odds. He thinks he knows everything about everyone. His daughter's ex-boyfriend is "special needs meets Special Brew". His son needs to do something more than wank in his bedroom. His wife, Natalie, who volunteers at the Samaritans, has become, he thinks, a sanctimonious do-gooder. The truth is that he understands his family less than he thinks: his boy is involved in dealing drugs; his daughter's new boyfriend is his own age; his wife's involvement with the Samaritans is how she sublimates her despair over their failing marriage.

There is something else he doesn't know, and this is that Natalie is getting involved with the detective investigating the murder. Morrissey is going to get most of the praise heaped upon Blackpool, but David Tennant, who played the vacillating vicar in He Knew He Was Right earlier this year, is every bit his equal as the down-at-heel copper Peter Carlisle, a younger version of Columbo, who uses the LA detective's trick of feigning incompetence, but talks in pop-culture one-liners ("And is that your final answer?" he asks a witness).

Carlisle has been parachuted into Blackpool presumably because the resident top cop is one of Holden's best friends and a secret investor in his business. "I'm like an emergency plumber, but less well paid," he explains to Holden at his amusement arcade. "It's a family entertainment centre," he corrects him. "Yes," says Carlisle, "and I'm a crime-citizen interface consultant." They are each other's equal in wit, and Holden is right to feel threatened by the newcomer. Meanwhile, as Carlisle's courtship of Natalie becomes more romantic, Carlisle's dislike of Holden develops into something personal.

It was Keith Waterhouse who said that Brighton looks like a town that is helping the police with their inquiries--but pretty soon all of Blackpool is helping Carlisle with his. The producer, Kate Lewis, has said the piece was inspired by Trollope's The Way We Live Now and that Holden is Blackpool's Melmotte. As in that novel, the plausible villain's fall will doubtless bring down a good many others. Given that these include the corrupt deputy chief inspector and Holden's inadequate backer, the B & B proprietor Terry, played by John Thomson, we can hardly wait. Terry, the prime butt of Holden's sarcasm and fists, should have deserted him years ago. When he admires an exotic dancer he claims to have seen "improve" over the years, Holden snaps: "What is this? Strip Idol? You're not a judge. You're a drooler like the rest of us."

The dialogue positively sings, which makes it all the weirder that Bowker and Lewis decided to make Blackpool a musical and have the characters periodically mime to pop songs in Dennis Potter fashion. It feels like a mistake. Potter believed that popular music expressed sentiments his working-class characters could not, but Blackpool's leads are hyper-articulate in the first place. Dramatically, the songs add nothing. What they do add is music, and good music. Once you have seen Carlisle perform "These Boots Are Made For Walking" at rather than with Holden, you would not wish the scene cut. Blackpool, in its aspirations and themes, is no Singing Detective. It is not an intellectual work. But it makes Moulin Rouge--not to mention most popular TV drama right now--look pretty dumb.

Pick Of The Night | The Evening Standard Nov 18 2004

Blackpool 9pm, BBC1

WITH another excellent opening musical sequence (this week, to Kenny Rogers' The Gambler), the second episode of Peter Bowker's dazzling musical murder mystery dances on to our screens.

I say "Peter Bowker's" because he is the creator of this witty, dark confection. But onscreen the show belongs to David Morrissey, who powers his way through every scene as amusement arcade boss Ripley Holden - a monstrous man we should hate, but who, thanks to Morrissey, holds a compelling fascination.

Tonight, though, Morrissey finds his centre-stage role challenged as David Tennant moves into the limelight as the sardonic, languid and defiantly unorthodox DI Carlisle.

The policeman decides the best way to pursue his investigation into the dead body found on Holden's premises is by wooing the arcade- owner's trophy wife, Natalie (Sarah Parish) - resulting in a fantasy dance sequence (above) in which Holden rises from the floor playing an organ (of the musical kind I say that, because with Holden any vulgar act is possible). It's not policing in the traditional sense, but it might just work Tremendous entertainment.

Vegas By The Sea Hits The Jackpot | The Independent Nov 12 2004

It's amazing how easy it is to use the language of class-warfare in favour of gambling - cf Tessa Jowell's recent characterisation of opposition to the government's new proposals for relaxing gambling laws as "snobbish". Cf, also, Ripley Holden (played by David Morrissey), the charismatic lout at the heart of Peter Bowker's drama serial Blackpool, who near the beginning of yesterday's opening episode proclaimed, "an amusement arcade is the people's stock exchange".

Blackpool isn't something you expect to come across on BBC1 at midweek prime-time. It was a drama of originality and intelligence, unfazed by the idea of muddling genres and tones, blessed with smart writing and direction, and some even smarter acting: jackpot, in fact. The story revolved around Ripley's plans to replace his promenade amusement arcade with a giant casino, turning it into the heart of a new Vegas-by-the-sea - an ambition that, thanks to Lukas Strebel's luminous, candy-coloured cinematography, didn't seem completely implausible. Ripley's plans were thrown out of kilter, though, when a body turned up in his arcade, and an eccentric copper from out of town (David Tennant) pegged him as the number-one suspect.

The plot jumbled together petty corruption, family disharmony and hints of a mysterious past (when Ripley's adored daughter, Shyanne, brought home a much older boyfriend, Ripley scared him off by the simple expedient of telling him - though not the viewer - his real name). In itself, this was hardly groundbreaking; indeed, there were several points last night where the narrative felt slapped together, plot cruces faked up. However, elsewhere, it seemed as if Bowker was using his influences in unexpected and subtle ways. At one point, confronted by a Bible-spouting anti-gambling protester (David Bradley, looking very Old Testament-like), Ripley topped his Biblical quotations with one of his own - the same trick used by Sky Masterson, the ace gambler in Guys and Dolls: and then it dawned on me that Morrissey was wearing exactly the same get up of black shirt and white tie that Marlon Brando wore in the film.

A more prominent influence was Dennis Potter, and specifically the Potter of Pennies from Heaven. Bowker has borrowed the device of having characters sing along to popular songs, though the soundtrack has been updated - the action opened with Ripley and family joining in with Elvis on "Viva Las Vegas"; later, a confrontation between Morrissey and Tennant turned into a duet on Nancy Sinatra's "These Boots Were Made for Walking". The songs didn't always fit smoothly into the narrative, but Morrissey, in dazzling suits and priapic quiff, injected enough vulgar energy to make up for that. The dialogue was sparky, the casting was spot-on, and Julie Anne Robinson's production, though hobbled by occasional outbreaks of self- conscious wackiness, had an appropriate brashness and flair. Whether Tessa Jowell will appreciate what it says about casino culture is another matter.

Still, the best case against casinos is made by the people who frequent them: cf "Lucky" Lucan, habitue of John Aspinall's Clermont Club in Mayfair, and murderer of Sandra Rivett, his children's nanny. The Hunt for Lord Lucan was put out to celebrate - and I'm afraid that probably is the right word - the 30th anniversary of the crime. A relative of Lord Lucan's talked about his wife, presumed to be his intended victim: "We were surprised at his choice. But we thought probably it was a case of his feeling sorry for her, because she seemed a rather pathetic little person to us." This is why casinos should be the preserve of the rich: it keeps these people away from the rest of us.