The Guardian Unlimited – Thursday 26th October, 2000

There was a line in this week’s Scarlet Pimpernel (BBC1), “Knowing where you have been is as important as knowing where you are going”, which explains the whole why and wherefore of A History Of Britain.

Sir Percy’s cry of “Gunpowder, treason and plot!” and a lavish firework display made this Pimpernel an unusually topical frolic.

The leg-pulling, educated script by Alan Whiting – in which William Turner had a small part and Isaac Newton a friendly mention – turned on the invention of a hand-grenade by the heroine. By happy chance, she was the world’s greatest living scientist, and pretty chippy about it too. “Surely you are not suggesting that that a woman doesn’t have the mental capacity to grasp the subject of chemistry?” Sir Percy, who had been playing with his balls all evening and had developed a useful yorker, bowled her bomb over Robespierre’s railings. The heroine had urged him to try an unorthodox overarm delivery. Being French, she did not know that in the 18th century, underarm bowling was de rigueur.

The bomb not only demolished the guillotine (“Well bowled, sir!”) but blew off Robespierre’s wig. Robespierre seems to be a proxy Sheriff of Nottingham in these stories, regularly getting it in the neck in the last reel. That both the Sheriff of Nottingham and Robespierre are French gives the whole thing a cheerier frisson.

The Pimpernel’s immediate adversary, in this episode, was General La Forge, a trying visitor who always knocks the door down with a battering ram. You could tell them apart because the Pimpernel (Richard E Grant) wore his hat east and west, and La Forge (Jim Cartwright) wore his north and south. Very like the Duke of Wellington and Napoleon, only vice versa, if you follow me. Half the secret of costume drama is the ability to wear silly hats with insouciance.

Why do I keep talking French? It’s not catching, is it?