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A new Brit drama is as much fun for its style as its content, notes David Knox.
What is it about Manchester? It was the backdrop to the original Queer As Folk and now it’s the home to more horny young Brits in the six-part drama, Sinchronicity.
As the snappy title suggests, this promises a hot-bed of racy ideas and volatile emotions. But if gay was groundbreaking in 1999, now its metrosexuals, wandering straight men and bi-sexuals who push the envelope.
The central character in this drama by Julian Jones (As If) is Nathan (Paul Chequer), a straight guy who writes straight porn for a magazine. When he is helping his pal Jason (Daniel Percival) to drive a van they have a minor encounter with Fi (Jemima Rooper), which leads to Jason asking her on a date.
But we quickly learn that it’s Nathan who desires Fi, despite the fact that Jason got there first. Sinchronicity cleverly re-tells some of its key moments from varying points of view, a device first created by Kurosawa’s Japanese film Rashomon, and exploited by Tarantino and films like Sliding Doors. Interlocking like a Rubik’s Cube, the non-linear storytelling is one of the drama’s best strengths.
The three nonetheless become inseparable friends, partying and boozing. Sure enough Nathan and Fi get it on behind Jason’s back. The real kicker is kept for the scene when Jason admits to a moment of weakness when he was hit on by a gay guy.
Not everything here is perfect politically. As Jason tells of his secret, Nathan feigns understanding while screaming inside. And a transgender minor role writing for the porn mag is, so far, little more than a man in a bad dress.
In watching the first episode it may be Nathan who is narrator, and Jason who is the hunk-turning-bi, but it was Fi who is the more captivating character. With a plot that sees her torn between two men, and with a performance by an actress who is not readily covergirl material, it only made her all the more engaging.
But by episode’s end I was ‘dead keen’ to see how this trio will sort their way through what is bound to become a minefield of shagging, confessing, compromising, screaming, partying, lying and loving.
Welcome back to Manchester.
Sinchronicity premieres at 10pm Monday March 10 on SBS.
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