Mr Loverman (BBC1)
Mr Loverman, what an arch and clever title. Barrington’s domineering wife, Carmel, is convinced he’s ‘putting his thing about with trampy cows’.
Barrington (Lennie James) has many faults. He’s a hard drinker who never goes out without a flask of rum in his jacket, and an insincere charmer who will promise anything to anyone for the sake of a quiet life.
But a philanderer he is not. ‘Hand on heart,’ he tells Carmel truthfully, ‘I have not slept with any other woman but you.’Â
Because Barrington isn’t Mr Loverman . . . he’s Mr Love-A-Man.Â
His lifelong best friend, Morris (Ariyon Bakare), is also his soulmate. And aged 74, Barry is almost ready to stop living a lie — if only he weren’t so terrified of his wife, and all her friends, and his daughter Maxine, too.
Lennie James stars in the BBC’s tender queer romance Mr Loverman
Closely based on Booker prize-winner Bernardine Evaristo’s novel, Mr Loverman is a wry comedy shot through with bitterness and heartbreak
Lennie James delivers an extraordinary performance, his hair dyed white and his gait sprightly, like a man determined not to show his age. He’s equally exceptional in flashbacks, when the young Barry and Morris are hiding their sexuality after escaping the intense and violent homophobia of Antigua, the Caribbean island where they grew up.
And in the opening scene last week, he was lovably convincing as a drunk coming down from the high of an all-night binge — giggly at first, then tired, then clumsy, until he stumbled into a row with Carmel (Sharon D. Clarke) that ended with silent, seething hatred after she slapped his face.
Closely based on Booker prize-winner Bernardine Evaristo’s novel, Mr Loverman is a wry comedy shot through with bitterness and heartbreak. If the characters weren’t so believable, these contradictory moods might tear the story apart, but Barry cultivates them on purpose.
Barry and Morris are hiding their sexuality after escaping the intense and violent homophobia of Antigua, the Caribbean island where they grew up
Whenever life threatens to get difficult, he makes a joke. When people demand more than he can give, he presses a drink on them.
Urged by Morris, in tense whispers across the table of a south London cafe, to tell the world that they’re both gay, Barrington denies it with a grin: ‘I ain’t no homosexual. I am a Barrysexual.’
And when Morris storms out, slamming the door, Barry sets the other customers at ease: ‘He really wanted to close that door, didn’t he, eh?
’Director Hong Khauo’s decision to split the adaptation into half-hour episodes seemed odd at first, but makes more sense as we discover how Barry’s double life has affected the people he loves.
One 30-minute episode took us into Morris’s lonely world, revealing in a harrowing scene how his wife, Odette (Suzette Llewellyn), discovered the truth about the two men. Morris has lost everything — marriage, home, children. Barry isn’t prepared to sacrifice as much. But it gradually becomes clear he’s lost it anyway.
In another episode, Carmel returned to visit Antigua without him, convinced that Barry never really loved her because (so she thinks) she isn’t as attractive as other women.
Mr Loverman makes us ache for all the characters. But however broadly Barry smiles, it’s too late for a happy ending.
