Hazell - TV series

Gordon Williams and Terry Venables wrote three private eye novels together in the 70s, using the pen-name P.B. Yuill, under which Williams had previously published an intriguing if eccentric thriller The Bornless Keeper. Their private eye was James Hazell, a Cockney and ex-cop, and the snappy writing style ensured the books were more successful than most British attempts at stories about gumshoes.

So successful, in fact, that they were adapted for television. 22 episodes were screened in 1978-79. At the time, I only caught one or two episodes, and they didn't make a lasting impression on me. However, Talking Pictures TV have been screening the series, and rather to my surprise I've found that, even though some of the attitudes have inevitably dated, the stories hold up pretty well.

Much of this is due to Nicholas Ball's performance as Hazell. I don't think Ball has ever quite matched the success of this particular role, but he really handles very well the combination of cheekiness, wit, and vulnerability in the character. Interestingly, I've just given an endorsement to a non-fiction book which includes an interview with him. Anyway, Hazell does misbehave from time to time, but overall it's clear that his heart is in the right place. More or less.

Several good scriptwriters contributed to the series, including Tony Hoare, and there are a number of excellent performances in individual supporting roles from actors ranging from Clive Swift to Pamela Stephenson (who was, in fact, married to Nicholas Ball at one time). A regular character is the dour cop "Choc" Minty, played by Roddy Macmillan; it was his last role prior to his premature death. Another is Dot Wilmington (Barbara Young), for whom Hazell works in the early episodes, an early and interesting example of a lesbian character in a British television series. The theme song is performed by Maggie Bell with the same verve she later brought to the Taggart theme, and it even made number 37 in the charts. There is violence in many of the episodes, but it's not as brutal as The Sweeney. Yes, I've enjoyed watching Hazell forty-plus years on.

Hazell

I've rhapsodised more than once about Talking Pictures TV. In addition to bringing back a host of minor but often interesting B-movies, they have screened a number of interesting British TV series from the past. I've enjoyed Scotland Yard and the Edgar Wallace anthology series, while the recent Shadows of Fear series (which I'd never even heard of before) was very good. Now they have started to show Hazell.

Hazell is one of the most interesting of British private eye series. It was co-written by Gordon Williams (best known as the author of the book that was made into Straw Dogs) and the former England footballer and manager Terry Venables. They used the pen-name P.B. Yuill, which Williams had previously adopted for his weird yet intriguing stand-alone novel The Bornless Keeper.

The books were successful, and were published in paperback by Penguin. There were, alas, only three of them, but they spawned a TV series with Nicholas Ball, then quite a big star, as James Hazell, the Cockney answer to Philip Marlowe. There were over 20 episodes, and I saw a few of them at the time, but now I've caught up with the first in the series.

Hazell Plays Solomon is based on the first of the novels, and it benefits from a strong and engaging plot. Our lad is hired by a flash lawyer to trace the daughter of an American client (played by Jane Asher) and gets into personal and professional complications. It's rather snappily done, and I enjoyed it. Whether the rest of the series lives up to the promise of the first remains to be seen, but this one has worn relatively well, despite all the flared trousers and macho 70s attitudes.