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''Joe's Palace'' is a
BBC television drama
BBC television dramas have been produced and broadcast since even before the public service company had an officially established television broadcasting network in the United Kingdom. As with any major broadcast network, drama forms an importan ...
, (co-produced by the
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
and
HBO
Home Box Office (HBO) is an American premium television network, which is the flagship property of namesake parent subsidiary Home Box Office, Inc., itself a unit owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. The overall Home Box Office business unit is ba ...
) and written and directed by
Stephen Poliakoff
Stephen Poliakoff (born 1 December 1952) is a British playwright, director and screenwriter. In 2006 Gerard Gilbert of ''The Independent'' described him as the UK's "pre-eminent TV dramatist" who had "inherited Dennis Potter's crown".
Early ...
. It was first aired on
BBC One
BBC One is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's flagship network and is known for broadcasting mainstream programming, which includes BBC News television bulletins, p ...
on 4 November 2007. It is linked, by the central character of Joe, to the Poliakoff drama ''
Capturing Mary'' which was aired (on
BBC Two
BBC Two is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It covers a wide range of subject matter, with a remit "to broadcast programmes of depth and substance" in contrast to the more mainstream an ...
) on 12 November 2007.
Plot
The play revolves around the character of Joe (who is also the
narrator
Narration is the use of a written or spoken commentary to convey a story to an audience. Narration is conveyed by a narrator: a specific person, or unspecified literary voice, developed by the creator of the story to deliver information to the a ...
), a
teenager
Adolescence () is a transitional stage of physical and psychological development that generally occurs during the period from puberty to adulthood (typically corresponding to the age of majority). Adolescence is usually associated with the te ...
who has just left school and finds himself employed by Elliot Graham, an
agoraphobic
Agoraphobia is a mental and behavioral disorder, specifically an anxiety disorder characterized by symptoms of anxiety in situations where the person perceives their environment to be unsafe with no easy way to escape. These situations can ...
billionaire.
Joe's task is to act as
doorman/
caretaker
Caretaker may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media
* ''The Caretaker'' (film), a 1963 adaptation of the play ''The Caretaker''
* '' The Caretakers'', a 1963 American film set in a mental hospital
* Caretaker, a character in the 1974 film '' ...
for one of Graham's houses, a palatial property in central
London
London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...
. Graham himself refuses to live in the house and instead resides in a more modest property over the road. Nevertheless, Graham employs a whole team of servants (including Joe's mother—how he got the job) to keep the place spotless even though it has
no apparent use. Joe is at first hired to work during the afternoons only but, following the departure of the first caretaker (played by
Clive Russell
Clive Russell (born 7 December 1945) is a Scottish actor. He is known for his roles as Chief Inspector Frederick Abberline in ''Ripper Street'', Angus O'Connor in ''Happiness'' and Brynden Tully in the HBO series ''Game of Thrones''.
He also a ...
), Joe takes over the whole day and is also allowed to sleep there at night if he so wishes.
It becomes apparent very early on that the house is associated with bad memories. None of the staff remains for very long—Joe's mother disappears off to Spain with her new lover, the first caretaker smashes most of the plates before very nearly throwing himself off the roof, and even a homeless person whom Joe invites back for company senses the bad vibes about the place. Joe, it seems, is much more grounded so none of this appears to affect him.
Graham appears obsessed with finding out some dark secret concerning his father's wealth (Graham inherited the wealth) and has hired many accountants and historians to research this. He states that he would like to spend his money to do good, but he has to know where it came from first. He even sends Joe onto the ''
Antiques Roadshow
''Antiques Roadshow'' is a British television programme broadcast by the BBC in which antiques appraisers travel to various regions of the United Kingdom (and occasionally in other countries) to appraise antiques brought in by local people (g ...
'' with a collection of gold snuffboxes worth nearly a million pounds to see if he can glean any more about their origin from the specialist
Geoffrey Munn
Geoffrey Charles Munn, OBE, MVO, FSA, FLS (born 11 April 1953 in Hastings) is a British jewellery specialist, television presenter and writer. He is best known as one of the experts on the BBC's ''Antiques Roadshow''.
Career
Munn's first ...
. This dark secret appears to be tied up in the bad vibes concerning the house. Meanwhile, Joe, on Graham's permission, allows the house to be used by Richard, a self-centered cabinet minister and friend of Graham's as a place for assignations with his mistress Charlotte. Joe develops a Platonic attraction toward Charlotte, and is perturbed when Richard eventually turns up with a new mistress—though he continues to see Charlotte on occasion as a friend.
Eventually, on Joe's suggestion, Graham hires Tina, a woman who works at the local delicatessen (which both Joe and Graham frequent) to go through his paperwork, and she does eventually find the dark secret. However, just as Tina is about to reveal this to Graham and Joe at the house, Graham loses his nerve, saying he does not want to put off hearing the secret but does not want to hear it first in that house. Later, Joe joins Graham on a trip to the country castle (represented by
Bodiam Castle
Bodiam Castle () is a 14th-century moated castle near Robertsbridge in East Sussex, England. It was built in 1385 by Sir Edward Dalyngrigge, a former knight of Edward III, with the permission of Richard II, ostensibly to defend the area agai ...
) which Graham's father had given him, and there Graham tells Joe what Tina has told him—the first foundations of Graham's father's fortune were in his doing business with German companies and Nazi officials in the 1930s. These dealings were not
treason
Treason is the crime of attacking a state authority to which one owes allegiance. This typically includes acts such as participating in a war against one's native country, attempting to overthrow its government, spying on its military, its diplo ...
ous, but this nevertheless made Graham's father complicit in some of the earlier actions of the
Holocaust
The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; a ...
, particularly in his non-condemnatory attitude to the abuse of Jews in a Berlin park during that time and his acceptance of the antiques as gifts from his German business partners (who had stolen them from Jews). Having told Joe, Graham attempts suicide, but Joe prevents him.
The drama ends with Joe himself moving on, and Graham now using his money for good, and having traced the rightful owners of the antiques.
Cast
*
Danny Lee Wynter
Danny Wynter (born 25 May 1982), known professionally as Danny Lee Wynter, is a British actor, playwright, and activist. He is best known for playing the lead in Stephen Poliakoff's BBC films Joe's Palace and Capturing Mary, alongside Sir Mic ...
as Joe, the central character - a doorman and caretaker.
*
Sir Michael Gambon
Sir Michael John Gambon (; born 19 October 1940) is an Irish-English actor. Regarded as one of Ireland and Britain's most distinguished actors, he is known for his work on stage and screen. Gambon started his acting career with Laurence Olivi ...
as Elliot Graham, Joe's employer - a billionaire financier.
*
Rupert Penry-Jones
Rupert William Penry-Jones (born 22 September 1970) is a British actor, known for his performances as Adam Carter in '' Spooks'', Clive Reader in ''Silk'', DI Joseph Chandler in ''Whitechapel'', and Mr Quinlan in the American horror series ''The ...
as Richard - a
cabinet minister
A minister is a politician who heads a ministry, making and implementing decisions on policies in conjunction with the other ministers. In some jurisdictions the head of government is also a minister and is designated the ‘prime minister’, â ...
.
*
Kelly Reilly
Jessica Kelly Siobhán Reilly (born 18 July 1977) is an English actress. She first appeared on screen in 1995 on the series '' The Biz''. Her other television work includes starring roles in the British crime drama '' Above Suspicion'' (2009– ...
as Charlotte - his mistress.
*
Rebecca Hall
Rebecca Maria Hall (born 3 May 1982) is an English actress and filmmaker. She made her first onscreen appearance at age 10 in the 1992 television adaptation of ''The Camomile Lawn'', directed by her father, Sir Peter Hall. Her professional s ...
as Tina - an employee of the local delicatessen.
Related media
In the linked drama ''
Capturing Mary'', the present-day meeting between Joe and the titular Mary (played by
Dame Maggie Smith
''Dame'' is an honorific title and the feminine form of address for the honour of damehood in many Christian chivalric orders, as well as the British honours system and those of several other Commonwealth realms, such as Australia and New Zeala ...
in the present and
Ruth Wilson
Ruth Wilson (born 13 January 1982) is an English actress. She is known for her performances as the eponymous protagonist in ''Jane Eyre'' (2006), as Alice Morgan in the BBC psychological crime drama ''Luther'' (2010–2013, 2019), as Alison L ...
in her youth) presumably happens within the same time-frame as the events in ''Joe's Palace'' as Joe is still in his position as doorman/caretaker in the house.
External links
''Joe's Palace''at the BBC website.
*
{{Stephen Poliakoff
BBC Film films
BBC television dramas
Films directed by Stephen Poliakoff