Revenge fantasies are commonplace – but how far would you go to get even with someone who has done you a terrible wrong? That is the question at the heart of the cheerfully absurd Dead and Buried (Virgin Media One, 9pm), a cheesy thriller adapted by Co Down novelist Colin Bateman from his 2013 play Bag For Life.
That original stage production was commissioned for Derry’s 2013 City of Culture Programme – an origin story that suggests something worthy and self-reflective. But this four-part retelling is 100 per cent bonkers escapism and doesn’t get bogged down on such trivialities as plausibility or nuance. It’s much the better for its breeziness, and everyone involved seems to understand they’re starring in a disposable thriller.
British actor Annabel Scholey affects a passable Donegal accent as Cathy, a wife and mother haunted by the murder 20 years previously of her teenage brother. When she runs into the killer, Michael (Colin Morgan), in a supermarket in Derry, decades of buried trauma come rushing back. She struggles to sleep – and when she does nod off, she dreams that Michael is in bed beside her.
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Cathy is repulsed by and drawn to Michael and becomes obsessed with the life he has built for himself since leaving prison. He lives over the border with a kind and understanding wife, Lena (Niamh Walsh), their lifestyle bankrolled by her rich dad – though at the price of Michael having to pretend to be enthusiastic about his father-in-law’s evangelical Christianity.
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Having sniffed him out on social media, Cathy begins a game of cat-and-mouse with her nemesis. She sends a pizza to his house and then orders a hearse for the funeral of his spouse (who is alive and well). She also drags her best friend (Kerri Quinn) to the cafe run by Michael’s wife – to the horror of the pal, who understandably flees for the hills when she realises what’s happening.
Cathy begins to obsess about Michael, whose dangerous streak contrasts with her rather dull English husband, Raymie (Waj Ali). Soon, she is texting him provocative photographs and sneaking into his house to leave underwear in his drawer – an act that suggests her interest in him has gone somewhere beyond the drive for vengeance.
Dead and Buried is exactly the sort of thriller you’d expect to go out on Virgin Media One on a dank Monday in September. It’s ludicrous, none of the characters behaves rationally, and the action bears only a passing resemblance to the real world. But isn’t that sort of escapism just what you want from a helping of early-in-the-week nonsense? A serving of feverish pulp fiction never did anyone any harm – and for all its silliness, Dead and Buried never stops being entertaining.
