When author Colin Bateman brought undercover cop
Tommy Murphy to life, he had only one actor in mind to play him.
Bateman believes his similar upbringing to James Nesbitt
enabled him to create Murphy especially for him.
"I have always been a big fan of Jimmy's work and I was aware that
he was a fan of my novels, so it made sense to get the two of us together.
"He was obviously hot off Cold Feet and was looking for a series
of his own, so we sat down with Tiger Aspect and discussed a whole range
of ideas, one of which was to have him as an undercover cop in London.
"And it was as simple as that really. I went away with complete
freedom to dream up what I could."
Producer Jemma Rodgers, who won a Bafta for the cult
大象传媒 TWO comedy League of Gentlemen, loved working on Murphy's Law so
much that she has signed up for a third series.
"I was familiar with Colin's work, and had read Divorcing Jack and
Empire State etc, so I was really excited about working with him.
"He has a fantastic tone and can be very dark which we've tried
to incorporate into this series and being post-watershed gave us a lot
more freedom to translate the script to Colin's style.
"It's almost like a new series - a lot harder and grittier."
Colin Bateman created an unusual, complex and charmingly flawed hero
in Tommy Murphy, whose wit and often maverick approach to undercover
policing leads the audience through each action-packed episode.
For Bateman, sharing a common background with James Nesbitt was important.
"We are both Northern Ireland Protestants brought up on the edge of
the troubles, not in the middle of them. We were sheltered, yet exposed,
so have a kind of contradiction in our characters and we're of the same
generation.
"Jimmy understands where I'm coming from as far as the humour
is concerned and he knows that sometimes the funny lines are meant to
be sad.
"This isn't a comedy, but it can be funny, and trying to get that balance
right in a drama is very hard indeed.
"He knows instinctively how to play it. Murphy is a fish out of
water and Jimmy has to convey an odd mix of confidence and panic which
is very difficult to pull off."
Bateman and Nesbitt have a friendship that goes back some years and
which influences their working relationship.
They have also worked together on Bateman's films Wild About Harry
and Jumpers.
"Jimmy has a real charm. He's a nice guy and that comes across. I
didn't picture him as I wrote Murphy's Law, I just sat there and wrote
like I normally do - but I found myself slipping into Jimmy's voice
very easily."
Nesbitt's character, DS Tommy Murphy, is an undercover cop working
in London after the death of his daughter.
The tragedy has affected his work - and enhanced his black sense of
humour.
"Tommy Murphy's background adds an edge to his work," adds Bateman.
"Being a police officer in Northern Ireland is riskier than in England:
Murphy's paid the ultimate penalty for it. Now he's in London to try
to reinvent himself," says Bateman.
"Murphy was something of a lost soul - his child had been killed and
he's divorced from his wife, so he buries himself in his work because
he has no real life outside of it.
"In the last series we saw Murphy try to deal with his guilt and
face up to his past but he hasn't even begun to move forward yet. He
just keeps on by-passing the issues."
In the final episode of series two, written by Bateman, Murphy does
however come face to face with the past in the form of the IRA man who
murdered his daughter.
While undercover as a vigilante he is offered an opportunity to kill
him without trace.
For Murphy, the past has finally caught up and he must now decide his
own fate.
In each of the six films, Murphy throws himself in at the deep end
with the hope that his presence will spark some kind of chain reaction
which causes the bad guys to reveal or incriminate themselves.
Colin Bateman's series of cult novels about maverick journalist Dan
Starkey became a worldwide phenomenon, earning him a huge fan base.
His first novel about Tommy Murphy was released late last year and
is now a series. It features the same characters as the television series
and the storylines are used as a rough guide, but he uses the books
to explore Murphy in more depth.
"Because of the nature of television you don't get to see a lot of
his back story but in the book you learn an awful lot more - about his
continued attempts to rebuild a relationship with his wife, about his
frustrated efforts to become a songwriter, his battles with alcohol.
"They're great fun to write, because during the course of writing
television scripts an awful lot of material gets thrown out. This however,
is my opportunity to put it all back in. The screen-writer's cut, if
you will."
There are obvious similarities between the characters of Dan Starkey
and Tommy Murphy.
"Murphy is a cop, and even though he believes passionately in the law,
he has an unorthodox approach to it.
"Starkey, a journalist, has no idea what he believes in and usually
opens his mouth before his brain is in gear. He wouldn't last five minutes
as an undercover cop."
A journalist by trade, Colin Bateman never expected to become a novelist.
He believed his future lay in writing about films as opposed to penning
them.
"I was always a film buff but never expected to be able to write one
and I was one of those armchair viewers who always complained about
shows saying, 'I could do better than that!'"
Bateman has now turned his hand to writing children's books and his
first, Reservoir Of Pups, was published in November 2003. The second,
Bring Me The Head Of Oliver Plunkett, was published in April 2004.
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