Joe's Palace
| Joe's Palace | |
|---|---|
_2007_(DVD).jpg) |
|
| Genre | Television drama |
| Created by | Stephen Poliakoff |
| Written by | Stephen Poliakoff |
| Directed by | Stephen Poliakoff |
| Starring |
Danny Lee Wynter Sir Michael Gambon Rupert Penry-Jones Kelly Reilly Rebecca Hall |
| Narrated by | Danny Lee Wynter |
| Country of origin | United Kingdom |
| Original language(s) | English |
| No. of seasons | 1 |
| No. of episodes | 1 |
| Editor(s) | Clare Douglas |
| Release | |
| Original network | BBC One |
| First shown in | 4 November 2007 |
| Chronology | |
| Related shows | Capturing Mary |
| External links | |
| Website | |
Joe's Palace is a BBC television drama, (co-produced by the BBC and HBO) and written and directed by Stephen Poliakoff. It was first aired on BBC One 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) on 12 November 2007.
"The action" revolves around the character of Joe (who is also the narrator), a teenager who has just left school and finds himself employed by Elliot Graham, an agoraphobic billionaire.
Joe's task is to act as doorman/caretaker for one of Graham's houses, a palatial property in central London. 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), 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 not intelligent enough to have that sort of imagination, 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 but his father was self-made) 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 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. 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 a Richard, a 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.
...
Wikipedia