Sean Pertwee is *beep* metal.
Legend tbpfh. Not too sure I like that smug git who played the rapist man in Eastenders though :(
shareAlex Fearns - played Mark Anthony.... he's obviously a good actor, because he scares the pants off me - in everything I see him in!!!
I like Sean Pertwee as well, but was chuffed to see the brilliant John Shrapnel as Pompey. What a voice!
"Just a passer by, as you might say!"
I wasnt keen on pertwees Caesar, he portrayed him as neurotic, unhinged and desperatly brutal, (what the hell was the decimation scene all about? this is not historical),
they ommitted a LOT of his character and missed out on the charm, clemency and his famous dignitas.
It is a shame as i really like pertwee as an actor otherwise.
I feel Ciaran Hines (from hbos ROME) has got him down brilliantly.
The actor who portrayed Marc Antony was plain awful, didnt behave, talk or even resemble the Antony of history at all . The lines throughout were not so good either, that speech at pharsalus was woeful.. ' will you fight with me will you fight with me, roman people will you.... blahh.'
It looked pretty damn good though, makes you wonder why hbo's ROME couldnt rustle up a battle or two like that, if a docu/drama with a lot less budget could do such a decent job.
Overall this series is worth watching for sure, but it skims and leaves out too much information.
Also, is it just me or does it feels decidedly anti-roman at times, like they are trying to hammer home a message.
I wasnt keen on pertwees Caesar, he portrayed him as neurotic, unhinged and desperatly brutal, ... they ommitted ...the charm, clemency and his famous dignitas.
Yes, I agree with you entirely. It was a one-note performance and, basically, the wrong note. I simply couldn't see this creepy thug having any following whatsoever, and for that reason thought this was the weakest episode in the series (though I haven't seen the final one yet).
Ciaran Hinds was much better of course, but I have to say that though he conveyed a sense of the politician very well, he didn't quite convince me that he'd been a soldier. Similarly, though it's possibly blasphemy to say so, I almost wish that, rather than Rex Harrison, Peter Finch had played Caesar in Cleopatra. Harrison - like Hinds - conveyed the politician but not the military man whereas Finch for me would have perfectly embodied Caesar in all aspects. For are time there is only one person who I would love to see as Caesar - Patrick Stewart. I think he'd be perfect, and would convey Caesar as complex, calculating, charismatic, and very clever.
As for being "anti-roman", I think what happening is that they were simply trying to be revisionist. In popular history Caesar is some sort of heroic figure: OK, we'll make him a bit of a sh!t. (As if you can't be both.) Similarly Constantine, the first Christian Emperor is portrayed as a neurotic tyrant. With Nero, they started off with a revision of popular history: Nero helping to put out the fire rather than fiddling, but then gave up and went for the standard Nero-was-totally-loopy approach.
Boy, was I drunk last night...
I think your correct that they attempted to be revisionist and in the process scuppered the whole program.
It is a shame as for many a person it is all they will know of rome and the empire.
bring on the 2nd series of hbo/bbcs ROME!
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I wasnt keen on pertwees Caesar, he portrayed him as neurotic, unhinged and desperatly brutal, (what the hell was the decimation scene all about? this is not historical),
they ommitted a LOT of his character and missed out on the charm, clemency and his famous dignitas.
It is a shame as i really like pertwee as an actor otherwise.
I feel Ciaran Hines (from hbos ROME) has got him down brilliantly.
I mostly agree with this. I didn't particularly like this portrayal of Caesar. The real Caesar simply wasn't anything like this character. It seemed like they went out of their way to make him seem "sinister", like a villain. The portrayal of Pompey was more subtle and realistic.
I think Ciaran Hinds was a better Caesar, though I wasn't crazy about him either. He was more subtle, more complicated and seemed more like a politician, but I felt that he too lacked the famous charm of the real Caesar (though he had more of it than Pertwee's Caesar did).
To be honest I haven't seen a portrayal of Caesar that i've been completely satisfied with yet.
The people, and the people alone, are the motive force in the making of history.
-Mao Zedong share