Breathtaking, review: pandemic polemic forgets storytelling in favour of politics

Created by Dr Rachel Clarke and Jed Mercurio, this three-part Covid tale has powerful points to make – but sadly at the expense of the drama

Joanne Froggatt as Abbey Henderson in ITV drama Breathtaking

As a polemic against the Government’s woeful failure to equip the NHS for the Covid pandemic, Breathtaking (ITV1) has power. But as a television drama, it’s weak. Adapted from a 2021 non-fiction book by palliative care doctor and ex-journalist Dr Rachel Clarke, it is so caught up in the fierceness of its message that it forgets the basics of hooking an audience.

TV dramas need to draw us into the lives of characters and make us care about them . It’s why so many dramas start off in the kitchen, with the protagonist saying goodbye to the kids and dashing off to work with a piece of toast in their hand – yes, it’s a hackneyed device but it roots a character, and marks the start of their journey from ordinary life to whatever disaster is shortly to befall them.

Breathtaking throws us straight into the world of Dr Abbey Henderson (Joanne Froggatt) in early March 2020 as Covid cases begin arriving at her hospital. She complains about the lack of PPE but is told that Public Health England do not deem it necessary for staff in her department. It’s suggested that she buy her own kit from Amazon; nurses start fashioning their own from bin bags; and eventually the hospital sources protective masks from building firms, vets and dentists, while schoolkids send in homemade visors.

Henderson can see that patients are being brought in with Covid symptoms, but the guidance states that only those who have recently returned from abroad need to be tested. The rigidity of this guidance, which bears no relation to what is actually happening on the ground, is maddening. As Henderson battles with hospital bosses, the drama plays a soundtrack of Boris Johnson or Matt Hancock falsely – outrageously – assuring the public that everything is under control.

A mob outside the hospital in ITV drama Breathtaking

Clarke created the drama with Jed Mercurio (Line of Duty) and Prasanna Puwanarajah (best known as an actor, most recently as Martin Bashir in The Crown ), both of whom are former doctors. Their fury at the way the pandemic was mishandled is absolutely warranted, and they convey the general helplessness and fear felt by NHS staff. Unfortunately, what they have produced feels like a frenetic episode of Casualty without an emotional core. It’s one part medical jargon, two parts Froggatt doing an angsty face. She is angry and stressed from the off, so her performance has nowhere to go.

And the decision to focus on one doctor rather than the whole team dilutes the effect of what we’re seeing. At a funeral service for a supposedly much-loved colleague – viewed over Zoom – the camera focuses not on the nurse’s family but on a tear rolling down Froggatt’s face. 

Some of this country’s best drama has been political. ITV’s recent Mr Bates vs the Post Office showed us how important television can be in making people sit up and take notice of a national disgrace. But that series worked because its writer, Gwyneth Hughes , fundamentally understands that drama needs crafted storytelling and great characters to make you care. Sadly, Breathtaking offers neither. 

Breathtaking is on ITV1 at 9pm, tonight, tomorrow and Wednesday; all episodes are available now on ITVX

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Gruffalo speech bubbles.

Gruffalo speech bubbles.

Subject: English

Age range: 5-7

Resource type: Worksheet/Activity

thercharl

Last updated

13 September 2014

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