Jonathan Creek

^{Review by Daniel Tessier}

One of the BBC's odder takes on the detective genre, but also one of its most popular, Jonathan Creek was halfway between a comedy and a murder mystery series. Written and created by David Renwick, the series starred Alan Davies as the eponymous sleuth, who solved mysteries on the side of his day job as a trick designer and technician for a stage magician.

Initially produced by Verity Lambert, known for being the first producer on Doctor Who and launching such varied series as May to December, Adam Adamant Lives! and the ill-fated soap opera Eldorado, Jonathan Creek ran semi-regularly from 1997 to 2004. After five years of silence, it returned in 2009 and ran on-and-off under various producers until 2016. Throughout the run, Jonathan would be paired with several women who would help him investigate and often recruit him to cases in the first place.

Renwick, established as a comedy writer providing material for The Two Ronnies and Alexei Sayle, was already a success for creating several series including Whoops Apocalypse, Hot Metal and most famously, One Foot in the Grave, all of which combined sitcom style with more serious, dramatic elements. Wanting to try his hand at a detective series, Renwick had less interest in the who and the why of the mysteries than the how. Jonathan was to be someone who would understand the mechanics of the mystery, bringing a lateral mind and an incredible attention to detail to his cases, puzzling them out in the same way he created magic tricks and illusions for his acts.

Coming from a comedy background meant that most of Renwick's contacts were in that area, and unusually, Jonathan Creek was made by the BBC's entertainment department rather than its drama section. Casting throughout the series reflected this, with just as many faces being most recognisable from comedy or light entertainment as from drama. Casting Jonathan proved challenging; Renwick and Lambert's first choice, Nicholas Lindhurst (Only Fools and Horses; Goodnight, Sweetheart) turned the role down. Others offered the role and were interested include Hugh Laurie (Blackadder Goes Forth, House), Nigel Planer and Rik Mayall (both of Bottom, The Young Ones and Filthy, Rich and Catflap) and Angus Deayton (who had worked with Renwick on One Foot in the Grave). Planer and Mayall would each go on to guest star twice on the series, Planer in different roles and Mayall as the irrepressible and sexually ambiguous DI Gideon Pryke in two specials. 

Finally, they looked a little further beyond, and director Susan Belbin noticed Alan Davies when he auditioned (unsuccessfully, it appears) for a sitcom. At the time working as a stand-up comedian with very limited television experience, Davies showed up to a meeting with Renwick looking dishevelled, his long hair in disarray and wearing what was to become Jonathan Creek's trademark duffle coat. Renwick realised that this was close to how he'd envisioned the character all along, and Davies was cast. Eccentric, determinedly rational and frequently extremely frustrating, Jonathan lives in a converted windmill (filmed at the actual King's Mill in Shipley, West Sussex).

For the first three series (and the 1998 Christmas special between series two and three), Jonathan was accompanied by Maddie Magellan, played by Caroline Quentin. Then one of the most recognisable faces in sitcom for her role as Dorothy on Men Behaving Badly, Quentin was the first choice for the role and no one else was seriously considered. An investigative journalist who solves miscarriages of justice and makes a living writing books about the cases, Maddy frequently uses dishonest means to sneak into crime scenes and into people's trust, and sometimes seems to be a pathological liar.

It's Maddy who seeks out Jonathan in the first episode, the feature length “The Wrestler's Tomb.” (The obscure title is seemingly taken from a Magritte painting rather than having anything to do with the plot.) A womanising artist is found murdered at his home, his mistress bound and gagged, while his wife is away. The only suspect is a burglar who swears his innocence. After a chance meeting at one of his shows, Maddy recruits Jonathan, somewhat reluctantly, to help her solve the seemingly impossible case. It unravels in a way that will soon become quite familiar: a convoluted investigation into a highly contrived situation, in which the truth is never what was at first suspected.

It also begins a long and drawn-out will they/won't they relationship between Jonathan and Maddie. While obviously attracted to each other, they never quite manage to make the leap beyond a platonic relationship (except on one occasion, which they rapidly agree was a mistake). It doesn't help that Jonathan has an amazing knack for saying exactly the worst thing at the worst possible moment, while Maddy is dishonest, quick to anger and prone to bouts of irrational jealousy. In fact, three of Jonathan's four sidekicks match that description quite well. Jealousy in particular is a recurring characteristic, not just of the main characters but also various guests, who are often driven to violent extremes by their jealousy, whether or not there's anything real to be jealous of. It does make you wonder if Renwick was trying to work through some issues through his writing.

Also introduced in the opening episode is Jonathan's employer, the lecherous stage magician Adam Klaus. In this episode he's played by Anthony Head, affecting an unconvincing American accent. After the pilot episode was filmed, Head nabbed his most famous role, that of Rupert Giles in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. With a new gig in the States there was no way he could continue to appear on Jonathan Creek, with Klaus kept strictly offscreen for the remainder of the first series. For series two, Stuart Milligan, an actual American, took over the role. Best known for Crossroads, Milligan fit the role of the oily Klaus very well, although with Tony Head it would have been easier to believe how he so consistently achieved his romantic conquests.

While murder was often the case of the week, the hour-long episodes would deal with all manner of mysteries. Over the first three series, Jonathan and Maddie dealt with a teenaged girl's seemingly inexplicable kidnapping; the theft of a priceless painting in the middle of a school tour; an alleged alien corpse that disappeared under armed guard; and the case of a man who was somehow seen both in England and America at the same time (the wonderfully named “Time Waits for Norman”). However, mysterious deaths were more often than not the case. In contrast to the strictly rational (if not always entirely believable) nature of the cases, the series was often presented as a spooky show with almost supernatural set-ups. From the outset, every episode has a rather eerie feel thanks to Julian Stewart Lindsay's arrangement of the 1874 piece Danse Macabre, which acts as the series' theme tune. Several episodes, particularly specials, were set in sprawling, gothic mansions, while later episodes upped the chills with haunted graves, doorways to hell, and other gruesome trickery. There's a definite trend as the series progresses for darker, more gruesome crimes, although the mysteries also become more contrived and harder to swallow.

One of the enjoyable parts of each new episode of the series was seeing which familiar face would be guest-starring that week. The first three series belied Renwick's comedy and entertainment links, featuring One Foot in the Grave co-star Annette Crosbie; The Fast Show star Simon Day; Pippa Heywood, then known for The Brittas Empire; impressionist Alistair McGowan; Goodness Gracious Me regular Sanjeev Bhaskar; Red Dwarf's Hattie Hayridge; Not the Nine O'Clock News and Alas Smith and Jones star Griff Rhys Jones; and The Hitchhiker's Guide to Galaxy's Geoffrey McGivern as Maddy's agent Barry Opper. Stand-up and showbiz legend Bob Monkhouse appears as an acerbic theatre critic, and even Jim Bowen of Bullseye fame shows up.

The early series are very much products of their time, not only in the smaller scale of their productions, but in their humour, which is deeply nineties. Lazy sexism abounds, with Maddy's overeating and alleged heaviness being running gags (although she gets more than her share of male interest). Adam Klaus's main characteristic involves going to extremes to try to bed women, with many of the jokes being questionable by today's standards. Even Jonathan, generally the decent guy, has his moments of laddishness, and there's more than a few homophobic jokes in there too. Later series moved with the times and gradually brushed off these elements, with Adam even having to face the consequences of his actions (well, a bit).

Caroline Quentin left after the third series; in the 2001 Christmas special, Maddy was revealed to have gone on a book tour in the States and shacked up with a new man, never to return. Instead, Jonathan falls in with Carla Borrego, a theatrical agent who is representing a legendary escapologist who Klaus wants to work with. Carla is played by Julia Sawalha, star of Absolutely Fabulous, Press Gang and Second Thoughts. Somehow even more aggressive than Maddy, she at least accepts that she and Jonathan have a spark from the off. If it were needed, this surely cemented Alan Davies as the 90s and 00s' most unlikely sex symbol.

After a gap of over a year, Jonathan Creek returned for a fourth series in March 2003. We learn that in the interim, Carla and Jonathan had dated for a while, until the latter made some characteristically clumsy faux pas and was unceremoniously ditched. Carla is now working in front of the camera as the presenter of a crime show, produced by her new husband Brendan Baxter – a recurring role for Adrian Edmondson, who had starred in Renwick's grim, short-lived sitcom If You See God, Tell Him, as well as Bottom, The Young Ones and more. Carla remains furious with Jonathan but demanding of his appreciation, while Brendan is the most open and understanding husband in history. Seeing Jonathan's skills as a sure-fire way to increase viewership of the crime show, Brendan brings him in to investigate exciting cases. Guest stars in this period include various comedian-actors such as Maureen Lipman (Agony), Jack Dee (Lead Balloon), Tamsin Grieg and Bill Bailey (both of Black Books), and dramatic actors with comedy pedigree including Celia Imrie (Victoria Wood: As Seen on TV), Michael Cochrane (Wings, The Pallisers) and Sophie Thompson (Big Top, EastEnders).

The fourth series was split over two years, reducing the show's impact on the schedules, and it was followed by a hiatus of almost five years. Finally, it returned with another special on New Year's Day 2009, “The Grinning Man.” Joining Jonathan this time was Joey Ross, a self-styled paranormal investigator, played by Sheridan Smith. Known at the time almost solely for sitcoms, including The Royle Family, Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps and Eyes Down, Smith had starred in Renwick's most recent series, Love Soup. Her appearance on Jonathan Creek marks a point when her career was shifting away from comedy and further into drama. While Joey's line of work outs her in opposition to Jonathan's rationalist worldview, she is almost his equal at investigation and debunking, and they form an excellent team. She's also the only one of the female leads not to share any romantic chemistry with Jonathan, in spite of, or perhaps because, she's actually nice to him most of the time and seems to genuinely enjoy his company.

Jonathan Creek works as a Christmas show thanks to its reassuring style of spookiness and unthreatening murderousness, with “The Grinning Man” pushing the horror angle just about as far as it will go without becoming too nasty. The following year failed to make the most of the programme's ideal season by giving us an Easter special, “The Judas Tree.” Joey returned to recruit Jonathan in another bizarre murder, also getting a chance to moonlight as a magician's assistant. The special guest stars Paul McGann (Doctor Who, The Monocled Mutineer), Ian McNeice (Edge of Darkness) and prolific actress Doreen Mantle (another One Foot in the Grave regular). This episode was also the final appearance of Stuart Milligan as Adam Klaus.

Fans would have to wait another three years for the next special, another Easter outing, “The Clue of the Savant's Thumb.” Renwick's script accepted that a lot of time had passed since the programme began and that Jonathan would have to move on in his life eventually. As such, he is now a businessman, having left the illusion business behind, moved out of the windmill and even got married. His wife and business partner, the strict and straight-laced Polly, is played by Sarah Alexander, known for comedy hits Coupling, Green Wing and Smack the Pony. Polly wants her husband to leave his frivolous former life behind, and isn't happy when Joey turns up to recruit him for a classic locked room mystery that's tied up in some sinister secrets. This episode features the legendary Joanna Lumley (Sapphire and Steel, Absolutely Fabulous) as well as a barmstorming appearance by Rik Mayall, while Renwick himself not only wrote the episode, but also directed it and enjoyed a sneaky cameo.

The 2013 special was successful enough to kick start a final, fifth series in 2014. With Sheridan Smith now in high demand and unavailable, Sarah Alexander's Polly became Jonathan's regular, if reluctant, sidekick. Now living in Polly's family home in a somewhat creepy, close-knit village, the couple divided their time between their business, investigation and seeing Polly's various awful friends. John Bird of Bremner, Bird and Fortune had a recurring role as village spokesperson Horace Greeley. The three episodes played with the format a little, presenting us first with a crime that the audience saw unfold but was a mystery to the characters, and then with an amateur sleuth who parodied Sherlock, which had dominated the genre on the BBC while Jonathan Creek was away.

The programme had a last hurrah with one last Christmas special, the enjoyably spooky “Daemon's Roost,” which featured Warwick Davis, star of Willow, Life's Too Short and the Star Wars franchise, as a devoted Creek fan. Featuring callbacks to various cases for the attentive viewer, “Daemon's Roost” was never officially announced as a final episode but was clearly made with the possibility in mind. It made for an intriguing final case, with Jonathan forced to confront that he may have made a wrong call years ago and let a murderer walk free.

In the years since, the possibility of a relaunch or remake of Jonathan Creek has arisen several times. American studios have pitched a remake three times, each time with Renwick returning as main writer – one treatment hoped to team up Alan Davies with Whoopi Goldberg. The latest attempt was as recent as 2022, with Netflix considering but ultimately passing on the opportunity. Renwick has also reported that he had written a stage treatment, something that could really work, but that this was scuppered by the COVID-19 pandemic. Both Davies and Caroline Quentin have suggested they'd be up for resuming their roles one last time if Renwick wrote the script. With Renwick's retirement from television, however, it looks unlikely that Jonathan Creek will be solving any more mysteries.