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Synopsis

After nearly 20 years in the role of Meg Mortimer, aging star Noele “Nolly” Gordon finds herself abruptly fired from the long-running British soap opera Crossroads. This is despite the fact that she is wildly popular with the fans and at the height of her career. Nolly doesn’t play by the rules. She is a woman who knows what she wants and will go out and get it. The series follows what ensues after she is “sacked.” It is based on a true story.

Review

I, along with most of us in the US, know very little about British soap operas. Sure, I had heard of Eastenders, but I was not familiar with Crossroads, nor had I ever heard of Noele Gordon. I saw this was going to be on Masterpiece, and as a long-time fan of the very talented Helena Bonham Carter, I was really intrigued.

As a young woman, Nolly started on the stage, but in the mid-50s, she got her own TV show, eventually working behind the scenes and becoming a producer. She was the first woman to appear in color on TV. She also had a talk show, and she even interviewed the then Prime Minister. The woman had some chops!! You had to in order to thrive in that industry.

In 1964, a new soap opera was created, Crossroads. The role of Meg Mortimer was developed and written specifically for Nolly. She is the owner of a motel where most of the drama takes place. The public loved it and adored her. She won eight TV Times Awards for portraying the “most compulsive character,” and the show turned her into a gay icon.

Nolly was on top of the world. Then, it all comes to a grinding halt. THE Noele Gordon has been fired! Of course, she was outraged, but the powers that be told her not to tell the public and to keep it quiet. She doesn’t listen and in one of the best moments of the show, the ever outspoken Nolly loudly lets everyone know she has been “sacked.”

Next, she wants to know how her character will leave the show. Death with a body? Death without a body? Sets off into the sunset? No soap star wants to die, even if dead people often return. She goes back to the stage and eventually makes a “shocking” reappearance on the soap, all in fine soap opera style.

As I said before, I love Helena Bonham Carter, and she is wonderful in this. That woman is a chameleon. I have been watching her since her Lady Jane Grey days. Carter portrayed Nolly’s strength, confidence and later self-doubt as she embarked on a stage career after her firing. She was roaringly funny and outrageous but at the same time lonely. I felt that I knew Nolly by the end of the show.

We also see how Crossroads was Nolly’s life. Never married, she spent her evenings going over scripts. She was dedicated. And without the show, she seemed lost, almost restless. You get to meet real-life characters, such as Tony Adams, her good friend, occasional chauffeur and confidante, played by Augustus Prew, known for playing Médhor, in the TV series Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power. Mark Gatiss plays another one of her good friends, Larry Grayson. The two were also “engaged” at one point, but it was all a joke. In real life, Gatiss was a huge fan of Crossroads and Noele Gordon. If he looks familiar, Gatiss is the co-creator of Sherlock and played Mycroft Holmes.

With the demise of nighttime soaps as well as most of the daytime ones (yes, I indulged in both back then), this series brought back a lot of nostalgia for the drama, excitement and over-the-top storylines that come with soap operas. The fact that it was a true story made it even more interesting. But it is more than just a show about a soap, it is a show about a pretty remarkable and fascinating woman. It made me look more into her life and just why she was “sacrificed” in possible back stage deals going on at the time. It’s a great series, sometimes sad, sometimes exhilarating, but very watchable.