Bookish: Mark Gatiss on queerness in new crime TV show about ‘antiquarian bookseller who’s also a detective’

It’s a scorcher of a summer’s day in Belgium’s Onze-Lieve-Vrouw-Waver, a small village between Brussels and Antwerp, but the atmosphere inside its Ursuline Winter Garden is positively chilly, due to the scene from new crime drama Bookish shooting there. The sublime Art Nouveau conservatory is standing in as a fancy London dining room, in which Trottie (Bridgerton’s Polly Walker) and Sylvia (Elizabeth Berrington from Lost Boys and Fairies) are reeling from the murder of a mutual acquaintance and having a standoff as icy as the fictional weather.

It’s quite the introduction for me, having travelled from the English capital to this lovely but unassuming Belgian village to find out more about the upcoming UKTV crime drama written by Mark Gatiss, who also stars as lead character Gabriel Book. 

“It’s about an antiquarian bookseller who’s also a detective and solves crimes in reference to his knowledge of the world’s books,” explains Gatiss, known for his esteemed (and mind-bogglingly varied) TV and film career, which ranges from The League of Gentlemen and Sherlock to The Favourite and the Mission Impossible films. “I love detectives. Always wanted to play one,” says Gatiss. “[Bookish] arrived fully formed, but I didn’t do anything with it. In lockdown, I thought: ‘I might write it as a book.’ I really wanted it to be light — a black comedy. But when the body’s found… it was so dark. I couldn’t lift it. So I thought, ‘I’m just going to write a script.’”

Bookish is set between the First and Second World Wars. “It’s my favourite period,” says the 58-year-old. “It’s very underexamined and I’ve always loved it. There’s so much concentration on the war — people don’t think about what happened after. But it’s interesting. The world’s upside down. A really radical government. Women were incredibly empowered; then most of them were told to go back behind the kitchen sink. Guns everywhere because loads of soldiers came back with weapons from looted German soldiers. Also, that very rapid nostalgia, which is why [Winston] Churchill got back [into power].” 

Gatiss’s character Gabriel is in a lavender marriage with wife Trottie. Walker, chatting to me with Gatiss in the aforementioned conservatory, perfectly sums up her character’s dynamic with Gabriel: “I’m there as his support. Foil. Aid. Friend. She’s very strong and unflappable. … It’s not a sexual relationship, but she loves Book for who he is. They’re together, but they’re alone. I’m sure they both feel alone. They’d both like love.” 

Bookish benefits from the incidental queerness that’s been adopted by contemporary film and TV dramas of late, but it’s refreshing to see this applied in a period setting. “In the storyline, I’ve lost the great love of my life, played by Jonas Nay from Deutschland 83,” explains Gatiss. “But I didn’t want to neuter Book. I didn’t want him to be in permanent widowhood. … It’s based on a lot of real-life cases. Particularly Noël Coward, who had a very dear childhood friend. They were inseparable for years, then drifted apart. Book and Trottie meet as children; they’re completely thick as thieves. Life intervenes, and then they come back together. That’s where we are.”

The U&Original series, comprising six episodes of 60 minutes, will air in July on specialist crime drama channel U&alibi, with a cast that also features Elliot Levey as Inspector Bliss and Buket Kömür as Nora. Joely Richardson and Jacob Fortune-Lloyd are also lined up for guest appearances. Produced by Eagle Eye Drama, Bookish is very much a genre show about ‘the murder of the week’. But they’re “melancholy, regretful, sad murders”, qualifies Gatiss. “I’ve always enjoyed that sort of bittersweetness. I wanted Book to have a superficially light-hearted attitude to the world because he’s seen some very dark things. That’s very much a post-war thing.” 

Indeed, millions of young men emerged from both wars with complex relationships with the past. “I’ve read diaries of spitfire pilots, 21 years old, and they had a reputation for arrogance,” recalls Gatiss. “They’d have breakfast with their best friend, and then their best friend would be dead. They’d go to the pub, get absolutely smashed. Then they’d get up at dawn, sit in their aeroplanes with pure oxygen to wake themselves up, and do it again. It was the most exciting possible time in their lives, and they did it in their twenties. It’s an amazing trauma.”

Here, Gatiss and Walker discuss the logistics of shooting abroad, the life-giving power of culture — be it books, TV shows or beyond — and that Jack and Karen comparison…

What stage are you at in the shoot?

Gatiss: This is day 49 of 66. [It’s been] a few months. We had a two-week gap recently. It’s nice to be somewhere different. Back home, you get very familiar with some of the locations. This is the fourth time I’ve been here this year…

Do you have plans for the wrap party?

Walker: Unfortunately, I wrap a little earlier. But I’ll be there in spirit.

Gatiss: We’re wrapping after four days of night shoots. We finish at 5am in a ruined warehouse. I’m trying to persuade everyone that we should push on and have a drink at dawn!

Tell me what you’re filming today…

Gatiss: Polly is about to do a big two-hander with [Elizabeth Berrington, who plays Sylvia,] the wife of one of the victims of episodes five and six. Much is revealed about his dark past.

Walker: It’s an important scene.

Gatiss: Sylvia does most of the talking.

Walker: She does today! For once, I’m grateful I haven’t got many lines!

What’s been your favourite scene to act so far?

Walker: [There have been] quite a few. I’ve enjoyed the more intimate scenes, I suppose. Ones where you get to see the relationship, instead of her just being busy. I’ve got one to do that I’ve not done yet, about where she checks in: are they OK? Is he happy? Am I happy? They’re both fine… Or they say they’re fine. It’s a rather beautiful scene.

Did acting it remind you of your relationships with gay friends or LGBTQ+ people?

Walker: Yes. I’ve had some deep relationships with gay men. But I don’t think his sexuality is really that relevant to her [Trottie]. She loved him as a child. She loves the man. It’s how it should be, really.

What’s it like recreating London in a different country?

Gatiss: They’ve done a brilliant job. The main street, where the shop is, is meant to be Cecil Ct, just off Charing Cross Road. It’s a charming street; they’ve built these shopfronts and stuff. There’s a bit of post-production to change things, but largely it’s very convincing. Also, post-war London was shattered, so there’s a lot of stuff we haven’t done yet. It’s heightened anyway, the world of Book. There’s a sort of European flavour to it, which I really don’t mind at all. You know the way in which Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, which was shot in Germany, but [was] sort of meant to be America? You’re like: ‘I don’t know where it is… But I don’t really mind.’

Walker: We’re shooting some stuff in London as well.

How do you explore Book’s sexuality?

Gatiss: What I’ve done, mainly, is populate the series with very hot people! [Laughs] No… It may look like that, but it’s just happened accidentally. I’m not entirely in charge of casting. [Seriously], there are a few things, but it’s quite subtle. First of all, it’s early days. If we do more, I’d love to explore it more. [Bookish has now been commissioned for a second series.] But it’s about showing how dangerous it is. There’s a little scene where we both set out. I tell the inspector [Trottie and I are] going to the opera, we’ve got our gladrags on, we walk down the end of the street, we stop, look to each other and say: “Be careful.” And then we go our separate ways, on into the night.

To read the rest of this feature, check out issue 365 of Attitude magazine, available to order online here and alongside 15 years of back issues on the free Attitude app.

Bookish is available on U&alibi (on Sky, Virgin and NOW) from 16 July.