‘England, 1735” reads the opening caption. A second adds “Just before bedtime”. With that, plus the title The Completely Made Up Adventures of Dick Turpin and the knowledge that Noel Fielding is playing the eponymous role, we should all know exactly where we stand and what is likely to be delivered. Slightly chaotic whimsy, sweet silliness and a vague air of “Will this do?” hanging about the place.
So it proves. Fielding’s ethereal daftness make him the perfect ethereally daft would-be highwayman, whom we first meet following reluctantly in his father’s footsteps as the village butcher. Dick is of course vegan. His cousin Benny (Michael Fielding – Noel’s brother, and Naboo in The Mighty Boosh) has his own set of knives and is ready to take over, so Dick gathers his sewing machine and purple shoes and sets off to find a new purpose. “He’ll be dead by the end of the week,” says Benny.
This nearly comes to pass when he falls in with top local highwayman Tom King (David Threlfall), accidentally kills him and ends up taking over his grateful Essex Gang who never liked their leader in the first place. The Essex Gang comprise Moose (Marc Wootton), a lumbering figure somewhere between Friar Tuck and Little John (you need not worry about historical accuracy or keeping your folklore figures too firmly separated here), Honesty Courage (Duayne Boachie) who quickly becomes devoted to Dick, and Nell (Ellie White, the wondrous Beatrice in The Windsors) who has until now managed to fool the gang into thinking she is a Nicholas, by dressing in trousers and applying a smudge of moustache above her top lip. Dick and his sewing machine are soon giving them a makeover – pleather (parsnip leather) trousers, capes, and a more comfortable smock for Moose who feels the need for greater freedom of movement. And who are we to say nay?
Adventures ensue, albeit of the very slightest sort, like the haunted coach that takes possession of anyone who tries to steal the monkey-fist sized emerald (the progenitor of too many belaboured jokes) that is housed in the back. The late Tom King, it turns out, had an arrangement with thief-catcher general Jonathan Wilde (Hugh Bonneville) whereby he tipped them off about good (cursed emerald-free) coaches to hold up and they gave him 95% of the proceeds. “It’s daylight robbery!” says Dick – which is around the time you realise quite how much of this thing is dependent on Fielding’s charm – and declines to maintain the deal. Thus the gang are now enemy number one of the thief-catcher and more adventures can ensue.
There are recurring gags (like dog walker Linda whose strolls take her past every hideout the gang has), there are knowing and ironic gags, there are purely silly gags and there are across the genre ones that work and ones that don’t. There is a lot of goodwill here, and like The Witchfinder two years ago (starring Daisy May Cooper as the supposed witch and Tim Key as her hapless finder) it is stuffed with prestigious comic talent. Dolly Wells plays the pamphlet writer turning Turpin into a legend, Tamsin Greig is crime boss Lady Helen Gwinear, Asim Chaudhry is Craig the Warlock (though he’s yet to pass his warlock exams) and the Turpins’ father is played by Mark Heap. Guest stars of the calibre of Jessica Hynes, Greg Davies and Diane Morgan abound. There should also be a shoutout given to child actor Kiri Flaherty as Little Karen, the barmaid in the local tavern who nails every line like a seasoned pro.
Nevertheless, The Completely Made Up Adventures of Dick Turpin does share with The Witchfinder the feeling that it is more the result of a group of mates who have got together to do someone a favour rather than any rush of attraction to the material, and it faces the same refusal to cohere or take flight. At the same time, I consider the entire second episode worth watching for Mark Heap as Dick’s butcher-dad and his indefinably Mark Heapish entreaty to his son to “Come back and work for me-at.” I can’t explain it, no one can and if they were going to try they should start with the marrow-deep genius of Heap. I’d stick around until at least then and make your mind up thereafter, if only to give me someone to talk to about it.
The Completely Made-Up Adventures of Dick Turpin is on Apple TV+.
