According to
the British Comedy Guide, “
Vicious tells the story of ageing partners, Freddie and Stuart, who have lived together in a for nearly 50 years. Freddie was a budding actor and Stuart a barman when they first met but their careers are now pretty much over and their lives now consist of reading books, walking their dog and bickering.”
The two leads are played by two of the UK’s
leading Shakespearean actors, Sir Ian McKellen and Sir Derek Jacobi.
The episode,
according to Radio Times, sees Freddie (McKellen) and Stuart (Jacobi) embark on a shopping expedition to buy a smart new overcoat for Freddie, who’s been invited to a
Doctor Who screening.
Timey-wimey life imitating art imitating life … or not!
In
Vicious, McKellen’s character is a somewhat also-ran thespian – unlike the man himself, “an actor whose ego is far more swollen than his CV”. The
Doctor Who-themed plot sees Freddie rather pompously declare that he has been voted the tenth most popular
Doctor Who villain of all time!
Interestingly, McKellen
has appeared in
Doctor Who as a villain – with Matt Smith’s Eleventh Doctor in Steven Moffat’s 2012
Doctor Who Christmas special,
The Snowmen – providing the voice of an old enemy of the Doctor, the Great Intelligence.
Unlike McKellen’s character in
Vicious, however, it’s Jacobi who has played probably the greatest
Doctor Who villain of all time: the Doctor’s arch-nemesis, the Master. He appeared in Russell T Davies’s
Utopia with David Tennant in 2007 and, before that, in Paul Cornell’s
The Scream of the Shalka (2003) with Richard E Grant’s alternate Ninth Doctor.
In
The Snowmen, meanwhile, Grant returned to
Doctor Who, this time as a villain himself: Dr Solomon, a man who has been possessed by McKellen’s Great Intelligence.
All this,
as Radio Times ponders, would be rather curious, if it wasn’t for the fact that
Mark Ravenhill (
Shopping and F***ing), the co-creator of
Vicious, is a self-proclaimed
Who fan, who has considered writing for
Doctor Who itself. McKellen and Jacobi are also supporters of the science-fiction series, which began way back in 1963. Jacobi has
attended a number of Doctor Who conventions in recent years and made no secret of the fact that he would have liked to have played the Master for longer.
Vicious also stars Frances de la Tour (
Rising Damp) as Violet, Freddie and Stuart’s man-eating best friend, and Iwan Rheon (
Misfits) as their young neighbour, Ash. The episode’s storyline sees Violet take Ash shopping, too, in an effort to try to get him into a pair of Speedos.
Vicious is broadcast on ITV on Monday’s at 9 p.m. The first season comprises of six episodes in total, with a festive special scheduled for Christmas 2013.
Doctor Who is nearing the end of its current season, with two more episodes –
Nightmare in Silver and
The Name of the Doctor – left to be broadcast.
