Skip to main content

BLUE MURDER - CRISIS MANAGEMENT

Jill Halfpenny, Richard Fleeshman and Katy Cavanagh guest star in the Blue Murder episode Crisis Management on Monday 17 December 2007 @ 9:00pm on ITV1.

The crime drama starts when K Troop are about to be redeployed overseas. A young female soldier sneaks out of a barrack party and meets her lover by the sports pavilion outside the base. The couple, Cathy Covington (Freya Parker) and Mike Blatt (Kevin Wathen), stumble over the body of Ray Pettigrew who has been beaten to death.

Having escaped from a house full of children, Janine (Caroline Quentin) is waiting for her friend in a bar when a handsome stranger, Tim Fairhead (Nick Reding), offers to buy her a drink. Janine asks Tim, “What do you do?” He responds “Health and Safety. You?”, to which Janine replies “I’m in crisis management.” Janine is interrupted by a phone call sending her to the nearby army base. Before leaving the bar she gives Tim her number. Arriving at the base, Janine and the team are introduced to Major Tim Fairhead. Not surprisingly this creates mutual embarrassment and some definite chemistry.

The investigation gets underway with Major Tim offering support from the Special Investigation Branch. Richard’s (Ian Kelsey) nose is out of joint, as he’s jealous of Tim, particularly in light of Janine’s obvious attraction towards him. Richard questions whether Tim and Janine have a conflict of interests, but Janine brushes him off.

The victim, Pettigrew, wasn’t particularly popular and had recently failed Gunner Tracey Duff (Lucy Gaskell) in a physical fitness test, which meant she probably wouldn’t be deployed overseas.

Lt. Rosie Parr had also come to his attention when a solider was injured on a live firing exercise. Parr was exonerated from blame in the incident, but Pettigrew had made comments about her. In addition Pettigrew’s wife Geraldine (Kathy Cavanagh) reveals she was in massive debt from internet gambling. Cathy is found brutally attacked outside the base. It looks as if Pettigrew’s killer may have tried to kill again, though Cathy survives.

Janine’s interest in Tim hasn’t gone unnoticed by Shap. Richard’s prejudices against ‘army plod’ officers’ leads him to rekindle a contact in journalist Kate Malin (Angel Coulby) when he feels the army are giving him the run-around.

When tyre tracks near Pettigrew’s body are traced to Sgt. Mark Turton (Neil Fitzmaurice) he's arrested. His wife Shirley (Carol Starks) arrives, claiming she had taken the car to the pavilion to meet Pettigrew, with whom she was having an affair. Shirley also says Pettigrew had asked her for money to pay off his wife’s debts.

Though Shirley has given her husband a motive, the DNA on Pettigrew’s body isn’t his and the detectives are back to square one. Reluctantly Turton is released, but questions remain. Richard is frustrated with the investigation and Janine’s closeness to Tim. Shap, for his part, is enjoying the attention from one of the female soldiers.

In trying to identify the DNA found on Pettigrew’s body we meet Sgt. Jackie Holroyd (Jill Halfpenny), her sixteen year old son Ben (Richard Fleeshman) and fourteen year old daughter Bethan (Larner Taylor). Jackie is about to be deployed with the regiment. While she’s away Jackie leaves the children in the care of Mark and Shirley Turton. Janine and Jackie bond over single motherhood and the difficulties of juggling work and family life. We then discover Mike Blatt is Tracey’s boyfriend, providing Tracey with a motive for both the attack on Cathy (jealousy) and Pettigrew (revenge). We see Tracey talk to her young teenage friend Ben. The investigation focuses on her, not least when she is found in possession of Pettigrew’s wallet.

Janine invites Tim round for dinner with the children. Their romantic evening is interrupted by the news Tracey has been found dead in woodland not far from the base. She’s taken an overdose of painkillers. Or did someone want her dead?

Popular posts from this blog

DOC MARTIN SEASON THREE EPISODE FIVE

Former Coronation Street actress Denise Black dyed her hair bright red to star in tonight’s episode of Doc Martin. “I play Dawn Lamb, the mother of the doctor’s receptionist, Pauline. Dawn is brash and boho, so I dyed my hair red exclusively for the role,” Denise explains. But the dramatic colour change didn’t go quite as Denise had planned. “I volunteered to come on set a day early because after I had dyed my hair the colour was rather robust. The make up artists looked stunned. ”A Corrie fan who saw me when I was walking around Cornwall during filming screamed when she saw the colour of my hair.” In the fifth episode of the third season which airs tonight on ITV1 @ 9.00pm will the course of true love run smooth for the star crossed couple Dr Martin Ellingham (Martin Clunes) and school headmistress Louisa Glasson (Caroline Catz) as they go on their first date? It is the perfect spot for romance: being serenaded with classical music at a concert in the stunning grounds of a country hou...

The Galvanized Film Group Acquires Film Rights to Tracy Chevalier’s novel Remarkable Creatures

Heather Ogilvie (Galvanized Film Group) has acquired the option to produce a feature film based on Tracy Chevalier’s novel Remarkable Creatures and will partner with Icon Film Distribution to bring it to the big screen. Academy Award nominee Jan Sardi (Shine, Mao’s Last Dancer, The Notebook) will adapt the book, which was published by HarperCollins Publishers in 2009. Tracy Chevalier is the author of five previous novels, including the international bestseller Girl with a Pearl Earring, The Virgin Blue, Falling Angels, The Lady and the Unicorn and Burning Bright. ‘I’m thrilled Tracy has entrusted to us the exciting task of adapting her wonderful novel for the screen,’ Heather said. ‘Icon Films have endorsed our conviction that this book will result in an outstanding movie by partnering with us to accelerate its development. Jan Sardi is a gifted, sensitive scriptwriter, and we’re confident he’ll deliver a script that more than lives up to our expectations.’ Tracy comments, ‘I think a ...

ELAINE CASSIDY ON A ROOM WITH A VIEW

The very lovely Elaine Cassidy plays Lucy Honeychurch in ITV1 splendid new adaptation of E.M. Forsters A Room With A View (adapted by Andrew Davies so expect some raciness amongst the longing glances). We caught up with Lucy recently to talk about the romantic drama. Spending hours at the piano practising with a concert pianist, Elaine Cassidy has rediscovered a childhood interest in playing, although she never had a passion for it like her character Lucy Honeychurch in A Room With A View. "Lucy lives out her emotions through her piano playing, but she isn't aware of it which is really sweet.” Explaining how she came to portray a talented pianist Elaine says: "I really can't play the piano that well. I had lessons for three years when I was young but then I lost interest in it, so I didn't practise and didn't get any further. “Tanya, my tutor on the show, was absolutely brilliant. She plays lots of concerts and seemed to have an understanding of what we we...