'This England', the series that was placed at the epicenter of the pandemic (and turned Kenneth Branagh into Boris Johnson)

What a time for British television to premiere a series called

.

In just a few days in early September, the UK went from having a queen (the long-lived Elizabeth II) to a king (her son Charles III) and from a prime minister (Boris Johnson) to a female prime minister (Liz Truss).

Everything that was a near present in this drama that reconstructs how an entire nation managed the unexpected first wave of the coronavirus in the spring of 2020 now seems like a distant past.

For Michael Winterbottom, one of the most eclectic and thought-provoking filmmakers of recent decades and responsible for this miniseries, it's a relative change.

“The queen thing is a big step.

After 70 years on the throne, hardly anyone remembers a UK without her.

The Liz Truss thing is not so much.

She is nothing more than a female version of the same story, ”he comments by videoconference in mid-September from London.

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Part of that "same story" that the director refers to, that of the political management of the British Conservative Government, is one of the keys to this six-episode production that can be seen on Movistar Plus+ from October 31.

Precisely one of the most striking aspects of

is seeing an actor as well known (and as British, and as Shakespearean) as Kenneth Branagh playing the former prime minister.

For this, it undergoes an impressive characterization process.

Throughout the chapters, the viewer enters the corridors of power, while Johnson deals with an unprecedented health and economic crisis, to which is added the long and tortuous Brexit process and a personal and political life in permanent controversy. .

Casting a face familiar to viewers around the world to play a politician as common in the media in recent years as Johnson was a risky decision that Winterbottom decided to make.

“Boris Johnson is a media star;

he is someone with a very recognizable appearance and way of behaving.

But having Kenneth is a way of reminding the viewer that they are not watching a documentary.

And that what we show is our version of Boris Johnson”, defends the director.

'This England' recounts in parallel moments of Boris Johnson's personal life and his management during the first wave of the coronavirus.Movistar Plus+

Winterbottom claims to have tried to be as aseptic as possible, to show the events as they occurred, without pointing fingers or looking for blame.

“A lot of people had to make a lot of decisions in a very short time.

And, looking at it with hindsight, we probably disagree with many of them.

This was a new virus for us, something that had not happened for many years.

You have to think that, in a certain way, everyone responded in the best possible way to a pandemic of these characteristics, ”he says.

Despite his conciliatory tone in defending the series, the end result does not paint a very positive picture of the former prime minister.

It is inevitable to link his figure to the literary reference contained in the title of the miniseries.

is a term that appears in the most famous passage of

, one of the least known works of William Shakespeare in Spain, with a profound poetic and, at the same time, political charge.

It is the story of a despotic and ineffective monarch who ends up overthrown.

His dying uncle Juan de Gante reproaches him at one point in the text for managing him, with a speech that serves as a passionate declaration of love for his nation.

"This blessed plot, this world, this kingdom, this England," declaims the character.

The king responds to this impassioned criticism by humiliating his uncle even after his death.

Beyond Boris Johnson

But the miniseries does not focus only on the politician.

It is also the memory of experts and scientists who worked against the clock to understand the virus;

of doctors, nurses and nursing home workers who fought tirelessly on the front lines to heroically contain the virus.

It is also the story of ordinary people whose lives were plunged into darkness.

Accustomed to doing investigative work for his dramas and documentaries based on real events, such as

(1997) and

(2006), Winterbottom's search for personal experiences took place almost live this time.

His intention was to build a general portrait through "testimonies that were as specific as possible" from medical teams, patients and scientists.

It was a way of being very careful in a reconstruction that, despite its closeness in time, could easily be inaccurate.

"Everything was going so fast during those days that the measures taken at the beginning of March could be considered absolute stupidity just a week later," he recalls.

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As of June 2020, the production process for the miniseries had already begun.

And it was inevitably chaotic.

In the weeks that the team could not shoot, due to the limited access it had to hospitals and residences as new waves of the coronavirus arrived, its managers were assembling the material that they already had registered.

The fact that the audience is so familiar with the story, being an experience that the entire planet has lived through just two years ago, affected Winterbottom's narration, he admits.

“Whoever has seen the first chapter says they have the feeling of watching a disaster movie.

Everyone knows that, unfortunately, that chapter is headed for the death of tens of thousands of people, many of them without even being able to access a hospital.

That the viewer has all that information makes the series more powerful.”

In the moments in which the story accelerates its plot, it is reminiscent of the BBC miniseries

generating a sensation of false dystopia: the facts that are summarized in a fast montage are true and recent, not future assumptions.

British media such as the BBC and the

consider in their first reviews that

has reached the screens too soon.

“If you treat a true story with care, good taste and honesty, it's never too soon”, defends its producer, the Scottish Richard Brown (

,

).

“One of the reasons that Michael and I conceived this miniseries was to try to understand what was happening behind the scenes during those first months of the pandemic;

doing an exercise of empathy with those who were managing something so unprecedented and unexpected”, he concludes.

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