Nick Cohen Nick Cohen

The Future of the BBC

I’ve a piece in Standpoint about The Killing, one of the most interesting dramas on television. It’s not British, alas, and provides another reason for the controllers of British television to stop patting themselves on the back and saying “we make the best television in the world”. But nor, like so much of the best television drama, is it American. The Killing is from Denmark, and I suggest that a reason why Scandinavian thrillers are so popular is that they come from countries where the sight of women in positions of power is unremarkable.

The best way to describe Sofie Gråbøl, who plays detective Sarah Lund, is to list what she is not. She is not a glamorous film star. Neither is she the “feisty” heroine, beloved by television and film executives alike, who is just as tough as the men she works with.

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