Our Friends in the North is a British television drama serial produced by the BBC. It was originally broadcast in nine episodes on BBC2 in early 1996. Written by Peter Flannery, it tells the story of four friends from Newcastle upon Tyne over a period of 31 years, from 1964 to 1995. The story makes reference to certain political and social events occurred during the depicted era, some specific to Newcastle and others affecting Britain as a whole. These include general elections, police and local government corruption, the UK miners' strike of 1984–1985, and the Great Storm of 1987.
The serial is commonly regarded as one of the most successful BBC television dramas of the 1990s, described by The Daily Telegraph as "a production where all ... worked to serve a writer's vision. We are not likely to look upon its like again".Unknown. The Daily Telegraph. Quoted on the DVD release cover. (BMG DVD 74321 941149) It was awarded three British Academy Television Awards (BAFTAs), two Royal Television Society Awards, four Broadcasting Press Guild Awards, and a Certificate of Merit from the San Francisco International Film Festival.
Our Friends in the North helped to establish the careers of its four lead actors, Daniel Craig, Christopher Eccleston, Gina McKee and Mark Strong. Craig's part in particular has been referred to as his breakthrough role. It was also a controversial production, as its stories were partly based on real people and events. Several years passed before it was adapted from a play, performed by the Royal Shakespeare Company, to a television drama, owing in part to the BBC's fear of legal action.
In February 2022, it was announced that Flannery had rewritten Our Friends in the North for BBC Radio 4 and that it would feature a new, tenth episode written by Adam Usden, set in 2020 Newcastle. It features James Baxter, Norah Lopez Holden, Philip Correia and Luke MacGregor in the respective roles of Nicky, Mary, Tosker and Geordie, and began 17 March 2022.
In October 2026, Our Friends in the North will be adapted for the stage and be performed at Newcastle Theatre Royal, produced by Live Theatre, Eastlake Productions and Newcastle Theatre Royal.
Plot
In 1964 twenty-year-old university student Nicky Hutchinson (Christopher Eccleston) returns to Newcastle after volunteering for the summer in the U.S. civil rights movement. His friends Geordie (Daniel Craig) and Tosker (Mark Strong) are eager to start a band but Nicky rebuffs them as he is occupied with his volunteering work.
Nicky's girlfriend, Mary (Gina McKee), is also unhappy with his lack of attention and they drift apart. Tosker takes advantage of the situation and successfully woos Mary, getting her pregnant. Nicky is offered a job working for Austin Donohue (Alun Armstrong), a former council leader who is starting a PR and lobbying firm.
Nicky is impressed by Austin's apparent passion for change and he drops out of university to accept the job, to the dismay of his working-class father, Felix (Peter Vaughan). Geordie gets into a fight with his abusive, alcoholic father and runs away from home, abandoning his pregnant fiancée.
Now living in London, Geordie accepts a job offer from sleazy crime boss Benny Barratt (Malcolm McDowell) and begins working as his assistant in the Soho sex industry. Meanwhile Mary and Tosker struggle to adapt to their new married life. Their high-rise council flat, despite being brand new, is plagued by structural issues including rampant damp. Nicky is dismayed that Austin's firm is representing John Edwards, the owner of the company responsible for the sub-standard flats. After discovering records of the extensive bribery that took place in the project's development, Nicky resigns in protest. Austin later receives four years in prison for his involvement and Edwards is declared bankrupt. Tosker's dreams of becoming a professional musician rapidly fade after a brutal audition with a local talent scout. Dejected, he continues to do menial jobs to make ends meet. After visiting Geordie in London, he is given a loan from Benny and starts his own grocery business. Around this time, Geordie starts an affair with Benny's girlfriend, Julia.
Working as a photo journalist in London, Nicky's ideologies become extreme to the point he joins an anarchist terrorist cell. While lying low in Newcastle he is confronted by his parents and family friend Eddie Wells (David Bradley) after his mother, Florrie (Freda Dowie), finds a submachinegun in his room. Despite his insistence he is in the right, his anarchist activities are brought to a sudden halt when the cell's hideout is raided by the police and everyone but he is arrested. Later Eddie runs as an independent Labour candidate in a Westminster by-election, after Felix agrees to be his campaign agent. Owing to Nicky's past ties to extremism, Eddie rejects his support, narrowly winning the seat nevertheless. Nicky eventually returns to mainstream politics in Newcastle and becomes a Labour parliamentary candidate himself. However, despite running in a safe Labour constituency and receiving an endorsement from Eddie, he manages to lose the seat to the Conservatives after a smear campaign depicts him as an IRA sympathiser.
In London the situation gets progressively more difficult for Benny's businesses as continued pressure from the Metropolitan Police (Met) Commissioner Colin Blamire (Peter Jeffrey) forces the heavily corrupt vice ("dirty") squad to reluctantly act. Meanwhile, tired of being repeatedly blackmailed by the dirty squad, one of Benny's men takes evidence of Met corruption to the Sunday papers and the resulting scandal forces the government to hold an independent inquiry. Roy Johnson (Tony Haygarth) is brought in from Newcastle as an outsider to run the investigation but is obstructed at every turn by Blamire, dirty squad Commander Harold Chapple (Donald Sumpter) and his henchman John Salway (David Schofield). Despite the setbacks, Johnson is able to present a report to the Home Secretary detailing extensive Met corruption. Blamire, however, is able to leverage a separate investigation into the Home Secretary's past business dealings to blackmail him into suppressing the inquiry findings. A disheartened Johnson returns to Newcastle to take early retirement. With the inquiry behind them, Benny and the dirty squad are free to reach new lucrative arrangements. Benny also has Geordie framed and imprisoned in revenge for the affair with Julia years before. Subsequent police investigations eventually bring down Chapple, Salway and many other corrupt Met officers.
Some years later Tosker is now a moderately successful businessman and Mary is occupied with her advocacy work. After Tosker's repeated infidelity, their marriage breaks down and he moves out to live with his new girlfriend, Elaine (Tracey Wilkinson). Nicky and Mary briefly reunite, but she is hesitant to resume their relationship out of concern for her young children. Out of prison and back living in Newcastle, Geordie is devastated to learn that Julia has been killed in an apparent accident. He aggressively questions Benny over her death but accepts Benny's argument that he had no motive to kill her. Eventually Geordie's casual drug dealing gets him in trouble with the law again and he departs for London a second time.
In 1984 Nicky is covering the ongoing miners' strike. After being injured in a brawl between the police and the miners, he rekindles his relationship with Mary. Tosker meanwhile has made his fortune as a slum landlord, straining his marriage with Elaine. At her urging, he sells the properties and invests heavily in stocks, which are subsequently wiped out in the 1987 market crash. Three years later, Nicky is struggling with his marriage to Mary and also with his father Felix who has been diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease. While in London, he needlessly picks a fight with Eddie Wells and starts an affair with a young student, Alice. He eventually separates from Mary to pursue Alice but by then she is not interested in a serious relationship. Geordie, who is now an alcoholic and living at a homeless shelter, sets fire to his bed in a moment of madness. Quickly apprehended, he is deemed a danger to society and is stunned when the judge sentences him to life in prison. Nicky reconciles with Eddie after he discovers Eddie's assistant is a mole for a PR company. Eddie resigns in embarrassment but as he is leaving Westminster he is caught up in the Great Storm of 1987 and dies of a heart attack. The storm also presents Geordie an opportunity to escape his prison transport but he chooses not to take it. In Newcastle, Mary initially refuses to run in the by-election for Eddie's seat but eventually changes her mind and is subsequently elected. Exasperated at Felix's increasingly outlandish behaviour, Florrie can no longer cope and she sends him to a care home.
Seven years later in 1995, Nicky has been living in Italy and returns to Newcastle to attend Florrie's funeral. Tosker and Elaine have slowly rebuilt their business and are on the eve of opening a new floating nightclub. Geordie has escaped from prison and approaches the club looking for work, where he is recognised by Elaine. Although Tosker and Elaine privately do not believe his story that he is out on parole, they take him in and give him a job playing keyboards for the opening night band. Nicky desperately tries to convince Felix that his life, in particular the Jarrow March, was not a failure, but Felix's mind is too far gone to understand. Geordie tries to attend the club launch event but is refused entry due to a miscommunication with the bouncers. Tosker fills in for the band at the last minute and finally achieves his dream of musical stardom, albeit on a small scale. The four friends reunite at Florrie's funeral for the first time for 31 years. Afterwards Tosker spends time with his grandchildren, Nicky decides to try and patch things up with Mary and Geordie walks off to an unknown fate.
Cast
Christopher Eccleston as Nicky Hutchinson Mark Strong as Terry "Tosker" Cox Gina McKee as Mary Cox Daniel Craig as Geordie Peacock Peter Vaughan as Felix Hutchinson Freda Dowie as Florrie Hutchinson David Bradley as Eddie Wells Tracey Wilkinson as Elaine Cox (née Craig) Alun Armstrong as Austin Donohue Malcolm McDowell as Benny Barratt Donald Sumpter as Harold Chapple David Schofield as John Salway Peter Jeffrey as Commissioner Blamire Tony Haygarth as Roy Johnson Stephanie Putson as Bernadette Cox (teenager) Emma Lightfoot as Bernadette Cox (young) Julian Fellowes as Claud Seabrook Danny Webb as Detective Inspector Ron Conrad John Dair as Charlie Dawson Trevor Cooper as DCS Dennis Cockburn Geoffrey Hutchings as John Edwards Frank Couchman as Patrick Soulsby Elspeth Charlton as Mrs Soulsby Jack McBride as Mr Soulsby Anne Orwin as Mrs Sandra Weightman Daniel Casey as Anthony Cox Nick Figgis as Anthony Cox (teenager) Saskia Wickham as Claudia Seabrook Angeline Ball as Daphne Chris Walker as DCI Paul Boyd William Hoyland as Commander Arthur Fieldson Pete Lee-Wilson as Colin Butler Larry Lamb as Alan Roe Anna Maria Donofrio as Frances Harriet Keevil as Helen Windsor Granville Saxton as Commissioner Jellicoe Louise Salter as Julia (Jules) Allen Siobhan Burke as Lucille Paul Greenwood as Ray Bennett Charlie Hardwick as Paula Bennett Mary Woodvine as Alison Colette Brown as Alice MacDonald Jean Heywood as woman at the market Pearce Quigley as Detective Jean Southern as Mrs Rashleigh Miriam Stockley as singer Libby Davison as Sarah Gavin Muir as Father Kyle Doreen Mantle as Mrs Wilson Sophia Diaz as Mercedes Margery Bone as Barbara Cox Melvyn Barnes as Sean Collins Joanne Macinnes as Francine Volker Angela Bruce as Nursing sister Harry Herring as Arthur Watson
Episodes
Background
Stage play