Watching TV has sometimes felt odd in lockdown. When characters on EastEnders hug, or visit a relative’s home, it can feel conspicuous by its very normality – quite the opposite to current times. But now the BBC is releasing a drama that feels haunting in its prescience.
In March 2018, Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia were found collapsed on a bench in the cathedral city of Salisbury. Initially, it seemed the pair had overdosed. But a massive public health investigation identified Novichok, a fatal poison, as the weapon in a bizarre assassination plot. Miraculously they survived, but a local woman, Dawn Sturgess, was not so lucky, passing away after her partner stumbled across a perfume bottle – contaminated with the poison – and gave it to her. Many headlines depicted Dawn as a homeless drug addict. But, for MyAnna Buring, the actor playing her in The Salisbury Poisonings, this was inaccurate. ‘Here was a woman who had gone through really hard times and was struggling, but she was trying to get her life back on track,’ MyAnna tells Grazia over a video call from her home in north-east London. ‘She wasn’t homeless. She had an alcohol problem, not a drug addiction. Everyone I spoke to about Dawn would say how she had the time of day for anyone and, if someone needed help, she’d be there. She was funny. She loved to dance. And she was a spark of joy. I just hope people remember that, you know? Nobody is disposable. Nobody is collateral.’
Watching the first episode is nerve- shredding in the way that it shows how the poison was spread around. The camera follows a policeman who attended the scene as he returns home, puts the kettle on, and passes his wife a cup of tea. It feels almost like a horror film, as you watch the contamination spread silently. ‘It’s sort of spooky how many similarities there are [between the transmission of poison and a virus],’ MyAnna says. Indeed, BBC bosses are said to have deliberated over whether it was appropriate to air the show during a pandemic. ‘But I think the story needs to be told. This happened two years ago in the UK, but I think for a lot of people it’s been an easy thing to forget.’
Despite years of TV work for MyAnna – who has appeared in series including Ripper Street and The Witcher – filming the show took its toll. ‘I haven’t done a single interview where I’ve not struggled to not cry,’ she explains. ‘Dawn was a mother of three. She was a daughter of the most beautiful parents. All of this gets forgotten when we reduce the human being to a headline.’ Amid the preparation for the role of Dawn – the dialect coaching and extensive research – MyAnna knew she had to consult Dawn’s parents, Stan and Caroline. ‘They were incredibly generous with their time and their stories,’ she says. ‘Can you imagine? This is your child, and she’s gone, and suddenly you’re having to read about your daughter in ways that feel invasive and wrong. It was quite emotional for all of us. So it made us more aware that it was an important story to get right. I would say to them, “I’m not Dawn, but hopefully what we’ll do is just remind people that she was a human being.”’ She is not sure if they will choose to watch the programme. Dawn’s life, MyAnna considers, seemed not to matter as much as others. ‘And I wonder, aren’t we seeing elements of that now?’ she asks. ‘That some people don’t matter as much? We’re packing people who can’t afford not to work on to packed tubes and buses, with no clear guidelines. It shows the classism that we still have. I’m hoping it will be harder to ignore after this.’
‘The Salisbury Poisonings’ airs for three nights from June 14th on BBC One at 9pm
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