While Clive Owen’s character has kicked his drug habit, he still has to contend with hospital politics and the bubonic plague in The Knick, writes Debashine Thangevelo
IT isn’t uncommon for a TV show to become synonymous with one particular actor. Of course, that’s because they not only own the role – they are a tour de force in it.
Kerry Washington is immediately identified with her role in The Fixer. Kevin Spacey is the poster boy for House of Cards and, as far as fans are concerned, Omari Hardwick is hardwired into minds as the soul of Power.
And it’s pretty much the same for Clive Owen, who has profound footprints in the movie industry, as Dr John W. Thackery in his TV outing with The Knick.
Set in the 1900s, the period medical drama kicked off with Thackery’s appointment as the chief surgeon at the Knickerbocker Hospital. His headstrong personality often gets him into trouble but, at the same time, his successes in his field make him somewhat indispensible.
In exploring his life, his skeletons come to light – especially his addiction to cocaine. The second season kicks off with him in rehab. However, Everett Gallinger kidnapped him, forcing him to go cold turkey. Picking up the pieces of his life isn’t easy – assistant chief surgeon Dr Algernon Edwards (Andre Holland) is now eyeing his position.
Meanwhile, the bubonic plague has arrived on their doorstep… and there are other unresolved personal issues adding to the difficulties.
Shedding light on the opening scene of the new season, Owen says: “He has ended up in rehab being given heroin as a treatment for what they called cocaine frenzy. That is based on fact and research – cocaine was legal at the time and they thought that you dealt with cocaine frenzy by calming patients down… with a bit of heroin. I said to the guys that when we do season two we’ve got to deliver. I’ve got to look worse than I’ve ever looked before and so we’re seeing him in a pretty sorry state, really. And a lot of season two for Thackery is about trying to get back on track and keep off the drugs.”
Of course, being clean has drawbacks for him in his profession capacity.
The 51-year-old veteran actor reveals: “You know he’s inspired by a real guy (William Stewart Halsted), who was taking vast amounts of drugs and being brilliant for real at the John Hopkins Hospital in New York. There’s an element where he’s kind of dependent on it. He’s a functioning addict. There’s a running theme through season two about his dependency on that and whether he has the confidence to get in there and do it as he did it before without the drugs. It was very important to me going into the next season that we didn’t treat the addiction too lightly. It would have been really unpalatable, to me, if he were to go out in the boat (where Gallinger takes Thackery to go cold turkey) in episode one, recovers and comes back a changed man. We know that addiction isn’t like that. The thing that drives him to push the boundaries of medicine forward is the same thing that causes him to be a drug addict and make things difficult for himself.”
Being the consummate professional that he is, Owen was adamant about going method. He lost weight to lend credence to his character’s downward spiral. He also exudes that intense rage addicts go through when they are cut off from their supply.
Owen continues: “Viewers will see some big ups and downs. But there are some incredible surgeries too. In some ways, that’s his redeeming quality. He is brilliant at what he does and that’s through his risk-taking.”
Season one explores the racial prejudice experienced by Edwards, whose ambitions see him encountering even more hostility. But his contention with Thackery changes when they bond over a delicate surgical procedure.
The Knick is marvellously shot. The set, the costumes and the mannerisms of the characters transport viewers to the Edwardian epoch. And the subservience of women and the bigotry of the times form some of the themes that are explored – amid the surgeries, of course.
The Knick 2 airs on M-Net Edge (DStv channel 102) on Mondays at 9pm.