🔗 Share this article

How could you respond if that wildest companion from your youth reappeared? What if you were battling a terminal illness and had nothing to lose? Consider if you were plagued by remorse for getting your friend imprisoned 10 years ago? If you were the one she got sent to prison and your release was granted to succumb to illness in her custody? If you used to be a almost unstoppable pair of con artists who still had a stash of disguises left over from your glory days and a longing to feel some excitement again?

All this and more are the questions that Frauds, a new drama starring Suranne Jones and Jodie Whittaker, presents to viewers on a exhilarating, intense six-part ride that follows two female fraudsters bent on executing a final scheme. Echoing an earlier work, Jones developed this series with a writing partner, and it has all the same strengths. Much like a suspense-driven structure was used as background to the psychodramas slowly revealed, here the grand heist the protagonist Roberta (Bert) has meticulously arranged while incarcerated after learning her prognosis is a means to explore an exploration of friendship, betrayal and love in every variation.

Bert is released into the care of Sam (Whittaker), who resides close by in the Andalucían hills. Remorse prevented her from seeing Bert during her sentence, but she remained nearby and avoided scams without her – “Bit crass with you in prison for a job I botched.” And to prepare for Bert’s, albeit short, life on the outside, she has purchased numerous undergarments, because various methods exist for female friends to show repentance and a classic example is the acquisition of “a big lady-bra” after a decade of underwire-free prison-issue rubbish.

Sam wants to carry on leading her quiet life and care for Bert until her passing. Bert has other ideas. And if your most impulsive companion has other ideas – well, those tend to be the ones you follow. Their old dynamic gradually reasserts itself and Bert’s plans are already in motion by the time she reveals the complete plan for the heist. This show experiments with chronology – to good rather than eye-rolling effect – to present key scenes initially and then the rationale. So we watch the pair slipping jewellery and watches from affluent attendees at a funeral – and bagging a golden crown of thorns because why wouldn’t you if you could? – before ripping off their wigs and reversing their funeral attire to become colourful suits as they stride out and down the chapel stairs, awash with adrenaline and loot.

They require the stolen goods to fund the plan. This involves hiring a document expert (with, unbeknown to them, a gambling problem that is due to attract unwanted attention) in the guise of magician’s assistant Jackie (Elizabeth Berrington), who has the technical know-how to assist in swapping the target painting (a famous surrealist piece at a prominent gallery). They also enlist art enthusiast Celine (Kate Fleetwood), who focuses on works by male artists exploiting women. She is equally merciless as any of the gangsters the forger and their funeral robbery are attracting, including – most dangerously – their old boss Miss Take (Talisa Garcia), a contemporary crime lord who had them running scams for her since their youth. She reacted poorly to the pair’s assertion of themselves as self-reliant tricksters so there’s ground to make up there.

Unexpected developments are interspersed with progressively uncovered truths about the duo’s past, so you experience the full enjoyment of a Thomas Crown Affair-ish caper – carried out with immense energy and praiseworthy readiness to skate over rampant absurdities – plus a mesmerisingly intricate portrait of a friendship that is possibly as toxic as her illness but just as impossible to uproot. Jones delivers arguably her best and multifaceted portrayal yet, as the damaged, resentful Bert with her lifetime pursuit of excitement to distract from her internal anguish that has nothing to do with metastasising cells. Whittaker stands with her, delivering excellent acting in a slightly less interesting part, and together with the creative team they craft a fantastically stylish, deeply moving and profoundly intelligent work of art that is inherently empowering without preaching and an absolute success. Eagerly awaiting future installments.