An Inspector Calls

1912 and with the possibility of the first world war looming the Birling's, Arthur (Ken Stott), Sybil (Miranda Richardson) and Eric (Finn Cole) are gathered around the dining table having just finished a celebratory meal to mark the engagement of daughter Sheila (Chloe Pirrie) to Gerald Croft (Kyle Soller), the son of a rival businessman, when the arrival of Inspector Goole (David Thewlis) brings news of the suicide of a young and pregnant working class girl Eva Smith (Sophie Rundle).  As each family member is interegated by Goole it soon transpires that they are all acquainted with the dead woman and have all, in some way, contributed to her demise.

Made for the BBC in 2015 screenwriter Helen Edmundson and director Aisling Walsh's adaptation of J.B. Priestley's play is a masterclass of subtle and sympathetic television that maintains the heart of the play and augments it via judicious use of flashbacks to further expand on the life of the doomed Eva.  It holds true to Priestley's core ideal of social responsibility present in his disdain for the attitudes and beliefs of the middle (the Birling's) and upper (Croft) classes in their treatment of those considered their social inferiors.

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