There Was a Crooked Man!

David Suchet plays disgraced tycoon Robert Maxwell
Maxwell
BBC2 Friday

There's a „you couldn't make it up‟ quality to the life story of newspaper baron Robert Maxwell. He was born into extreme poverty in Czechoslovakia in 1923, and (1)_____ he arrived in this country (2)_____ the age of 17, he couldn't speak a (3)_____ of English. Yet he (4)_____ to become a war hero, fighting (5)_____ a captain in the British Army, and one of the most high-profile — and controversial — business magnates of the 20th Century.

This week's BBC2 drama Maxwell (6)_____ the story of the final months of his life, leading up to his mysterious drowning off the coast of Tenerife in 1991.

His media empire, which included the Daily Mirror, Macmillan Publishing and the New York Daily News, was haemorrhaging cash. In a desperate attempt to staunch the losses, Maxwell (played by David Suchet) started to raid the pension funds of his companies, stealing about £500,000.

„He (7)_____ nothing to become this huge business magnate and massively colourful figure,‟ says David, best known for his role as Agatha Christie's Belgian detective Hercule Poirot.

„Even though Maxwell gatecrashed society events and made (8)_____ he was photographed with powerful figures such as Russia's President Gorbachev, he never felt embraced by society. He became a media tycoon (9)_____ he was desperate to have influence.‟

David (10)_____ hours of footage of Maxwell and says he developed a strong sense of his character's intimidating natural authority.

„Playing Maxwell, I felt the (11)_____ power of the man,‟ he says. “That's dangerously intoxicating for everyone. Down the centuries, nothing has been abused more than power — from Napoleon and Hitler to Saddam Hussein. If you know that when you (12)_____ your fingers people will jump to attention, it can be very seductive.‟