Simple Simon

Seventeen-year-old Simon Bailey is behaving strangely, and Inspector Kate Longton wants to know why. Simple Simon is a tight, focused mystery built on the quiet observation of one young man, and the show gives the boy the dignity of a proper inquiry rather than a quick judgement. It went out in November 1983, late in the fourth series, and director Marc Miller, who handled several of the season's quieter episodes, gives the boy's story the room it needs.

Stephen McGann, one of the four acting McGann brothers and later a Call the Midwife regular, plays Simon with a stillness that keeps the viewer guessing. Whatever is behind his behaviour, the episode takes its time finding out, and the investigation works through the usual channels with Sergeant Joseph Beck, Sergeant George Parrish, PC Danny Sparks and PC Brian Kelleher, plus John Holden in the background. The family circle matters most: Rita and Doug Bailey, Simon's parents, each have their own version of the boy and his moods, and the show lets those versions clash before the truth emerges.

John Foster wrote it, Marc Miller directed. Anna Carteret is Kate Longton, with David Ellison as Beck, Noel Collins as Parrish, Mark Botham as Sparks, C.J. Allen as Kelleher and Tom Georgeson as John Holden. Stephen McGann plays Simon Bailey, Mary Rutherford is Rita Bailey, Roy Holder is Doug Bailey and Russell Brook is a Policeman.

The episode's tension comes from watching someone behave against expectation. Simon is not a suspect in the usual sense, and the show is careful not to turn him into one; the mystery is in what has driven him, and the resolution lands with more sympathy than judgement.

It is satisfying viewing when the whole hour hangs on the careful reading of one young man's actions. The dedicated work of the officers on the ground, the show argues, is mostly about paying attention. That is the job, and Simple Simon is the job done well.