Murder Before Evensong, on Acorn TV

It makes sense that priests make good detectives. After all, people are constantly confessing to them. However, Canon Daniel Clement is Anglican. He is still a good listener, but he could have used the profound understanding of evil that G.K. Chesterton granted Father Brown. Instead, he inherited the social conscience of his creator, Reverend Richard Coles, who was formerly a pop star with the Comunards and the Bronski Beat. Clement prefers classical, but he will not have much time to listen to records when he stumbles across a dead body at the start of the six-part Murder Before Evensong, which premieres tomorrow on Acorn TV.

Poor Canon Clement was already mired in a rough patch. His mother just moved into the Champton Rectory with him, because his recently deceased father left her penniless. Ominously, Canon Clement has also received poisoned pen letters from an angry crank objecting to his volunteer ministry at an AIDS hospice. Consequently, DS Neil Vanloo wonders if the clergyman was the intended victim, instead Anthony Bowness the shaggy dog cousin of the local lord, Bernard De Floures.

Initially, Vanloo recruits Clement to help him navigate the villagers’ eccentricities—and to hopefully encourage them to reveal more than they otherwise would, but he grows tired of the clergyman’s annoying compassion. He also doubts Clement’s intuitive conviction that the murder must have had something to do with the De Floures estate’s murky WWII history, as a training center for Free French pilots and a collection hub for counter-intelligence investigating potential saboteurs and double-agents.

As adapted by Nicholas Hicks-Beach, Evensong is a throwback to the Adam Dalgliesh dramatizations of the 1980s and 1990s, which devoted six episodes to a single novel. The deep dive approach is appreciated, but Coles lacks P.D. James’ depth of characterization and the complexity of her mysteries. The regular finger-wagging at the socially conservative Anglican hierarchy also grows tiresome. It is also probably self-defeating, because the demographic for murder-solving clergy must lean slightly right-of-center, whether it be Father Brown, Brother Cadfael, or Don Matteo.

Nevertheless, Matthew Lewis inspires great sympathy for the achingly reserved and dignified Canon Clement. The tart tongue and withering attitude Amanda Redman brings to her portrayal of Audrey Clement definitely helps counterbalance him and liven up the series in the process.

Generally speaking, the casting worked out pretty well, particularly Adam James as the elder De Floures, who has a lot more to him than the average to-the-manor-born fuddy-duddy. Marion Bailey and Marion Hadingue are also quite touching as Kath and Dora, twin senior sisters dealing with a fatal cancer diagnosis.

Tonally, the series can’t seem to decide between the coziness of Midsomer Murders or the moroseness of Dalgliesh. However, many of the WWII-era revelations unfold rather cleverly. As far as odd couple sleuths go, Clement and Vanloo are okay, but they lack the cop-and-clergy chemistry James Norton and Robson Green forged in the early seasons of Grantchester.

There is some nice atmosphere, but the slow pacing (partly due to its heavy-handed social biases and partly due to the need to fill six full episodes) remains an issue. Decidedly mixed, Murder Before Evensong can pass the time, but there are plenty of grabbier series available (including The Red King). It starts streaming tomorrow (9/29) on Acorn TV.