In late 1890s London, Amalia True (Laura Donnelly) is part of St. Romaulda’s Orphanage, a haven for the “Touched” (superpowered people) and her power is to see glimpes of the future. She and her best friend Penance Adair (Ann Skelly), who can control potential energy, visit Myrtle Haplisch (Viola Prettejohn), whose parents have chained to her bed after exhibiting powers and speaking in Chinese language. Amalia and Penance realize Myrtle is being kidnapped by thugs and fight them, leading to a chase in the streets in their stagecoach but manage to flee in a motorcar. Amalia and Penance decide to take Myrtle to live with them at the orphanage. There, she’s introduced to Horatio Cousens (Zackary Momoh), a doctor with healing powers; and Primrose Chattoway (Anna Devlin), a 10-feet tall girl.
Government officials begin discussing the events, with Lord Massen (Pip Torrens) deeming the Touched as dangers to society. Detective Frank Mundi (Ben Chaplin) investigates a murder on a factory, with a message “Behol My Works For I Am The Angle of Death” written on the wall, which he thinks may be connected to a serial killer known as Maladie. Augustus “Augie” Bidlow (Tom Riley) visits his friend, Hugo Swan (James Norton), owner of a private club, to ask for help in something involving the Touched.
Amalia and Penance go to see Faust in the opera when their stagecoach is boarded by Declan Orrun (Nick Frost), who is known in the underground world as the Beggar King. Amalia asks for his help in finding more about the thugs who tried to kidnap Myrtle and he agrees, but threatens to cut her face if things go wrong. At the opera, Auggie accompanies his sister Lavinia (Olivia Williams), who runs the orphanage but has to use a wheelchair. During the performance, Maladie (Amy Manson) appears and kills an actor playing the Devil before one of her thugs uses a machine gun to kill part of the audience. But one of the actors, Mary Brighton (Eleanor Tomlinson) is revealed to have an angelic voice, which affects Amalia, Penance and Auggie. Maladie takes Mary and is pursued by Amalia but they manage to flee.
Detective Mundi once again investigates Maladie and questions Hugo about what happened but gets no information. Penance finds Amalia in an alley, having lost part of her dress during the chase. She comforts her and both try to understand what the song was that Mary sang during the performance. Meanwhile, a surgeon named Dr. Edmund Hague (Denis O’Hare) is shown to be medically torturing Touched people, in an attempt to understand their powers. He alludes to being the person who ordered the kidnapping of Myrtle earlier.
A flashback reveals the events of what led to the creation of the Touched three years ago. A spaceship entered the orbit and passed over London, all while exposing the citizens to sparkles that fell onto some of them. Amongst the affected are Penance, Auggie, Mary, Dr. Cousens, Maladie, Lord Massen’s daughter and Amalia, who was attempting suicide by drowning. After getting touched by the sparkle, Amalia swims to the surface.
* * *
(somber violin music playing)
♪
(birds chirping)
♪
(distant rumbling in sky)
(loud rumbling continues)
♪
(rumbling continues)
♪
(breathing shakily)
(exhales)
♪
(steam hissing)
(bellows fluttering)
♪
Good morning, Mrs. True.
(gears clicking)
(clock chiming)
(sniffs)
(water running)
♪
(gears clattering)
(electricity powering down)
♪
Mrs. True.
Miss Adair.
You look very fine.
I think so, too.
(hooves clopping)
(indistinct chatter)
(motor rumbling)
What are you walking around here for? That’s what I’m saying.
Oh, I just…
No, wait!
Will you do something about this man, please?
Newsboy: Read it in “The Star”!
Maladie kills fifth victim!
Murder spree soon to eclipse The Ripper!
(indistinct chatter)
(church bells tolling)
I don’t suppose you know how this all works out.
The ripplings don’t come when they’re called.
Well, let’s just try to keep it civil.
Not like with the innkeeper.
He had a shotgun.
I’ve heard that excuse before.
When they have shotguns.
What’s the, uh, girl?
Myrtle Haplisch.
Something to do with her voice.
(door opens)
Good day, Mr. Haplisch.
Mr. Haplisch: Yes.
Are you, uh…
I’m Amalia True.
This is my colleague, Penance Adair.
The reverend told you we were coming?
Oh, yeah. About Myrtle.
Um, come… in.
Missus!
Please, come through to the, um, parlor.
They’re saying Myrtle might be…
Touched?
We, we heard about those girls the last few years.
They’re… not right.
Neither right nor wrong, being Touched is not a defect of character.
But isn’t that killer…
Mal-Maladie. Isn’t she one of them?
Maladie’s homicidal. I don’t know if she’s Touched.
We don’t know if Myrtle is.
Oh, she’s Touched, all right.
Touched by Red Boot Teddy!
We’re, um, of a mind, there’s a Satanic element.
She’s Lucifer’s vessel, is what.
He speaks through her.
Up!
Yes, uh, the reverend mentioned an affliction of the tongue.
‘Cause old Satan is squattin’ on it.
Spewing out his foulness, making a chamber pot of our Myrtle’s mouth.
(tea kettle whistles)
Mr. Haplisch: Well, that’s a bit descriptive.
Oh, uh, new kettle. (chuckles)
It tells you when it’s, um…
Sophie!
(distant voice yells)
(thuds)
(panting)
(distant grunt)
Is Myrtle here at home, then?
♪
(door squeaks open)
(chains rattling)
Why is she chained?
Infection.
W-w-we got the others.
Mrs. Haplisch: Out. Get out. Get out, I say.
Myrtle was the only one could earn a wage with the new labor laws.
Now this.
Myrtle, I’m Penance and that’s Mrs. True.
May I sit?
Uh, we’ve come to help with what’s been troublin’ ya.
There’s plenty of girls who’ve been shown a strangeness of some kind. A “turn.”
But Mrs. True and I, we’ve worked with them, and they come up fine.
Would you like that?
Speak, Myrtle.
You mean, “Speak, Satan”?
(speaks foreign languages)
See?
(speaks foreign languages)
Myrtle, you can understand me, yes?
(speaks Chinese)
Chinese?!
Most of it. Some of it may have been Russian.
And I want to say… Turkish?
Huh.
Amalia: I’d guess every known language is crowding her mind.
How would a girl like Myrtle learn Chinese?
She’s never even seen a Chinaman.
Well, at least we can rule out any sort of Satanic influence.
(Mrs. Haplisch gasps)
Those acrobats.
Mr. Haplisch: What?
No! They just tumbled about.
They come to Barney Park doing flips and balancing.
They had an unnatural air.
I said it then. And there was a monkey!
He looked right at me.
Yes. Well…
Allow me to be frank…
After being grateful for the chance to give Myrtle the kind of care…
(clattering upstairs)
Amalia: Keep them down here.
(Myrtle grunting)
(whimpering)
(thief grunts)
(Amalia yells)
(thuds)
Amalia: (sighs) Right.
(distant yelling)
Gentlemen.
(neck cracking)
Might we be civil?
(yelling)
(thuds)
(yells)
(punching, grunting)
(thief yells)
(thwacks)
You bitch!
(glass shattering)
(thwacks)
(grunts)
Penance!
(thwacks)
Shiner!
(thief grunting)
(exploding)
(punching, grunting)
Thief: Aah!
(thwacks)
Amalia: Get the carriage!
(thief yells, grunts)
(clicking)
Da! The lady did a wrestle!
(glass shattering)
Aah!
(thuds)
(grunts)
(Myrtle whimpering)
(clangs open)
(clattering)
(Myrtle grunting, whimpering)
(Amalia yells)
(thuds)
(Shock Trooper growling)
(grunting)
(thwacks)
(horse whinnies)
Amalia: Come on. Let’s go!
(horse whinnies)
(shrieks)
(thuds)
(thwacks)
(thuds)
(growling)
(Amalia yells)
(yells)
Now! Myrtle, run!
(horse whinnies)
True!
(thwacks)
(electricity buzzing)
(thwacks)
(horses whinnying)
♪
(crowd exclaiming)
(firing)
Did you see that face?
I think I preferred when people just had shotguns.
(gunshot)
(yells)
Oh, no. No, I didn’t.
(bystander screams)
(gunshots)
(crowd yelling)
We can’t outrun them. We’re going to have to change it out.
Uh, you mean… It’s only a prototype.
(hooves clopping)
(crowd yelling)
(yelling, screaming)
(clattering)
This is weird for us, too.
(Myrtle shrieks)
(screams)
Heads down!
(metal clanging)
Penance: Out of the way!
(dramatic music playing)
One side!
(rumbling)
♪
I, I think it’s best if you come stay with us for a bit.
If that suits ya.
(operatic voices)
We can, we can deal with those fellas.
We can find out what they want, or what they… are. How are we gonna deal with those fellas?
True?
We’re going to the opera.
See? We already got a plan.
(upbeat violin music playing)
♪
General Pecking: It’s just a woman.
Five men murdered. I’d say she’s more than that.
Prince: Yes, murder.
Very distressing.
This “Maladie” is a lunatic.
Scotland Yard has their Special Detail to catch her.
What matter if she’s Touched? This is beneath us.
Lord Broughton: She is not killing whores, your grace.
These are respectable men.
Psychoanalysts.
Well, the Prime Minister intends to take a public position on the Touched.
We need to decide what it is.
A few women pulling parlor tricks…
It’s not just women.
And it’s not a few.
There are hundreds, at least, of unique, inexplicable afflictions.
Lavinia Bidlow has made a cause of them.
Lord Allaven-Tyne: Which is why the PM needs to take a…
Women are being attacked, accused of witchcraft, or some island voodoo, and…
Prince: Fairy stories.
These are biological anomalies, caused by electricity.
(Massen clears throat)
Uh, Lord Massen?
A girl started in my engine works last month wiping down the plating press.
She slipped. Got her arm caught in the press.
And then she pulled it back out.
Three tons of pressure, and she snapped the hydraulic without so much as a bruise.
People cheered.
General Pecking: Well, I say enlist her.
Point her at the bloody Boers.
A machine breaks. Again, gentlemen, this isn’t a troop deployment, or a, a market crash.
(thuds)
(exhales)
The Prime Minister will not be taking a position on the Touched.
Nor will he allow any official debate on the subject.
Not until we understand the nature and breadth of the attack.
Attack?
You’re declaring the Touched a direct threat against the empire.
-(thuds) -Which we here are sworn to protect.
All: Contra hostes omnes.
And this attack is expected to come…
It came three years ago.
Third of August, 1896.
A Monday. Rather gray.
Not one case of someone being Touched before then.
Not one outside London.
Those reported overseas were all here at the time.
And not one man of stature afflicted.
That’s the genius of it.
They came at us through our women.
Lord Allaven-Tyne: “They”?
I’m still not sure I can equate a few bizarre anecdotes with the Mongol horde.
Only a blind man measures the length of a blade by how much is in his belly.
Your overstep the mark, Massen.
This was designed so that we would see the parts… and not the whole.
Philanthropists like Lavinia Bidlow see the suffering of the afflicted.
The common throng see a macabre murderess.
And you see a broken machine. (laughs)
That is exactly what I see.
The greatest machine.
The heart of our empire brought to a shuddering halt by the caprice and ambitions of those for whom ambition was never meant.
(thuds)
Industrialist: This is the Age of Power.
New power.
The X-ray.
The wireless.
Electricity.
We are the first generation accustomed to the impossible.
What women are appalled by today, they will accept tomorrow, and demand the day after that.
And the immigrant. And the deviant.
(thuds)
That is the power being wielded, and not by us.
The blade is in, gentlemen.
We need to know whose hand is on the hilt.
(indistinct chatter)
Nobody gets through.
(metal clanging)
(shovels digging)
Foreman: Put your back into it, Jones, you lazy…
Jones: Yes, sir.
Foreman: We get any further behind, I’ll pluck the lot of ya!
Not in front of the officer. Show some respect.
Detective Mundi.
You’re the Special Detail, yeah?
You’re gonna wanna see this.
Am I?
Mind your head.
(rats squeaking)
Was a digger stumbled on her.
Near had a kiss, they did.
Here. You see the stab wounds?
These mates brung the torches in.
They spotted this on the wall.
That’s how they knew it was one of hers.
It’s a message.
Not from Maladie.
But how can you be sure?
She can spell.
Did he recognize the victim? The digger?
No.
Well, not much to recognize, the rats having had a go.
You get vagrants and drunks taking shelter down here all the time.
Mmm. This woman was neither.
Where does this lead?
Foreman: It was meant to be the maintenance tunnel for the southern line, but it got scrapped.
There’s too much to do, expanding the underground.
The city’ll fall in on itself.
I don’t envy you this job.
Yeah.
Who moved the body?
Must have been… Wait. What?
No, it was there.
She wasn’t killed there.
And her blood’s been dry a lot longer than this pig’s.
No. It’s not… Oi.
You’re tossing about a lot of assumptions.
Clearly I meant to.
Right. Shut this lot down. Line ’em up.
No…
We check every man in here for blood on his hands or his clothes.
You, you can’t stop the dig. We got a schedule to keep.
And what’s a murder to that, eh?
What? You think you’re the first to try and pin something on Maladie?
People think every Touched they meet might be her.
And some of them Touched, they’re weird enough. They are.
Make your skin crawl. But here’s you, letting a killer get off by making it harder to catch another one.
For a schedule.
I know about you, Frank Mundi.
East End Ape. Always fists first.
He could beat a confession out of a headstone.
You can play the righteous man, but even you answer to someone.
Yes, I do. She’s right there.
Now, that woman faced an horrible end.
And I don’t think you killed her, but I’m not letting you bury her.
What about the Special Detail?
If it’s not Maladie done this, then it’s not your case.
Oh, no. Maladie done this, didn’t she?
(grunts)
Because she left a message.
So you’re gonna tell me what was here before you dressed it up, ’cause one more lie, and I’m not on a case,
I’m the fucking “Angle” of Death.
(indistinct chatter)
♪
(indistinct chatter)
Leave the doors!
Mrs. True’s back with a new one.
They’s in Penance’s… Uh, the prolatype.
What, the auto-carriage? (laughs)
It’s mad. Primrose, you got to see.
Mother says motorcars are common.
Common? There’s only eight of them that ever were.
I wouldn’t expect you to understand, but Mother says they’re a blight.
Yeah? She say that lately?
On a visit, maybe, that we all missed.
As though you know anything about being a mother.
Harriet: Primrose!
She didn’t mean that.
Does she think she’s too big for a spanking?
Penance: Coming through!
(indistinct chatter)
(speaks foreign languages)
Horatio: All right. All right, come on.
Don’t suffocate them. It’s only a carriage.
No?
That’s fuckin’ amazing.
Myrtle, this is Dr. Horatio Cousens. He swears a lot.
(speaks foreign languages)
No, I don’t.
How was your journey?
Eventful.
Lucy, I need to send a letter to Mrs. Bidlow.
Let her know about the attack.
Lucy: Attack? What attack?
Lucy. Pen. Paper.
I’ll set up in your rooms.
Shop talk first.
Not first.
This is just a scratch.
(laughs)
Primrose?
I can’t ride it in, so I don’t see what…
No, it’s just… I recalled you saying you didn’t have anyone your own age to talk to.
Oh!
I’m Miss Chattoway.
But you may call me Primrose.
I hope we’ll be friends.
So what’s your “turn”? I’m large.
(speaks foreign languages)
Myrtle has a language situation, and I imagine she could use a cup of tea.
Oh. Um, do you want…
She does speak English.
But not with her mouth.
(speaks foreign languages)
All right. Come with me.
(rooster crows)
We should be married in this.
Lucy: How is this new?
People been attacking us since they known we was Touched.
Or since always.
Amalia: This is different.
This whole day.
We knew people would come down on us the more we were thriving.
Why would they want this…
Myrtle?
Amalia: I don’t think she’s the first.
I think they’ve been doing this for some time.
All those girls we went after who’d “just run away”?
(sighs) Lord.
We need to bolster our security.
All entrances, windows bolted or blocked.
I could rig up a few surprises, as well.
Nothing lethal, but very discouraging.
Everyone signs in and out. Time and destination.
No one goes out alone or after dark.
Not even visitors.
One time.
I’ve been showing the girls a bit of scrapping.
You’ll show them all.
But not using their “turns.”
Well, there’s plenty you can do with what’s at hand.
It’s about confidence. As my mum used to say, if you can look a man in the eye, you can stab him in it.
Smart woman.
But also, don’t do that.
The Beggar King. Tell him I need to see him.
We pay him for protection, and he’s been feeding us potential candidates.
I need to know if he’s been feeding anyone else.
Here, first thing tomorrow. Put word on the street.
That’s not how it works, Mrs. True.
Amalia, you don’t just ask the Beggar King to come calling.
I am, in fact, not asking.
All right.
Better tend to that scratch, since you’re in such a hurry to make new enemies.
(church bell chimes)
(indistinct chatter)
(knocking on door)
(knocking continues)
(grunts softly)
(grunts, exhales)
(clattering)
(grunts)
(clanging)
(liquid bubbling)
(groaning)
(panting)
(snorts)
Valet: Augustus Bidlow to see you, sir.
(groans, exhales)
(groans, yawns)
Augie, sorry I kept you waiting.
Did I keep you waiting? I’m at odds with time.
They’re unhappy.
Who? The Humphries? Of course they’re unhappy. They’re old.
The crows.
They shouldn’t be massing here.
Hugo: Crows…
Do you mean to say we’re witnessing a murder?
(groans)
You know I hate that term.
So unfair, “a murder of crows.”
Crows are actually lovely. They’re intelligent creatures.
Why is it an “exaltation of larks”?
Larks are not at all as soc…
Hugo: Not at all as social.
Yes, Augie, your radical stance on avian nomenclature hasn’t changed since Eton.
No, thank you.
I think they’re here as a Greek chorus to your distemper.
(sighs)
So…
what has you so ruffled?
I assume your sister is angry about something.
No.
I just… I, I’ve done something stupid.
And that’s not why she’s…
(sighs) Fu…
(sips, gulps)
She… This.
(clears throat) You know Lavinia’s charity endeavor?
The Touched.
Yes. The, uh…
The Orphanage.
Orphans. Right.
No. The Touched.
Yes. They’re terrible.
(sighs) They’re wonderful.
They’re absurd.
Do you even know what the term means?
“Touched”? Yes! (laughs) No.
Uh, they’re all, uh, they have, uh, weird, um, deformities and afflictions.
And… Oh! Um. Alderton Musgrove has a niece who can float.
Really?
(laughs) Yeah.
Just an inch or so off the ground.
She can’t go anywhere unless you tow her about.
Musgrove is apoplectic.
I’m not supposed to tell. (laughs)
Oh, and, uh, Lavinia’s opened a, a home for them.
And it’s all rather controversial, and…
And… she, she, she just now got word from the widow who runs the affair.
Some Touched girl was attacked.
I mean, the girl’s fine, but Lavinia, she’s aflame.
“It’s time society accepted that the Touched are amongst us, and they’re…”
And I said, “Well, they’re not amongst us.
You know, they’re in The Orphanage.”
And she called me a genius.
Which is worse than when she calls me an idiot, because… I, I never know what she…
She’s bringing them to the opera.
Tonight! In our box.
She’s ousted the Van Alders for these wo-women.
I’m to make the fourth.
Are they hideous?
I’ve no idea.
It’s, um…
It’s, it’s, it’s the widow, Mrs. True,
I think, and her companion.
Do you think they might be hideous?
Well, whatever they are, flirt with the ugly one.
It creates an unexpected balance.
I don’t know how to flirt.
God, these people make me uneasy.
What if she’s some sort of Elephant Man woman?
Well, then, she’s probably the ugly one.
You have to come.
Oh! To the opera?
Well, you know everything about flirting.
Plus, you don’t mind when people are odd.
(groans)
It’s how we’re friends.
(shoes thunk on floor)
But it’s “Faust”!
Please?
I’ll do anything. I mean…
People are already saying unkind things about Lavinia’s passion on the subject.
If this whole thing doesn’t go smoothly…
Mmm-mmm.
I’ve got a very important meeting with the Minister of Finance about The Ferryman’s next Midnight Carouse.
The Ferryman’s? I don’t…
Sorry, wh-what does the Minister of Finance have to do with your pagan sex club?
Hugo: Whatever he has to do to get the pictures I have from the last one.
(coughs)
That’s how the club works.
It’s all quite delicate. Favors and threats, and then, one shining night where no law yet exists.
It’s more than just a club. It’s an ethos.
And I won’t sit through three hours of moralistic bellowing with everyone I know and hate,
just because Lavinia’s gone weird.
She’s not weird.
I’m an ape.
But she does push you around.
I know.
I know.
I will come tonight.
If…
Augie: No. Me?
At The Ferryman’s? No. Hugo, no. Please. I…
Sex club is just…
That’s just flirting on a much scarier level.
You don’t have to flirt.
You just have to relax.
Endure someone flirting with you.
These are my terms.
(groans)
(cawing)
Oh, he’s a pokey one.
As far as society is concerned, Augustus Bidlow is above reproach, and beneath contempt.
He’s perfect.
For what?
You don’t have to wear that anymore.
Oh. (laughs) Right. You are the maid.
(sighs)
(energy humming)
I like watching you work.
It’s like you’re conducting.
Well, get in wrong with the Beggar King, and you’ll get a symphony.
You shouldn’t be in that life.
Gift like yours, you should be the Royal physician, not patching up gangsters and freaks.
Gift like mine gets me branded a voodoo witch doctor.
(water dripping)
I gave up being choosy.
Nothing about me not being a freak?
(speaks foreign languages)
Oh, no, just come in. It’s only surgery.
(speaks foreign languages)
Oh, right.
I’m going to the opera tonight.
I had a rippling.
“…to accompany me and my brother Augustus to the opening performance of ‘Faust.’ (mutters) Lavinia Bidlow.”
(speaks foreign languages)
So you send word that you’d just been attacked, and she says, “Come out to play.”
She even sent an outfit.
And what about the part where you rest?
It’s the theater, not hard labor.
And I…
Think I need to be there.
Trouble?
Hmm.
Katherine will have supper ready soon.
Does Lavinia really think I can fit into this?
It’s a good dress for you.
(bag clasps shut)
It’ll keep pressure on the wound.
(footsteps departing)
Mrs. True.
Miss Adair.
You look very fine.
I think so, too.
(indistinct chatter)
It’s like something from a storybook.
(speaks foreign languages)
(classical music playing)
I’m not confident in my curtsying.
I’m not confident in my breathing.
Oh, I wasn’t planning to breathe.
I think it’s considered rude.
Does it hurt?
Itches.
Aah, that’s much worse.
Are you sure we need to go to this?
You have to say yes or I’ll cry, but…
We need to go to this.
Wish I knew why.
(horse whinnies)
(horse whinnies)
(ominous music playing)
(carriage door closes)
Aah…
Give us the room.
That’s Odium. Pardon the stench.
You cannot get that man into a bath.
Declan Orrun.
The Beggar King.
Or, no…
Mr. Orrun, Penance Adair.
Declan: Yeah, I know.
The great inventress.
Oh, I’m not great.
Amalia: I assume you’ve heard about…
Do you know how it looks?
Every rum on the street hearing you calling me come like a bitch puppy?
There’s channels.
We were attacked today.
Only once?
They came for Myrtle Haplisch same time we did.
Probably been after the Touched for some time, but now they’ve been seen.
They’re a danger to us, and I’d suspect, anyone known to be connected with us.
Which you made sure I was known far and wide to be.
You called me out, so I’d be forced to help you.
And now you’ve told me that to my face.
I’m genuinely searching for a way that this spins out… that I don’t kill you.
It would be better if you didn’t.
(laughs softly) You’re a rare fuckin’ bird.
You sold us the information about Myrtle.
And you’re wondering if I sold it to someone else.
Well, wonder away, princess.
My business is mine.
Apart from the sanctity of my harmonious marriage, fuck-all is exclusive.
My girls need protection, and I need information.
Exclusive, about who’s hunting the Touched, and why.
Skip the posture and name your price.
You ain’t got that kind of swag.
We’re resourceful.
Is that so? How ’bout you get me the Crown fucking Jewels?
Wait, are you considering that?
We’ll start with a gift for today’s thoughtlessness.
An automated motor-carriage, designed to your specifications.
And you will be paid, if you help us.
(sniffs)
You’re mad enough to make this worth it.
But you’re mad enough to try not to.
If it goes that way, I will cut your face to a mess.
This isn’t my face.
(carriage door closes)
(hooves clopping)
(laughing)
I thought you was gonna scare them.
Spread out your fingers.
Bystander: Wait.
Hold up your hand, and spread out your fuckin’ fingers.
(classical violin music)
(indistinct chatter)
♪
(Amalia breathing shakily)
(exhales)
(whispers): Hugo, get off!
I have to go!
I’m done after the cavern ballet in act five, right before the prison scene.
Hugo? You listening?
Yes. The prison scene.
Yes.
(both chuckle)
(giggles)
(indistinct chatter)
Dr. Beldon: Don’t you agree, Miss Bidlow?
Must we fight a war over words?
I’m exhausted by these overwrought alarums about the Frenchification of our language.
It’s the end of the century.
These ancient prejudices have no use.
Dr. Beldon, you adopt new terms as they become relevant to your practice of psychoanalysis, I imagine.
Practically every week of late.
Lavinia: Language requires not stasis, but specificity.
I should be thrilled to excise the word “nice.”
It’s vague as paste. Isn’t that right, Augustus?
Augustus.
Sorry?
We were discussing it earlier.
The specificity of modern language.
Oh, yes. Yes, yes, yes.
It’s very nice.
(groans)
(clears throat) If it’s, uh, French terminology we’re discussing, there are a few terms
we Britons simply don’t have a word for.
Oh, excuse me. (chuckles)
Dr. Beldon: I suppose we all know the sort of terms he means.
What on Earth is Swann doing here?
I…
No, I know.
S-so impulsive…
Lord Massen. You’re well, I hope.
I am, Miss Bidlow. Thank you. Dr. Beldon, hello. Swann.
We were discussing the panic a few old men are having about certain French terms.
There was one debated on the Parliament floor. What was it?
“Employees.”
Employees. And here we say it, and yet live.
It is not panicking to abhor something.
Neither is it useful to replace a perfectly good Anglo-Saxon word with some foreigner’s flourish.
In England, we say “the employed.”
What possible benefit in replacing it with “employees”?
Amalia: The singular.
One may refer to a single employee, whereas “the employed”
can only be used to describe a mass of people.
It doesn’t allow for the idea that a single worker may be a whole and meaningful being.
Mrs. Amalia True. Miss Adair.
May I introduce Lord Massen?
Mrs. True runs The Orphanage.
Indeed.
(whispers): Which one’s the ugly one?
Lord Massen: I take it then that you are yourselves among the afflicted?
Touched, yes. We don’t consider ourselves afflicted.
Perhaps some women are more fortunate in the nature of their ailment than others.
That’s true, but, more suffer from society’s perception than their own debilitation.
Well, so what’s wrong with you?
(laughs nervously) I, I think he means me.
Uh, where to begin…
No, it’s just, you, you lo… you, you look…
You’re qu… You’re quite nice.
And you, um, y-you have the charity, The Orphanage.
That seems… normal.
Miss Bidlow runs The Orphanage.
We’re just the employed.
Shockingly, I’d say my brother has spoken for everyone.
They’re anxious to know what your “turns” are.
(sniffs) A “turn” is a trick.
Amalia: It’s not a trick.
Penance is an inventor. A creator, really.
Oh. There’s only one Creator. (laughs)
No, uh, I can see energy.
Potential energy. Like with electricity.
I can see where it wants to go, or, move, or settle.
It helps me put things together.
And yours?
Mrs. True tends to be a few steps ahead of the rest of us.
Mmm. A prognosticator.
Nothing so grand.
So I shouldn’t ask how I’m going to die.
No, but one can safely assume it will involve a French word.
Ha!
You see the future?
Snippets.
It’s as confusing as it is useful.
You were a soldier.
You’ve seen men who suddenly feel themselves back in battle.
Well, sometimes I go forward.
I never said I was a soldier.
You’re probably going to.
No, it’s the eyes.
Assessing every threat.
Lord Massen is the last line of defense against the scourge of modernity.
(scoffs)
I’m old and I’ve seen too much change to fight against the tide, but, uh, chaos is not change.
Shouting for recognition does not make a people worthy of it.
There’s a harmony to our world that’s worth preserving.
Amalia: As I understand it, a harmony is made up of different voices sounding different notes.
Yes. And one is always above the other.
Ladies.
(operatic singing in foreign language)
♪
(singing continues)
(singing continues)
(both moaning, panting)
(Hugo pants, grunts)
(opera music continues)
(sudden fluttering)
(rope straining)
(voices, music crescendo)
(exploding)
(flames roar)
(orchestral music playing)
(shrieks)
(crowd screaming)
I killed the devil.
(crowd chattering)
Man: It’s Maladie!
(crowd chattering)
Woman: It is Maladie!
Man (softly): What does she want?
Is no one going to say “thank you”?
(crowd quiets)
It’s okay. It’s okay.
It’s okay.
(kissing noises)
It’s okay, petal. It’s not your fault.
(whirring)
It’s the doctor.
Oh! Oh, there’s so many people.
(chuckling softly)
Did you all come in hats?
(giggling)
Now all of your brains are naked. No?
You shall have a wreath of eels with the tail in your mouth.
(giggles) Please!
Please.
Don’t… go.
(shrieking)
(panting)
Devil’s speciality is eels. (pants)
Which is known by you as a serpent.
(audience gasps)
Oh, but it’s only Adam.
It’s all the same when it slithers.
(laughing)
(audience exclaiming)
(whispers): Eve had a c*nt.
(panting)
Why am I here?
I came to kill an angel witch.
Oops. (chuckles)
But the closer I came, the more I felt I was here for a r…
Because I… saw God.
He was all light.
And He put on me His wreath. He came.
He came to us all, and you all turned your backs on Him.
You lied. You said He never.
But He makes hum.
Oh, He sings. (gasps strained note)
(frustrated yell) I could never make it out, but I feel His hum, like a comb in my throat.
(panting) And I feel it.
I feel it.
Him. Here.
Who… Who…
Ah, bugger it. Take the angel.
(whirring)
(firing)
(audience screaming)
(screams) Oh, nothing?
Anyone? Tell me what you want!
Either I am here for a reason, or for a bonfire.
(audience yelling, chattering)
(Mary vocalizing)
(singing in foreign language)
(singing continues)
(crowd screaming, clamoring)
(Mary continues singing)
(Mary continues singing in foreign language)
♪
(distant screaming, chattering)
(thuds)
Oh, no! She fell!
(grunting, thwacking)
(slicing)
Aah!
(thwacks)
(thuds)
Maladie: Mice. Tiny mice.
(Mary whimpers)
(crashing, shattering)
(fire crackling)
How is that still hard?
(Maladie panting)
(Mary whimpering)
(shrieking laughter)
(door thuds, latch clicks)
(thudding)
Maladie: Go.
Amalia: Damn it.
Maladie: Come on, don’t stop.
(frantic music playing)
♪
La!
Just let me have the girl.
(echoing): Just let me have the girl…
(mournful music playing)
No.
(knife slashes)
(grunts)
(thwacks)
(grunts)
(knife clinking)
(grunting, punching)
(grunts)
(thwacks)
(stomps)
(grunts)
Well, you’ve made a mess, little songbird.
(yells, grunts)
(gasping)
(thwacks, yells)
(yells)
(thwacks)
Aah!
(thwacks)
(alarm blaring)
(distant yelling)
Boss…
Huh?
Oh.
(whooshes)
(explosion)
(bulb pops)
(panicked chatter)
Frank: Hugo Swann.
Lord Swann.
But I’ll overlook the breach this once.
(Katie giggles)
I’m sure this must be a very difficult time for you.
On the contrary.
London’s deadliest maniac was as close to me as Kitty is now.
It’s Katie.
And the presence of sudden death makes one appreciate the act of living.
He did seem to appreciate it.
I’ll need to interview his lordship alone, Katie.
Hugo: I don’t see why…
It’ll be quicker.
(ice clatters)
Frank: But don’t leave the theater, please.
Oh, I could never leave the theater…
So I don’t suppose you made any effort to stop Maladie.
(cork pops)
I have it that that’s… your job.
Oh, and that there’s a young widow doing it for you.
Amalia True.
Guest of Lavinia Bidlow. Runs The Orphanage.
Maladie kidnapped a girl. Mrs. True gave chase.
Champion of the unfortunate, and she knocks dangerous men about.
Then I guess you’re lucky she don’t know what you’re up to.
What we’re up to.
I think of you as a partner, in a way.
I don’t profit by what we do.
(laughing) Well, neither do I.
Yet.
Once you’ve sent enough suitable girls my way, and a certain investor is invested,
The Ferryman’s Club will become not just a profitable business, but a phenomenon.
I might even forget a few debts.
Take the fucking champagne, Frank.
You’ll want it.
You see, I know the name of the girl Maladie took.
And so do you.
(light fixture squeaking)
(water running)
(creaking)
(footsteps approaching)
Dr. Hague: One little polyglot.
One tiny Touched girl.
That’s all you had to bring me.
I like that word. “Touched.”
Like the finger of God gave a few of us a little poke.
Woke us up.
Every subject gets me closer to finding exactly where it is He touched us.
Oh!
(singsongs): Not today, though.
Mmm. No. Today… let’s just see where it hurts.
(drill whining)
(groaning, shrieking)
(drilling continues)
(screaming)
Man (yelling): Stop him, George!
He’s got it in his jacket pocket!
(dog barking)
(distant yelling)
(metal clattering, clanging)
(distant coughing)
Man: We didn’t want it anyway!
Fucking tart!
(grunts) Oi. Is that maniac a friend of yours?
(clinks)
(exploding)
(men grunt, thud)
Amalia?
(man groans, thuds)
(object clatters)
Mrs. True?
(breathing shakily, sniffling)
Miss Adair.
You look very fine.
Got into a fight.
Penance: It’s been a day for that.
I didn’t win.
Maladie has the girl.
Mary. Brighton, they said.
She won’t kill her.
Not right away. We have time.
We… (sniffles) have some time.
(sniffles)
And you’ve found an invigorating way to spend it.
They started it.
Mmm.
Not…
No, I started it.
I know.
I know. Trouble makes you troublesome.
But nothing sets you off like good fortune.
Mary’s song.
(sighs)
Reachin’ right into me.
Tellin’ me that… that I’m here.
I belong here.
And you.
And… all of us that’s Touched.
We’re woven into the fabric of the world, and we’re meant to be as we are.
We find Mary. We get her singin’.
They’ll all come to us, and they’ll be safe.
They won’t be safe.
Less lonely, then.
And that’s a start.
It’s a start.
(soft orchestral music playing)
♪
(orchestral music swells)
♪
(inaudible)
♪
(chokes, coughs)
(coughs, spits)
♪
(coughing)
♪
(light orchestral music playing)
♪
FRANK MUNDI: Are you Amalia True?
Have you got information?
You’re Mary Brighton.
Is Mary touched like you?
AMALIA TRUE: I see things that aren’t there, I drink when I shouldn’t… and I’ve had more experience with violence than I would’ve liked.
(GRUNTS)
I can assure you she is nothing like me, she’s wonderful.
How are you not wonderful?
♪ (TENSE MUSIC PLAYS) ♪
SPEAKER: There’s been a massacre.
Maladie’s defiance is at a fever pitch.
(YELLS)
Are you afraid?
HUGO SWANN: The Touched are the future.
Particularly, our future.
We’re being attacked, and it’s getting worse.
The Touched are not here to be slaughtered for show.
PENANCE ADAIR: And if we have the power to stop it,
then that is the reason that we have power at all.
GILBERT MASSEN: They are not special.
They are not a community.
If London is going to be saved from chaos…
it needs to see chaos.
♪ (“LONDON CALLING” BY THE CLASH PLAYS) ♪
♪ London calling To the faraway town ♪
♪ Now war is declared… ♪
SWANN: Amalia True?
I do not believe she has any interest in giving the Touched a safe haven.
MUNDI: Blood.
That ain’t her whole story.
TRUE: I do have a mission.
The future of the world depends on what I’m doing.
♪ (MUSIC SWELLS, STOPS SUDDENLY) ♪
(CACKLING)
(GRUNTS)
MALADIE: You said you had a mission!
Well God gave me a mission, too.
♪ (MUSIC SWELLS) ♪
♪ And I Live by the river ♪
TRUE: It’s time to tell them.
Everything.
♪ (MUSIC SLOWS) ♪
♪ (MUSIC CONCLUDES) ♪
Miss True! You look very fine.
I think so, too.
So, Amalia, before she goes to the opera, has a rippling that tells her that she thinks she’s going to be needed there.
PENANCE ADAIR: Are you sure we need to go to this?
Yes. Wish I knew why.
♪ (CLASSICAL MUSIC PLAYS) ♪
TOM RILEY: The opera is a huge event in society, and it’s the first time that a lot of our characters are going to meet each other.
OLIVIA WILLIAMS: Lavinia is trying to, sort of, display her best subjects from the Touched, and show that they are socially acceptable.
She invites her very conventional and slightly sinister friend, Lord Massen, along to show off how brilliant her… Her young subjects are.
LORD MASSEN: I take it, then, that you are yourselves among the afflicted.
Touched, yes. We don’t consider ourselves “afflicted.”
LAURA DONNELLY: There’s a power play between Massen and Amalia.
He’s the old power. I guess she represents the new power.
And neither one of them is gonna give that up easily.
PIP TORRENS: For him, the way things are should be a very patriarchal model, as it was before.
And the real problem is that these women who are Touched around London represent something very unsettling to the social model.
There’s a harmony to our world that’s worth preserving.
As I understand it, a harmony is made up of different voices sounding different notes.
Yes. And one is always above the other.
DIRECTOR: Cut there please.
ASSISTANT DIRECTOR: Straight away again please, guys. First positions.
DONNELLY: The things that stands out about the week that we were filming at the opera, was the heat that we were filming in.
ELEANOR TOMLINSON: We were filming in Wimbledon Theatre, which is just the kind of perfect space for it.
It’s a gorgeous, gorgeous theatre.
And, uh… And in amongst that, we had this, um… these opera singers, who were just absolutely fabulous.
RILEY: The kind of camaraderie that comes from being in woollen tuxedos in, uh, inside an ancient building in, like, 95, hundred-degree heat is um… is… is special.
And in a weird way, I think that helped the scene, because it was uncomfortable, and strange…
(BLADE SLICING)
(PERSON WHIMPERS)
(SCREAMING)
(AUDIENCE CLAMORING)
I killed a devil.
(AUDIENCE BUSTLING)
Maladie is a force of wonderful chaos.
She comes out on that opera stage, and she is enraged, she is vengeful.
Did you all come in hats?
(GIGGLES)
Now all of your brains are naked. No.
AMY MANSON: “Maladie” means “disease” in French.
I don’t think she intends to go there to kill the elite of society en masse, but that’s what ends up happening.
(SCREAMING)
MANSON: She’s somebody that I want to hug all the time.
You know, because people aren’t born that vindictive, or as a terrorist.
They become it because of something within their past, and that’s what resonated with me.
DONNELLY: The opera scene was my first experience of Amy playing Maladie, and it was incredible to see what she was bringing out of that character, and how she was able to perform, literally, on that stage.
MANSON: As an actress, you dream of a role like this.
That’s no mean feat, playing Maladie.
I went back to what we used to do at drama school, so the words come last.
It’s all about who she is, and what she feels, what’s her trigger, and what it feels like to be lonely, to be this solitary existence.
It’s taken me down some, uh, some random paths, the research that I go into, actually, and some, yeah, really squirmish places that I get to.
Why am I here?
CHRISTINE BLUNDELL: Maladie’s got this constant war with herself.
It’s very hard when you’re doing somebody that is that damaged.
We did so many different looks on her.
We went to the absolute extreme, where we are just, kind of, almost doing comedy joker stuff, and then we pulled it back.
The inspiration almost come from modern-day punk.
Her hair is really messed up, do you know what I mean?
And when she puts on her makeup, we literally go…
There we go. (LAUGHS)
MANSON: Every time I got in her garb, there was like a flick of a switch that just went off in my mind, uh, each time.
(AUDIENCE CLAMORING)
Either I am here for a reason, or for a bonfire.
(MARY SINGING)
ASSISTANT DIRECTOR: Stand by.
DIRECTOR: Be quiet now.
(CREW TALKING IN BACKGROUND)
TOMLINSON: The opera scene was… Was a lot of fun.
It’s one of the first things that we actually shot.
So, to be, sort of, finding the character, you know, straight off in… in a scene that’s that important was…
Was quite intense.
We had these great big, um, rigs of blue light that, sort of, went around me and changed as we shot it.
And it’s visually kind of arresting and haunting at the same time.
♪ (MUSIC CONTINUES) ♪
JANE ESPENSON: We used a light effect that’s not really meant to… to symbolize an actual visible light that everyone in the room saw.
It’s sort of, “Here’s what it feels like,” and you can see who’s Touched and who’s not.
And certain people are off camera and you don’t know whether there’s a light on them or not, they’re purposely kept ambiguous.
But we saw, for example, that Augie is Touched, which is, uh, a… a reveal.
I don’t think Augie’s got any idea that he’s Touched prior to that moment.
That partly comes from the fact that he belongs to a social class where he doesn’t believe this is something that affects people like him.
ANN SKELLY: It feels like all your pain is just melted away and then you’re just left with this, like, very present feeling that Penance gets to share with Augie.
I think she’s the only one who sees this and understands it and realizes it.
It hits Amalia somewhere deep in her soul that this means something very unique and special for The Touched. She knows that, kind of, Mary is the way forward with this.
MANSON: Maladie thought that she was the chosen one, she was the special one, but Mary’s got this bigger power over more people and queries, “Hang on a second, I thought it was just me.”
So that’s why she chooses to kidnap Mary, and just to gain more information.
There’s more going on than what Maladie first understood.
(SHRIEKS, LAUGHS)
Mary is the key person that we didn’t even know that we had to find.
Just let me have the girl.
(AMALIA’S VOICE ECHOING) Just let me have the girl…
No.
SKELLY: And that sets off, like, a massive chain of events.
(EXPLOSION)
♪ (MUSIC PLAYS, CONCLUDES) ♪
