A NEW HBO-style cop drama starring Dominic West will introduce phrases like ”ow bist’ and ‘gert lush’ to Guardian readers.
He Was a Bloody Good Builder, Mind is a tough, authentic new ITV thriller series starring The Wire actor as a handsome version of Gloucestershire serial killer Fred West and Idris Elba as tough, cider-addicted local policeman PC Bindle.
Screenwriter, Julian Cook, said: “Gloucester is a bit like Baltimore but with more badgers and strong cheese. Similarly, it has its own unique street patois.
“To capture the language, I spent six months undercover as an out-of-work plasterer, hanging out in Forest of Dean pubs with ruddy borderline alcoholics whose thick necks and domed heads make them look like angry, sun-burnt bottoms.
“I discovered that, also like Baltimore, Gloucestershire has a gang culture, although its criminal activity is more concerned with horse trailers full of stolen Flymos and dropping brieze blocks off of motorway bridges than high grade crack cocaine.”
He Was a Bloody Good Builder, Mind includes scenes where a cop describes a corpse as ‘kippin the gert kip’, before announcing ‘I’m gwain ter av me a lie-down’.
Guardian enthusiast, Emma Bradford, said: “I find the evolution of language fascinating. My friends and I have been arguing about this for months but perhaps now really is the time to re-contextualise Eddie Grundy from The Archers.
“Beneath the stereotype yokel burr and scams involving out-of-date parsnips there’s probably a lot of interesting pain and dry gallows-humour quotes about the futility of attempting a moral existence in an amoral world.
“As Eddie himself might have said, ‘gwain bint ker kippin gert’.”
