Entertainment

Are you watching?: Tom Hiddleston and Hugh Laurie in The Night Manager

The Night Manager screens on Sunday nights on BBC One
The Night Manager screens on Sunday nights on BBC One The Night Manager screens on Sunday nights on BBC One

The Night Manager, Sundays, BBC One, 9pm

THE Beeb's new six-part John Le Carre adaptation starring Tom Hiddleston is well worth getting up to speed with.

Last week's nicely paced series opener introduced viewers to Jonathan Pine (Hiddleston), the titular hotel worker who is caught up in a deadly cloak and dagger carry-on after intervening in the Arab Spring-related affairs of "the worst man in the world" AKA Richard Roper (Hugh Laurie), a bullish British business mogul whose public acts of humanitarianism are misleading to say the least.

When Roper's associates hurt someone close to Pine, this ex-army good Samaritan (who, it should be noted, is not actually a spy himself – not yet at any rate) quietly embarks on a personal vendetta with a little help from his ally in UK intelligence, Angela Burr (Olivia Colman).

If only all first episodes were as tightly, coherently plotted as The Night Manager's – not to mention as well stocked with first-rate actors (supporting player include Russell Tovey, Tom Hollander and Douglas Hodge) – TV would be a much more rewarding medium.

Hopefully, the remaining five episodes will be of an equally high standard.

:: Catch up now via BBC.co.uk/iplayer and On Demand.