Russell T Davies to omit Margaret Thatcher from AIDS epidemic TV series

Queer as Folk

creator Russell T Davies is setting his next television project amid the 1980s AIDS epidemic, but has decided to omit a prominent figure from the series – former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.

Tentatively titled The Boys, Davies said the series would explore the theme of death against the backdrop of the AIDS crisis sweeping the UK at the time, but would avoid directly referencing the introduction of Section 28 – the controversial legislation banning positive connotations of homosexuality – in 1988, The Guardian reports.

“I want to tell stories about people I knew who died,” he said. “They were told, ‘you’re going to die’ – and die because of sex. It was like homophobes’ wish fulfilment.”

Because Davies saw friends around him suffering, he said the project would honour their memories, while compensating for his own behaviour at the time.

“I didn’t go to their funerals. Didn’t say anything when they were said to have died of cancer when they really died of AIDS,” he said.

“Didn’t get in touch with their mums. I did some charity stuff but I didn’t do enough. I wish I could have been more militant, but that’s not me.”

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Davies said The Boys would sidestep the politics of the period, where Thatcher’s government had also refused to screen a series of public health advertisements around HIV and AIDS, because he felt such issues would be “more fittingly done as documentary”.

“Imagine a doc[umentary] about Thatcher and [then health secretary] Norman Fowler’s attitudes to AIDS. If I made them characters, it would get skewed. I’d be worrying who’d play Thatcher,” he said.

“I’m not on this Earth to defend Margaret Thatcher, but they were out of their depth. They didn’t know anything and well, if they didn’t know anything, they should have done more to find out. That’s what governments should do.”

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