Capital City is a television series which focused on the professional and personal lives of a group of investment bankers working in the dealing room at Shane Longman, a fictional international bank based in the City of London. The 23-episode series was produced by Euston Films, a wholly owned subsidiary of Thames Television, for the ITV network and that aired from 26 September 1989 to 20 December 1990.

Thames Television spent an estimated £500,000 to run newspaper and billboard advertisements to promote the series' launch which at the time was believed to be the largest advertising spend for a programme in the history of ITV. Full-page advertisements were taken in six national newspapers including The Financial Times, The Times and The Independent. The ads promoted the Shane Longman "brand", rather than "Capital City", and featured images of cast members in character. One television critic stated: "All of this would have been quite novel and exciting three years ago, but the world has turned, the market has crashed and we have all seen enough of other people's Porsches to last a lifetime... City hustlers do not look very heroic any more, just extravagantly paid."

Capital City is very much a product of the late 1980s, on the cusp of the digital revolution. The dealing room computers use what appeared to be a MS-DOS; mobile phones are the size of bricks; the primary methods of long-distance "instant" communication are still the land line telephone, fax and telex; and smoking – banned in England, within most public buildings, in 2007 – is still allowed in the workplace as well as inside restaurants, bars and other public places. At the same time, the series dealt with several mature storylines including alcoholism, depression, mental illness, sexual assault, drug use, homosexuality, physical assault, gambling addiction, prostitution, promiscuity, shoplifting, fraud, bribery, corruption and abortion.

Cast

The main cast (in alphabetical order as shown in the series credits) included:

  • William Armstrong as Max Lubin
  • Emily Bolton as Sylvia Roux Teng (from episode 13) Sylvia's duplicitous nature is revealed when she mentions to City headhunter and personal friend, Petra Allunson, that the core members of the dealing room team – Declan McConnochie, Michelle Hauptmann, Sirkka Nieminen, Chas Ewell and their assistants – are unhappy and potentially "on the market"
  • Leonard Ansen (John Bowe), the Director of Banking Activities, who constantly clashes with the power-hungry Lee Wolf who regards the bank's dealers as reckless risk-takers; becomes romantically involved with Hannah Burgess after her marriage breaks down
  • James Farrell (Denys Hawthorne), the bank's Chief Executive Officer
  • Jimmy Destry (Dorian Healy), a maverick junior trader, nicknamed 'Squirt' by Declan McConnochie, who is sacked for malpractice in episode 13;
  • Declan McConnachie (Douglas Hodge), a senior trader on the secondary desk; becomes romantically involved with Michelle Hauptmann, who he marries in the final episode
  • Chas Ewell (Jason Isaacs), a junior trader on the primary desk, who questions his role in the city during a personal crisis in series one
  • Sirkka Nieminen (Joanna Kanska), a senior trader in the secondary desk; the character is originally from Finland (though the actress is Polish) and experiences numerous personal crises during the series including a battle with alcoholism, an abortion and a lesbian affair; she is a serial risk-taker and thrill-seeker who, during episode 11, represents herself as a high-class prostitute on at least two occasions; during the series it is revealed that Sirkka and Declan McConnochie were romantically involved at one stage in the past
  • Lee Wolf (Richard LeParmentier), the Director of Corporate Finance, who constantly clashes with Leonard Ansen over the role of the banks dealers, who Wolf regards as reckless risk-takers
  • Michelle Hauptmann (Trevyn McDowell), a 24-year-old senior trader on the primary desk; she is originally from Germany and becomes romantically involved with Declan McConnachie during series one; the two marry in the final episode at the end of series two
  • Hudson J. Talbot III (Rolf Saxon), a US-born attorney and the bank's capital markets originator whose mentally unwell wife Alex leaves him and their infant son in episode 1
  • Hilary Rollinger (Saira Todd), a 22-year-old graduate who excelled in economics and philosophy; joins Shane Longman in episode 15 to assist Michelle Hauptmann on the primary desk; during the office party celebrating the impending nuptials of Michelle and Declan, a very tipsy Hilary manages to tell Declan what a sweet and sexy guy he is, much to everyone's amusement as they look on from the table

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Production credits

  • Creator: Andrew Maclear
  • Writers: Andrew Maclear, Matthew Bardsley, Charles Jennings, Tom Greenwood, Richard O'Keefe
  • Directors: Mike Vardy, Sarah Hellings, Paul Seed, Robert Walker, Clive Fleury, Diarmuid Lawrence
  • Associate Producer: Ron Purdie
  • Executive Producers: Andrew Brown, John Hambley
  • Producer: Irving Teitelbaum
  • Music: Colin Towns

Series trivia

  • The series was created by Andrew Maclear, who also wrote the 1989 movie Dealers;
  • The music for the series was composed by Colin Towns Neither address actually exists.
  • Shane Longman's headquarters are located near the Bank of England; in one episode Michelle Hauptmann loses her driver's licence for one year after being caught speeding in her Porsche and is shown exiting the London Underground at Bank station after catching the Tube to work.
  • In the final episode, Michelle and Declan are married and, in the closing scenes, are shown travelling by water taxi to the airport en route to their honeymoon in Venice; their marriage is taken to have occurred 1 September 1990 as this is the date shown on their travel documents.