The Tony Blair Story review – character study leaves gaps

Episode one of Michael Waldman’s new three-part biography bears the subtitle “Who Are You?”. As well as harvesting archive clips and interviewing colleagues and rivals to build a picture of past events, Waldman has gained interviews with Tony Blair, his wife, Cherie, and several of their children in an effort to capture the character of the politician who was re-elected twice as British prime minister.

The question is: what sort of man is Blair? Waldman traces Blair’s life back to childhood: a contemporary at Fettes College says “the school teaches you to survive – it knocks a lot of the emotion out of you”. While Blair was at school, his father suffered a stroke.

At Oxford, after a close friend died by suicide, a fellow student recalls Blair returned with his long hair cut short and his cheery counter-culture leanings replaced by a steely drive to achieve. The film follows his move into politics in the early 1980s and his vow to lead profound reform of Labour.

United Kingdom, Oxford

tony blair, michael waldman, cherie blair, fettes college, oxford, labour, prime minister, character study, archive clips, 1980s politics