'It was radical' - How The Holy City brought the Easter story to Glasgow

It's the sort of TV drama that could only have been made at the height of Margaret Thatcher's time as prime minister. The Holy City re-imagines the Easter story in a Glasgow of post-industrial decline, where the disciples drink in run-down pubs and the messiah is a shabby, long-haired former shipyard worker in a grubby overcoat. Broadcast across the UK on Good Friday 1986, it mixes street violence, religion and politics in an attack on what was happening in Scotland at a key moment in the nation's history. And 40 years later its star, David Hayman, believes we still have something to learn from it. "We're a much more secular people than we were back in '85," he says. "I think the message is pretty powerful. The political and moral message of it, let alone the Christian message, is still very powerful." The Holy City was created by Bill Bryden, one of the most significant figures in post-war Scottish theatre and television. Born in Greenock in 1942, he'd trained with STV before directing plays in Scotland, London and New York. In 1984, he took over as head of drama at BBC Scotland. His nine-year tenure transformed the department, its output, and Scottish broadcasting. His biggest an