Charlie Cooper makes fussiness funny without treating the fussy person as worthless. His writing and performance in This Country turn small rural grievances into comedy worth seeking out, with an affection that survives the arguments.
Fi1m perspective
In This Country (2017), Charlie Cooper’s Kurtan knows the bus timetable and takes the correct loading of the recycling seriously. Cooper gives that fussiness enough conviction that we understand why Kurtan needs other people to get things right. Beside Daisy May Cooper’s Kerry, who keeps checking that everyone considers her hard, his readiness to correct her makes even an idle conversation contentious. This is finely judged comic acting, and the writing gives him something small and exact to be unreasonable about.
The Coopers created and wrote the series together, building it around two cousins with little to do in a Cotswolds village. Tom George directed all three series, and the borrowed documentary format lets the pair take their complaints straight to the camera. We laughed at the cousins explaining each other’s stupidity because both Coopers play these petty disagreements with such patient conviction. The kindness matters too: Paul Chahidi’s vicar is allowed to be decent even when they take advantage of him. Their writing understands how exhausting the cousins can be without inviting us to despise them.
A dramatic guest role as Kevin Reape in A Confession (2019) was an early step away from Kurtan. See How They Run (2022) then reunited Cooper with George, casting him as Dennis Corrigan in a period whodunnit. We recommend the film for Saoirse Ronan’s comic timing and her partnership with Sam Rockwell, with a caveat about a mystery too satisfied with its own cleverness. Cooper has a place in that larger ensemble, but it is his own writing that gives us the stronger reason to seek him out.
The risk now is that Kurtan becomes the measure of everything Cooper does. Charlie Cooper’s Myth Country (2024), which he presents, explores British folklore and rural traditions, and keeps him close to the subjects that fed his writing. There is plenty left to notice there, although the slight repetition in the third series of This Country suggests that familiarity alone will not sustain the comedy. If he returns to that village, we would want some new trouble for the cousins.
Biography
Charlie Cooper is an English actor, comedian and writer. He is best known for playing Lee 'Kurtan' Mucklowe in the BBC Three mockumentary series This Country (2017–2020), which he co-created and co-wrote with his sister Daisy May Cooper.
Born on 16 June 1989 in Cirencester, Gloucestershire, Cooper studied sports science at Exeter University before working as a model and in various jobs while developing the series with his sister. The show drew on their experiences growing up in the Cotswolds. He has since appeared in films including Greed (2019) and See How They Run (2022), and television series such as Inside No. 9 (2024) and Stath Lets Flats (2021).
Cooper has received BAFTA awards for his work on This Country, including for scripted comedy and breakthrough talent.
