If you get a chance, find a way to watch "Marvellous"

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THERE'S a point in Marvellous where then Stoke City manager Lou Macari asks Neil Baldwin, "How do you do it, Nello? How do you stay so positive?". Without a beat, Neil turns to the footballing legend. "I always wanted to be happy," he tells him, "so I decided to be."

It's one of several utterances in a truly remarkable drama that, as this one does with Macari, stops you in your tracks as surely as if you'd just tried to nutmeg 'Chopper' Harris. I think they're known as lightbulb moments – and Neil is 100 watts.

Neil's relationship with Macari is deeply touching. Macari, a Scotland and Manchester United idol. Neil, a man to whom society attaches less savoury labels.

Moved by his willingness to wait outside the Victoria Ground all day in the rain for a glimpse of the new man in charge, Macari gives him the job as the club kit man. It's yet another event which prompts those close to him to ask, "Neil, are you sure you've got this right?". But really they should know better. As several cameos confirm, when Neil says he knows someone, you can guarantee he means it. "How does he get to know them?" a bemused clergyman asks. "By being Neil," comes the answer.

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It says everything for Neil that Marvellous was ever made. For in times when TV is seduced by vacuity and celebrity, it doesn't sound that promising a pitch. A drama, set in Newcastle, about a man saddled with the tag of 'learning difficulties' who reveals himself to be so much more? Good luck with that one.

And yet here it is – primetime BBC2. Toby Jones played Alfred Hitchcock in his last major TV drama. It's Neil Baldwin who really knows how to unlock life's mysteries.

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