‘EQUALS’ MIX SEX AND POLITICS IN THIS SOAP SUPREME

Scandal . . . Intrigue . . . Politics . . . Ambition . . . Corrupting power . . . Sex. These are the elements of TV’s latest juicy saga.

The Iran- contra affair? Jim and Tammy Faye? Gary Hart?

No, the forum is “First Among Equals,” a nine-part series from England’s Granada Television that kicks off at 9 tonight on KCET Channel 28. It’s a roaring good time--steamy, sexy and occasionally stupid, but irresistible from start to finish.

“First Among Equals” is several notches below such other Granada renderings as “The Jewel in the Crown” and “Brideshead Revisited.” It’s shot on videotape and has production values that pale in contrast with the best of British TV.

But take it for what it is. These nine weekly hours--based on Jeffrey Archer’s best seller of the same title--are soap-opera supreme, injected with the topicality of a British Parliament setting.

The story, adapted by Derek Marlow (“The Two Mrs. Grenvilles”), spans some 30 years, beginning in 1964 with four ambitious politicians taking their seats as MPs (Members of Parliament) for the first time.

Two of the men, Simon Kerslake (James Faulkner) and Charles Seymour (Jeremy Child), are bitter rivals within the Conservative Party. The other two, Raymond Gould (Tom Wilkinson) and Andrew Fraser (David Robb), are Labour Party members.

All four MPs have clashing backgrounds and life styles, but they share a driving ambition to occupy No. 10 Downing Street as prime minister.

“First Among Equals” traces their interlocking public and private lives and their fortunes and misfortunes, of which there are many.

There is even a little whiff of Gary Hart in the air as early as the second episode, when a potential sex scandal pops up, endangering the womanizing Gould’s political career. He is threatened with blackmail and exposure in the press by a prostitute.

In fact, the fictional incident hit even closer to home in England, where government life frequently imitates sexy art. In the same week that the prostitute episode was running on British TV last year, Archer’s own political career was being ruined by a prostitute-related sex scandal. Besides being the author of numerous best sellers and a former MP himself, Archer was also deputy chairman of the Conservative Party at the time, a highly visible, telegenic Tory official whose main task was polishing the party’s image. But he was forced to resign after the appearance of a huge spread in a London tabloid reporting his payment of hush money to a prostitute. Archer denied sleeping with her, but the scandal filled newspapers and TV, and Archer’s wife even went so far as to serve hot coffee to the media camped outside the Archers’ country home.

London’s notorious tabloid press is continually lurking in “First Among Equals,” too, something that undoubtedly will evoke comparisons with the Miami Herald’s expose of Hart’s still-blurry relationship with Donna Rice.

Made for a British audience, “First Among Equals” could have used an Alistair Cooke to fill in some of the gaps and provide perspective for American consumption. The British parliamentary system, party alignments and some of the political terminology may temporarily put many American viewers in a London fog. Ultimately, though, the confusion fades. Politics are politics. Soap opera is soap opera. And sex is sex.

The four MPs are flawed men, generally more upstanding in public than in their private lives. The upper-crust Seymour is ruthless and determined to expose fellow Tory Kerslake’s association with a shady businessman. Gould is a philanderer and the Scottish Fraser is an obsessed careerist.

There are some delicious drolleries here. When Seymour gets an environmental appointment early in his career, his sniffy wife Fiona (Jane Booker) wonders if he will have to go around planting trees and giving preservation orders. “No,” he replies, “we’re in opposition. The other side does that.”

And no one will miss the irony of Gould getting advice from his solicitor on handling the prostitute’s blackmail threat, then repaying the solicitor with economic advice on the stability of the pound.

The story’s political intrigues are the most compelling. “First Among Equals” captures the flavor of those rousing debates in the House of Commons that are broadcast by BBC radio. Moreover, the continual dueling between Labourites and Tories is even more fascinating than it is baffling, and as the Conservative Party regains control, the Margaret Thatcher-like Hillary Turner arrives on the scene--bouffant hair, pocketbook, the works.

Once again, the Brits are coming, another of public TV’s gifts to Anglophiles.