Cottage industry

The following post contains strong language, good grammar, perfect punctuation, and a superfluous sub-clause, I have to say! But when the BBC precede a programme with the announcement - or warning - that it includes strong language, the corporation invariably means swearing, what most people call bad language. Strong is used as a euphemism. Broadcasters do not wish to imply, before it has even begun, that the drama on which viewers are about to invest their time may be poorly written! Strong language, taken literally, is more likely to be found in the work of Dickens, Hardy and Shakespeare than it is in the latest BBC or Channel 4 offering set on a housing estate. Yet I consider Dennis Potter to be television’s all-time greatest writer, and he used ‘vulgar’ vocabulary, likely to upset the late Mrs Whitehouse and all like-minded folk, on a fairly frequent basis. Lipstick On Your Collar opens with a character proclaiming, out of sheer boredom with his mundane job at the war office, “Bum-holes! Bum-holes, say I, in the plural!!”. This, no doubt, seemed shocking at the time of its first transmission, although it certainly grabbed your attention, but, now, not many would bat an eyelid. The passage of time has eroded resistance to left-field literary ideas. In the third instalment of Fry’s Planet Word, entitled Uses And Abuses, originally shown on BBC2 on 9th October, Stephen Fry explored the benefits of so-called bad language, finding out from Brian Blessed how swearing can help relieve pain, and discussed, with Armando Iannucci and Omid Djalili, its power in comedy. I, myself, have found that ‘letting rip’ at key moments is certainly a great reliever of stress! And, if you want to read that the wrong way, be my guest!!

There is, perhaps, only one taboo swearword left in broadcasting and that is the word cunt. Fuck has become acceptable despite many still hating it. I can remember the first broadcast, on ITV, of Alien in which Ripley exclaims, “We’ll trap it in the airlock and blow it the fuck into space!”. “The fuck” was edited out as offensive and ultimately unnecessary whereas, these days, the film is shown complete. The original Terminator has Linda Hamilton sweatily cry out, “You’re terminated, motherfucker!”. This doesn’t seem to me to be out of place. The android has come back through time to kill the mother before she gives birth to the future saviour of mankind and is, as it’s about to be crushed into oblivion, as Linda describes and not in the least gratuitous. But, considering the amount of fuss when Jeremy Hunt’s surname was mispronounced recently, on two separate occasions, how will the powers that be treat the Andy Serkis comedy-horror The Cottage when the time arrives for its initial terrestrial transmission? It concerns the attempts of two estranged brothers, after a successful abduction, to ransom a gangster’s daughter, Tracey, played with an enormous amount of enthusiasm by Jennifer Ellison. The problem with the movie, for any potential broadcaster, is that the girl in question has the ultimate potty mouth. She is gagged for a reason! Once the gag is removed everyone under the sun is a fucking cunt. She’s bright but aggressive with it, breaking the nose of one of the brothers with a head-butt for staring at her breasts. Can’t say as I blame him! But Jen seems to relish the opportunity to give it all she’s got, in her best Liverpudlian accent, and some critics have claimed she steals the show. Maybe the movie would’ve been better titled The Curse Of The Cottage!

Adventures of a lifetime

And so the final episode of The Sarah Jane Adventures was transmitted on Tuesday afternoon at 5.15pm on the CBBC channel. Part Two of The Man Who Never Was completed the curtailed run of the Fifth Season. There was talk that the series might continue without its leading lady. It’s happened before. Blake’s 7 survived, after the departure of Gareth Thomas, as did Taggart, on the death of Mark McManus. But the BBC finally took the opportunity to pull the plug. Credit to Russell T Davies, who fought hard to keep the show on air when it was threatened with cancellation earlier in its life. I believe the BBC took some persuading to make the show in the first place. Bringing back a character, popular in the Seventies, to front a programme aimed primarily at twelve to fourteen-year-olds doesn’t seem like an obvious choice! But it seemed to work, though, in real life, one would no doubt question the motives of a sixty-year-old woman hanging out with a bunch of school children, even if some of the children in question did look as though they were in their early twenties themselves! Yasmin Paige, as Maria Jackson, and then Anjli Mohindra, as Rani Chandra, certainly gave the adventures in which they appeared that additional bounce! But The Sarah Jane Adventures belonged to the late Elisabeth Sladen and, in the present economic climate, it is unlikely we shall see its kind again in the foreseeable future.

It’s a shame really. Programmes such as The Sarah Jane Adventures were commonplace once upon a time. Everyone took them for granted. ITV were always trying to create a winning formula with which they could rival Doctor Who in the mid-to-late Sixties and throughout the Seventies. For the most part, they were as successful. The obvious examples are the string, no pun intended, of hugely popular-to-this-day Gerry Anderson puppet series. They began in the Fifties, of course, but took off when Gerry and then-wife Sylvia turned their hands to science fiction. Supercar, Fireball XL5, Stingray, Thunderbirds, Captain Scarlet And The Mysterons, Joe 90 and The Secret Service were all hugely exciting. Live action series were equally as popular. Sexton Blake, Freewheelers, Timeslip, Ace Of Wands and The Tomorrow People all left their mark, as did UFO and Space: 1999 when the Andersons put Supermarionation behind them. Peter Davison’s first acting role was in The Tomorrow People, up against the very series he would eventually helm! We’ve seen their like since. The Demon Headmaster and Moondial were two such. Ironically, other than Sarah Jane, the last were Dark Season and Century Falls in the early Nineties, both excellently written by Russell T Davies. Children are being sold short without such fantasy stimulation, and televisual creativity will suffer further because of the demise of this genre!

Strictly Confidential

As the Prime Minister sups on another glass of claret to accompany a not inexpensive joint of roast lamb, and as the rich keep getting richer by not carrying loose change, and while the poorer among us deliberate over whether or not to invest in a six-pack of crisps (cheese and onion flavour), the future of broadcasting is being decided over at the BBC. You might think this a more mundane matter but, despite the country teetering on the brink of financial ruin, the impact of programming on the nation’s health and wellbeing should not be underestimated. My father has been trying to persuade me to indulge in a more modern television, one that doesn’t drift out of tune five minutes into a programme and every few minutes thereafter, one that actually comes complete with a SCART socket! He’s even offered to purchase the thing for me. My thoughts, however, have been leaning towards chucking the old set out and not bothering to replace it. Why, you might be inclined to ask? The answer is simple. Quality drama is in decline. We’ve been told the 20% cuts, to be implemented by the BBC between now and 2017, will hardly be noticed. Unless you’re a totally casual viewer, this simply isn’t true. I’ve been noticing it all year, even prior to the recent announcement, and the axing of BBC Three’s Doctor Who Confidential, at the end of last month, is not an inducement to my continued support.

Added to the demise of Confidential is the knowledge that Doctor Who itself will not be returning until the Autumn of next year. The next series will again be split in two so that the second half will not actually see the light of day until the Spring of 2013. In other words, one series spread over two years. And, all this as the programme approaches its Fiftieth Anniversary in November 2013. Presumably, this will mean next year’s Christmas Special is sandwiched between the two halves of the Seventh Series. All in all, the proposed schedule means less new content than was broadcast over 2008 and 2009 when the Fourth Series was followed by a handful of specials. Doctor Who fans should’ve got rid of their television sets back in 1989 when the show was quietly cancelled following the furore of four years earlier. The resulting accumulative-reduction in license income would’ve forced the BBC to rethink their strategy and reinstate the programme forthwith. Thus, consequently, there would not have been a sixteen-year hiatus. Then, perhaps, the series might still be more like it used to be! Money is tight, I know, unless you’re a politician or banker, but you can rest assured that Strictly Come Dancing will return year after year, budget intact, regular as clockwork, to appease all upstanding simpletons! The only Come Dancing I want to hear is by The Kinks!!

Inspecting Wexford

When Doctor Who finished in 1989, the series of serials that replaced it in my affections was a TVS production called The Ruth Rendell Mysteries. At the centre of these psychological whodunits was a grumpy, weatherworn copper called Chief Inspector Wexford. He was played with tremendous subtlety by a brilliant character actor, mixing tenderness with anger, sympathy with outrage, and I received the news of George Baker’s passing with great sadness. Wexford was a more open-minded policeman than his moralising sidekick, Mike Burden, though Christopher Ravenscroft gave an equally valid performance and the chemistry between the pair was electric. For me, while Jeremy Brett was the quintessential Sherlock Holmes, George Baker was the archetypal modern-day bobby. While not wishing to take anything from the late, great John Thaw’s superlative portrayal of Inspector Morse or Roy Marsden’s thoughtful take on Commander Adam Dalgliesh, the detective holding the greatest appeal was George Baker’s Reg Wexford.

Part of the attraction of The Ruth Rendell Mysteries lay in its format. Each series consisted of several self-contained stories invariably told over multiple episodes. Towards the end of its run, Wexford adopted the Morse structure of imparting a narrative in a single 103-minute film, to a certain degree, and perhaps these were less successful, creatively speaking. But, for the majority of its life, the chosen construct consisted of 51-minute episodes, unravelling its multiplicity of puzzles over two, three or occasionally four-part adventures. In that respect, it became a natural successor to the Time Lord’s escapades, while Cracker adopted the same strategy subsequently. Brian Bennett’s terrific theme tune must, surely, also be a contributing factor to the programme’s immeasurable success.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t in on the magic from the very beginning! I missed, and still haven’t seen to this day, the first television adaptation of a Ruth Rendell Inspector Wexford novel. Entitled Wolf To The Slaughter, it was told over four parts. I believe it was transmitted earlier in the day than subsequent stories. I picked up on the series from the second serial, A Guilty Thing Surprised, related in three episodes and guest starring Michael Jayston and Nigel Terry, and never missed a single broadcast thereafter. I’m not sure why Wolf To The Slaughter has never been repeated on ITV3, or released on VHS or DVD? The other stories have seen the light of day since their initial broadcasts, although ITV now seem to own only the rights to screen the last three tales, Simisola, Road Rage and Harm Done. My favourites include Kissing The Gunner’s Daughter, a four-part investigation into multiple murder which concluded the final series; The Mouse In The Corner, a two-part discourse concerning the abuse of a spouse; but, best of all, An Unkindness Of Ravens, detailing nasty goings-on amongst a female collective and featuring the gorgeous Imogen Boorman (Hellbound: Hellraiser 2, Casualty) as a murderous schoolgirl!

Although Wexford was probably his most famous role, Baker’s repertoire included comedy, drama, soap operas and science fiction over a remarkable six decades. In the mid-Sixties, he appeared in Dennis Potter’s Alice opposite Deborah Watling, before she became my favourite Doctor Who companion! He guest-starred in Doctor Who himself, alongside his namesake Tom Baker, and, between those two, in the first series of the original version of Survivors. He played Number Two in the first episode of the original version of The Prisoner, then shared screen time with John Hurt, Derek Jacobi and Brian Blessed in I, Claudius. On the big screen, amongst numerous roles, he featured in three of the James Bond series, firstly You Only Live Twice (1967), then On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969) and latterly The Spy Who Loved Me (1977). But, the film most are likely to recall is The Dam Busters (1955). George died yesterday of pneumonia, aged 80, having recently suffered a stroke. He will be remembered as a meticulous man, always smartly presented, who, interestingly, retained a record of all those with whom he worked, both in front of and behind the camera. He met his third wife, Louie Ramsay, on the set of The Ruth Rendell Mysteries, ironically cast as on-screen wife Dora. She passed away just seven months ago.

The girl next door?

Rihanna has been in the headlines again this week, prompting discussions as to the suitability of her live shows for those of a young, impressionable age. “She has to push the boundaries,” enlightened ex-Atomic Kitten singer Liz McClarnon, on Monday’s edition of The Wright Stuff! Does she? Is she? Why? Which boundaries are those, Liz? Musically, like most pop stars, she hasn’t a clue. DJ Tony Blackburn disagrees with me, claiming Rihanna to be very talented and with no real need to overtly sexualise her every single action. And these are the boundaries under discussion, social mores. But, even here, she’s not really doing anything that hasn’t been done before, manifold. In my youth, I was keen on a five-piece all-female band from America called The Runaways. They appeared on the scene around the same time as Blondie and I, for one, found them more appealing than Debbie Harry and the guys! I was older though, than the children parents are taking to see Rihanna simulating sex and sing about guys not being able to get it up! But the lead singer of The Runaways, Cherie Currie, dressed equally as provocatively, in a basque, knickers, stockings and suspenders, whilst triumphantly exclaiming, in their debut single Cherry Bomb, she was gonna, “have you, grab you, ’til you’re sore!”

I saw The Runaways live twice, once in Birmingham, in an enormous converted railway shed - the name of which escapes me, and latterly at The Hammersmith Odeon, London. I suppose, in retrospect, the Brummie gig was the more memorable experience. I was right at the front of the stage, with Cherie, who must be about the same age as me, spreading her legs directly in my face with only a small piece of cotton separating her womanhood from my leering eyes… and those of a thousand other young innocents! I also remember vast tables selling paperbacks including American prints of Space: 1999 novelisations, but that’s another music in a different kitchen!! When I saw the band for the second and last time, Miss Currie had departed, for whatever reason, and Joan Jett had taken centre stage. The Queens Of Noize, as they were nicknamed after the title of their second album, perhaps wanted to be taken more seriously. As a four-piece, they were less glam rock and more hard rock. They were in the UK to promote their latest album, Waitin’ For The Night. The lead single, School Days, has the deepest pressing of any in my collection and is probably the loudest piece of vinyl I own! It’s definitely not as loud on the album, despite being exactly the same recording!

Joan is probably better known, now, as the singer of I Love Rock ‘N’ Roll with her band The Blackhearts. This song was covered by Britney Spears. She, herself, caused controversy for dressing up as a schoolgirl in her debut video for Baby, One More Time. About the same time, Russian duo t.A.T.u. were appalling the easily shocked, running around kissing each other wearing only vagina-hugging panties and see-through shirts. Both Lena Katina and Yulia Volkova have since appeared topless in the uncensored promo for White Robe. Lena takes off her knickers, too, so maybe Rihanna still has some way to go in pushing those social boundaries. Lena’s not the first. I recall a member of L7 pulling her trousers down during a performance on Channel 4’s The Word and giving us all a glimpse of her pubic hair. Can’t remember what the song was! As for lyrics, pop records have always been predominantly about sex. Gary Glitter was chanting Do Ya Wanna Touch Me?, which Joan Jett has covered, back in the early Seventies and bragging he was “the man who put the bang in gang”, so why his later activities came as any surprise is beyond me! And so the debate goes on, with Rihanna the latest in a long line advocating promiscuity of one sort or another but as Mick once put it, “It’s Only Rock ‘N’ Roll… but I like it…”