Frost at Midnight
From EMMA BOOKER
NEW YORK
MOST of the cast and some of the writers of TW3 flew over to New York last Fri- day; shouting in their cock- ney accents and waving metaphorical streamers out of the windows of the Pan- American clipper, they gave the impression of a jolly school outing on its way to the seaside. They were, in fact, as they happily adjusted their watches and practised American on the hostesses, flying towards the event that was to mark the end of satire for a very long time. What at first had sounded like a hoax instigated by the last of the big spenders had actually come true: the women's division of the Federation of Jewish Philanthropies of New York were paying for them to come to appear at Madison Square Garden and receive an award for their tribute to Kennedy. Of course, there was some rehearsing to do. It was difficult to remem- ber exactly what had been said about the death of Kennedy at the time and old scripts had to be dug out; but it was fun to go on a trip to New York (where David Frost was already comfort- ably dishing out old material in the American TW) and everything would be all right on the night. It Wasn't.
Madison Square Garden was packed to its distant rafters with philanthropic Jews in full evening dress and the atmosphere was solemn. An enormous orchestra sat on the dais and above them billowed curtains of green and red which shed an aqueous light on those of the audience rich enough to afford one hundred dollars each for a seat. Programmes entitled 'An Inter- national Tribute through the Arts' were gravely handed round. The atmosphere of a charity pro- duction in London was lacking: this was no audience bravely determined to enjoy itself how- ever long the evening. On the contrary, this was a really serious occasion. How could the members of TW know as they joked and waited in the wings that great names were resounding through the hall: 'I think it was Benjamin Franklin who said' ... 'in the words of Montaigne' ... for there was a long wait before we were served up with the piece de resistance. Doctor Linus Pauling made
a long speech, the message of which was that a dangerous bomb had been invented that could blow us off the face of the earth if we weren't careful; and he was heartily applauded for this dashing announcement; a stout lady sang some arias in a red sequined dress; and the dance of the hunter and the deer was performed by two members of the Mexican Folklore team. Un- fortunately the hunter, just as he was about to spot his prey, fell down some wooden stairs be- hind the stage and it seemed for a moment while attendants rushed to his assistance as if the deer would never be shot.
The hunter recovered, however, and now it was time to introduce four young pianists who came respectively from Japan, Argentine, Italy and the United States. 'Isn't it wonderful to think that these four young people all speak different languages and yet in the language of music they can understand?' cried the red lady who was in- troducing them. Soon the piano-playing was over and in the gloom the cast of TW could be seen on the stage. 'Isn't it wonderful to think,' the lady might well have said, 'that all these young people can speak the same language and no one can understand them?' Polite applause trilled out when the producer of TW, introduced as Nat Sherrin, informed the audience that he was not quite sure how valid or valuable the Kennedy tribute would seem at this late date, and there was a murmur of incredulity when it was announced that in 1963 the House of Commons, the House of Lords and 7'W had been the main political forces in Britain.
TW started the act for which it was to be re- warded by a newly minted gold Kennedy medal. Frost was the calm obstetrician and delivered the actors who were informally dressed and smoking nervously on stage of their nervousness; they opened with excerpts from various shows. Now it seems unbelievable that a fuss could have been made in England about their potential danger in election year. With long faces and word by grisly word they re-enacted the Kennedy tribute. As the humiliating business went on it took the shape of a nightmare; they were administering their own death-punch in the most bizarre cir- cumstances. Spotlit and in front of thousands of people the mawkish sentimental words came pouring out.
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