Television
Speaking up
Richard Ingrams
___-So much gooey syrup is lavished on actors and actresses by the Parkinsons and the Hartys that it was very gratifying w see one, being thoroughly done over in the shape 0' the late Joan Crawford, subject of the first of a new series of programmes written and presented last week by Barry N°rInall (BBC 1). Film stars like most public figures have to wait until they are dead before theY can be exposed and vilified and this fact Is not just due to the natural tendency of the media to play their part in glamorising the living famous. There are the libel laws to be considered as well. Norman's programme was a wonderf if ul rather depressing anthology of bitchutess not only on the part of La Crawford but also, those of her acquaintances, male Oa female, who gleefully lined up to spit on the poodte on the other. With so little to he was the grave. It was hard to decide who
a lonelY more pitiable — Crawford herself,
and vindictive woman trapped by her °will image, or men like Hollywood lawyer Greg of the B. autzer with his whining catalogue indignities he had to suffer during his tw,..,,°hyear affair with the great star, vi'l!'", included having to walk behind her carrY11.1: a viln!ci a knitting bag on one arm and in her favour I couldn't quite understart oni st.or_ what in her attracted so many fans, them, apparently, women. This otherwlsct excellent profile failed to explain the Were_ pi of her appeal. Curiously, the sameii7 ctcohe of someone disliked by his closest leagues but at the same timeinspiring t„d adoration of thousands of fans ernerty from the brief Nationwide survey of.lererh—e Thorpe's career on the day of his arrest' live moral would seem to be that we (nib' "
SPectator 12 August 1978 out our political or sexual fantasies through Unpleasant and arrogant people.
Yet another programme about homosexuals, 'Gays-Speaking Up' (Thames) helped to foster my natural prejudice against them. Homosexuality has now become a political Cause. As a result individual homosexuals can forget their private miseries by taking Part in communal action. It is possible and Preferable to feel sympathy and even respect for individual homosexuals but once they band together and campaign they become a boring and unappealing lot. I did not I confess, stay up for the whole hour104 belly-ache, but! noted as usual in these discussions it was not once suggested that it might be a good thing to try and overcome omosexual tendencies which whatever the movement' may say result in the denial of creative instincts and much consequent unhappiness. boring as these pooves were they were not half as boring as those members of the B.ritish Communist Party, featured in Decisicm (Granada) a three-part seiies made by Professional fly-on-the-wall Roger Graef.I Watched the second instalment of this tedious trilogy and can honestly say that it was about the most pretentious thing I have ever se en on telly. Graef showed his contempt for the viewer by catapulting him with only the sketchiest preliminaries into a series of c°,.rilmittee meetings at King Street called to luseuss the Party's latest manifesto. No one Was properly introduced. The importance °f what was going on in relation to other Tatters was never made clear. Graef 1,0cUsed on a squabble between the party's uldustrial organiser, a hardened old war ;tnhorseh .se called Bert Ramelson, and an obses',T'e and unattractive lady delegate called •t‘tLetiate Simpson. It was difficult to follow ,..,11e argument, but more difficult to see why Graef regarded the procedural squabblings of the moribund British Communist Party as in an— Y way significant. It would have been tit, ore Worthwhile to film a parish council debating on a disputed right of way.
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