Future for Mr. Barker Being nothing if not constructive, I
should much like the Supreme Court of the B.B.C. to receive two submissions, and then draw a conclusion from them. The first is that Mr. Eric Barker's pro- gramme, which was born as Merry-Go-Round and took an uncon- scionable time dying as Waterlogged Spa, grew very tedious in its decline and dotage. The second is that Mr. Barker appeared last Saturday in television and proceeded to be inimitably funny. The conclusion ? Easy I think Waterlogged Spa proved (and I am surprised only that it
• wanted proving) that the writing of a half-hour weekly programme by its chief performer is a job that no community with a sense of Christian charity is entitled to. Only the theatre actor in weekly repertory, who goes off after his Monday first night to learn the first act for the next week's play, could appreciate the feelings of Mr. Barker, faced every seven days with the necessity for a new script, and even at his back hearing Time's winged chariot. On television last Saturday he was like an enfranchised spirit.
If anything could have depressed Mr. Barker, it would have been the surroundings in which he found himself ; for Music Hall is about the worst thing which Alexandra Palace does. (Oh, those " Music Hall Maids ! ") To this jaded business Mr. Barker—after an unsure start—brought his own originalities. I do not know why it should be funny for a comedian to direct a look of faint alarm and bridling vexation at an approaching camera and observe " Sneak- ing up on me again, are you " and then in a philosophical mutter, " Well, I suppose you know your own business best "; but what is not amusing in print was somehow enchanting in performance.
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