DIARY
BRYAN FORBES Idon't keep a diary any more, having decided that my past efforts contained too much that was either libellous or trite. However, leafing through a collection of oldies this week I noted one pertinent item, namely that when the National Insurance scheme was launched in July 1948, Bevan's vision was greeted with mixed feelings by doctors and sections of the public, especially those he had designated as vermin A sum of 4s 11d was docked from wage packets, of which only 81/2d went to the Health Service. In nine months, costs had already spiralled an extra £50 million from the original estimate of £176 million, prompting the BMA to predict national ruin. So what's changed?
Qe thing the old diaries do record is my V./frequent and abortive attempts to give up smoking. Since the day is fast approaching when it will be a costly offence to smoke in church — another Lewis Carroll edict from this increasingly ludicrous government — I thought I should confess that, having contentedly puffed on the weed for 60 years, 514 days ago I gave up cold turkey — no patches, chewing gum, hypnosis or acupuncture — driven by the conviction that my luck must be running out. I am now left with £1,000-worth of Dunhill pipes, a collection of expensive lighters and half-a-dozen Picasso ceramic ashtrays. I certainly don't feel any smugness, and I retain limitless sympathy for those social lepers forced to huddle in doorways or forgo a quick Marlboro during Evensong. Nanette was sure the deprivation would make me the definitive grumpy old man, since previous attempts had usually transformed me into an ogre; but this time, curiously, I remained my charming, affable self. I had always persuaded myself that, without a cigarette, my creative juices would dry up, making me incapable of writing a coherent sentence. At the end of a week of such self-flagellation the family would be on their knees, begging me to resume, and resume I did time and time again. I became hooked during the war when the British army in Germany were given free tins of 50 coffin nails every week, and I have to confess that I always enjoyed smoking — two fags and a cup of coffee got bowels and brain going in the mornings.
Recently Nanette and I recorded a commentary to a new DVD of The League of Gentlemen. I hadn't seen it in ages but there we all were — Jack Hawkins, Nigel Patrick, Dickie Attenborough, et al. boosting Imperial Tobacco's profits. Whenever I directed a film my prop man was delegated to hand me a packet of 20 the moment I stepped on to the set and to keep me supplied all day. Bette Davis, our neighbour in Connecticut while we were shooting The Stepford Wives, smoked for America. One evening after she had cooked us Boston baked beans, her speciality, the conversation moved to her legendary feud with Miriam Hopkins while they were making Old Acquaintance. Nanette, innocent of the history involved, inquired: 'Whatever happened to Miriam Hopkins?' Bette, took a deep drag on her Camel. 'Well, Nanette, God was very good to the world. He took her from us.' This said 30 years after the event. I admire somebody like Bette who can smoulder for decades.
T am, of course, a grumpy old man on a 1 variety of other subjects. Just don't get me started on the Iraq war, publishing, blubbery Charlie Falconer, the 2012 Olympics, the closure of 2,500 rural post offices, ID cards, MI's' pensions, Ken Livingstone or Heathrow airport. As one gets older and body maintenance becomes a constant necessity, I find that one of the few compensations is to be able to indulge in a good old whinge with friends. My ideal companions for such pleasurable occasions are Tom Conti and the artist Bryan Organ who have both fine-tuned their own brands of vitriol. I once contemplated a third volume of autobiography to be entitled In Jugular Vein.
y garden is in danger of becoming a wildlife zoo. This week I spotted two fox cubs, a mature fallow deer, muntjacs, rabbits and, unless I am much mistaken, an otter, plus ample evidence that badgers have been at work on the lawns. All that is lacking is a tribe of pandas who might rid me of the great swaths of bamboo that were stupidly introduced by a previous gardener and are now lethally prolific. Together with Pascal and Johan, the two young men who now help me one day a week, I have been attempting to do a John Wayne and hack my way through the swaying canes. I have always had grandiose plans for my garden, but sadly have never won the lottery to pay for them.
Tt was a strange feeling to be honoured 1with a Lifetime Achievement Award by Bafta last week, rather like a remake of A Matter of Life and Death in which I was permitted to return to Earth and witness my visual obituary. One of the film clips they unearthed showed me in a British B feature, the aptly named Wheel of Fate. It was while shooting the very last sequence on a wintry night in Marylebone shunting yards that I first glimpsed the young and delectable Miss Nanette Newman; and the rest is history, as they say. I doubt whether many people have tangible evidence pinpointing the exact moment when they fell in love, but there it was for me, up on the screen, going though the camera gate at 60 frames a second. My grandchildren stared at the images unaware that they owed their existence to a casting directors arbitrary choice.
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