MEDIA STUDIES
Why everyone's pleased as Punch about the editor's
departure (including, I suspect, the departed editor)
STEPHEN GLOVER
Apart from wishing it well before its re- launch in early September, I have avoided writing about Punch in this magazine. It might be considered a rival, and my criti- cisms, if I had had any, could have been regarded as tainted. But as time has gone on it has become clear that the two maga- zines are operating in different corners of the park. Punch has built up a circulation, the size of which is admittedly shrouded in a certain amount of mystery, while this mag- azine has continued to put on a few sales.
When Mike Molloy, deputy editor of Punch, was sent packing several weeks ago, I nonetheless thought it best to say nothing. But now Peter McKay, editor of Punch, has gone the same way and it is no longer possi- ble to keep silent. I am not sure that the editor and deputy of a new (or relaunched) publication have ever been despatched so quickly. Lady Bracknell might have had something to say about it. It is very odd.
Last Wednesday, Mr McKay came into his office, announced that he was feeling unwell, and went home. Not long after- wards, Stewart Steven, chairman of Liberty Publishing, the group belonging to Mohamed Al Fayed that owns Punch, arrived to address the troops. He said that a contractual problem had arisen between Liberty and Mr McKay. In addition to his duties as editor of Punch, Mr McKay had begun writing a weekly column for the Daily Mail. According to Mr Steven, he was prevented from doing this under the terms of his contract unless he had the written permission of the chairman — i.e. Mr Steven — which he did not. In order to make his point, Mr Steven read out chunks of the relevant contract to the assembled company.
And so this is how Mr McKay's depar- ture was explained to the world, and how it was written up in the newspapers the next day. There was another theory, presumably put about by over-zealous friends of Mr McKay, that he had resigned because he did not want to publish anti-Government tirades emanating from the fiery and embit- tered heart of Mr Al Fayed. There seems to be no foundation to this idea. There is more to his resignation than meets the eye, but it is not explained by conspiracy theo- ries involving Mr Al Fayed.
I don't believe that Mr McICay's column was considered reason enough to debar him from the editorship of Punch. Does not Mr Steven himself write a weekly column for the Mail on Sunday? It is difficult to escape the conclusion that be was looking around for a good excuse to ease. Mr McKay on his way. If he had really wanted to keep him as editor, a compromise could have been found. The same can be said of Mr McKay. He was paid what Mr Steven describes as 'a national newspaper editor's salary' — say £175,000 a year. The Daily Mail offered him £60,000 or 00,000 to do a weekly column. You would think that, forced to make a choice, his natural loyalty would be to his full-time job which paid him nearly three times as much. If he had loved editing Punch, and believed wholeheartedly in its future, he would have passed up the oppor- tunity to write a weekly column.
His refusal to compromise suggests to me that in his heart he wanted to leave. Apart from an equally brief stint as editor of the now defunct Sunday Today, Mr McKay has avoided the burdens of executive office. He belongs to that Fleet Street tradition, now, alas, in retreat, which believes as an article of faith that journalism must above all be fun. This entails long lunches, much drink- ing, good stories and laughter. Writing must be fitted in where it can. From my own knowledge of Mr McKay, I can hon- estly say that he exudes more good cheer than any man I know, though his anarchic sense of fun may not always be faithfully reflected in his writing. It was a cruelty on the part of Liberty, and a lapse of self- knowledge in Mr McKay, to imagine that his Falstaffian spirit could thrive within the confines of editorship.
Mr Al Fayed and Mr Steven, and most of Punch's staff, appear no less relieved than Mr McKay. Mr Al Fayed has been grum- bling about the magazine; not many weeks ago he was sent a paper by his friend Brian Basham, the PR man, enumerating its shortcomings. Mr Steven, a former editor who rescued the infant Mail on Sunday, made suggestions that were not taken up by Mr McKay. The extent of his frustration can be measured by the many changes which he has initiated since taking over as temporary editor of Punch last week. Arti- des intended for publication have been thrown out or rewritten, and the magazine is being redesigned. The marvellous thing is that everyone seems much happier, Mr McKay most of all, and that he will be able to return to doing what he does best.
Pamela Anderson, the large-breasted star of Baywatch, is the constant obsession of the downmarket tabloids. When it was announced last week that she had broken up with her husband, Tommy Lee, it was not to the Daily Telegraph or the Times to which one looked for enlightenment (though they both carried reports, and the Times a small picture of Miss Anderson beneath its masthead), but to the reputed scholarly authorities on her sexual antics — the Sun, the Daily Star and the Daily Mirror.
Alas, these papers of record (on such matters) disagreed. The Daily Star suggest- ed that Mr Lee's insatiable sexual appetite had become onerous for Miss Anderson, notwithstanding her former enthusiasm. The Daily Mirror granted that Mr Lee's attentions had proved excessive, but added that he was violent. (`Tommy Beat Me Up and Made Me His Sex Toy'.) The Sun sug- gested that the problem was that 'Tommy couldn't stop cheating'. In other words, Miss Anderson is still game, but Mr Lee has other blondes to attend to.
So whom should one believe? Imagine my bewilderment last Sunday when the downmarket tabloids — supposedly the greatest scholarly authorities on Miss Anderson and Mr Lee — came up with their own differing theories. Incredibly, the Sunday Mirror had little to offer, and rele- gated Miss Andersen to the inside. The News of the World led with a piece alleging that Mr Lee had been paying court to Suzie Sterling, whose resemblance to Miss Anderson is remarkable, save in what Pere- grine Worsthorne would call the 'embon- point' department. ('We Made Love on Pam's Piano.') The People also devoted its front page to the story, but alleged that Mr Lee had cavorted not with Suzie but with a porn star called Debi Diamond on — wait for it — the kitchen table.
I won't deny I'm disillusioned. If these newspapers can't get their facts straight so far as Pammi and Tommy are concerned, I think I may have to rely on the Times, which managed to work Pammi into a med- ical column by Dr Thomas Stuttaford.
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