Samaritans in the can
In the spring of last year, an acquaintance of mine who does some writing for tele- vision put up an idea for a drama series (with draft script) to BBC-TV. After a few weeks it was returned with some criticisms. It was then revised and resubmitted, together with a detailed format for the series as a whole—which, I can reveal, was to deal with the work of a fictional organisation based closely on the Samaritans.
In August of last year the whole bundle was received back from the BBC-TV script unit with an apologetic letter explaining that 'it has not found favour in the series depart- ment—it would seem that dedicated social work is not in the running this season and therefore they regretfully rejected the idea.'
So far, a routine non-success story. And fair enough—except that last week BBC-TV screened a play as a 'try out' for a projected series called The Befrienders, devoted to what must certainly be called 'dedicated social work' and based directly on the Samaritans. The programme has been 'in the can' for several months, as is the case with most television drama.
Without going into either the merits of this programme or the wisdom and ethics of tying fictional stories to a factual organi- sation (with all the consequent restrictions and embarrassments that must inevitably be involved), the sequence of events prompts an obvious question:
Ws the decision to embark upon the programme taken before or after the cor- respondence I have mentioned?
It is a moot point which answer would provoke the more disturbing inferences.
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