Clarke Chroniclers Viewing
Thursday 18 October 2018
1119 Empire of the Censors
First viewed : 28 May 1995
This was a two-part documentary series on the history of censorship of film and video in Britain with clips from infamous censor-bait such as Ken Russell's The Devils ( above ).
Tuesday 9 October 2018
1118 The Politician's Wife
First viewed : 16 May 1995
This dark three-part drama on Channel Four was written by Paula Milne. It starred Juliet Stevenson as Flora Matlock, the wife of a Tory minister who schemes to avenge herself on her philandering husband Duncan ( Trevor Eve) and also her father ( Frederick Treves ) who's been covering up his affair with a researcher ( Minnie Driver ). The series pushed the boat out with its sex scenes including Duncan sodomising Flora and Flora masturbating in the lingerie he's bought for his mistress. The series concluded with Flora successfully supplanting Duncan as an MP with him being packed off to obscurity in Brussels.
Milne's follow-up series, though with none of the same characters, The Politician's Husband was shown on BBC Two in 2013.
Monday 8 October 2018
1117 The Governor
First viewed : 14 May 1995
This series was the brainchild of Prime Suspect creator Lynda La Plante and had a similar theme of a woman in power battling against male prejudice. Beanpole actress Janet McTeer played Helen Hewitt, the new governor of a men's prison where a riot has just occurred, following which a notorious sex offender is discovered dead in his cell. Derek Martin played her resistant deputy who is covering up the connivance of some of the officers in the man's death.
The pilot episode began with explosive scenes from the riot and there was plenty more blood and violence to come. Both Mum and I felt it was a bit over the top and didn't continue with the series which ran for two seasons ( 12 episodes overall ).
Sunday 7 October 2018
1116 Glam Rock Top 10
First viewed : 8 May 1995
This was the first - by some distance- of Channel Four's Top Ten nostalgia shows that I enjoyed greatly. It was presented in deliberately over-the-top Smashie and Nicey style by Tony Blackburn and Alan Freeman. The ranking was based on success in the UK singles chart by acts the producers considered to be glam. There were a couple of contentious issues there. One was the inclusion of the Bay City Rollers, a bubblegum pop act that were contemporaneous with glam rock but not usually considered to be part of it. The second was the exclusion of David Bowie and Roxy Music, mentioned as being influences on glam but regarded as too significant to be lumped in with the likes of Mud and Alvin Stardust.
Each act was awarded a short film, narrated by Dani Behr and combining archive and contemporary footage with interviews with the survivors. The most memorable of these was the feature on The Sweet. For casual viewers, the appearance of the decrepit Brian Connolly, shaking and slurring his words, came as a considerable shock , especially when compared to the likes of Alice Cooper or Noddy Holder who'd looked after themselves. The latter made me laugh when he said he'd left Slade to do something different followed by footage of him spinning glam rock singles for a local radio show. That's not exactly a leap in the dark, Nod !
Saturday 6 October 2018
1115 Without Walls
First viewed : Uncertain
Without Walls was a Channel 4 documentary strand covering the arts in a loose sense and confusingly was usually split into two unconnected sub-strands of half an hour each. One of these sub-strands went under the heading of J'accuse and allowed a media personality to sound off about their pet hate. It's one of these that I first recall watching
J'accuse : Manchester United ( 4 April 1995 )
This one had Spurs-supporting journalist and author Hunter Davies sounding off about the over-commercialisation of football with the attack focused on the most successful club at exploiting its brand, Manchester United. I suspect one of my regular readers might beg to differ but Davies put a well-argued case together with some juicy examples including a coach journey with a bunch of glory-hunters from North Devon who brushed off his question about why they weren't supporting Exeter City that day as ridiculous. Unsurprisingly, the club's damage limitation exercise following the then-recent Cantona incident was covered.
Also unsurprisingly, the programme itself came under fierce attack. I read one review ( which I think must have been in the Sunday Telegraph ) from a presumably United-supporting critic which attacked Davies in such coarse, childish terms it read like he must be one of Newman and Baddiel's history professors. I think the opening sentence was something like "It's amazing when someone with truly unpleasant facial features chooses to put themselves in front of the TV cameras".
Nearly a quarter of a century on, the truth of Davies's critique of football at the top level - not just relating to United of course - is so self-evident that it seems amazing that there was ever a time when someone had to point it out.
My Generation : The Troggs ( 4 April 1995 )
Davies's polemic was followed by an uncontroversial biography of The Troggs in the My Generation sub- strand which looked at bands from the sixties. It featured interviews with all the ex-members including singer Reg Presley, suddenly wealthy from the royalties on Wet Wet Wet's cover of Love Is All Around and just in the nick of time as we're on the brink of the download era here ( one of the other episodes in the J'accuse series was Janet Street-Porter's denunciation of the internet before most of us were even aware of it ).
Friday 5 October 2018
1114 Bookmark
First viewed : Uncertain
This documentary series ran on Saturday nights on BBC Two between 1983 and 1999 and focused on stories from the world of literature. It was not a magazine programme and concentrated on one author at a time. It was often tied in with a film adaptation shown on the same weekend.
The first one I definitely recall is :
Charlotte Bronte Unmasked ( 1 April 1995 )
The Brontes have always been of interest to me, partly because I enjoyed studying Wuthering Heights for my A Levels and partly because Bronte Country wasn't far away from where I lived and I often went walking there. This programme looked at two recent developments in the story , the possible identification of a photograph as Charlotte Bronte, the only one of the sisters to have made it into the photographic era and a controversial new biography of the sisters by Juliet Barker ( who lived even closer to me and had a common acquaintance ).
The photograph has been conclusively identified as being Charlotte's friend Ellen Nussey to the disappointment of the zealots in the Bronte Society, some of whom were interviewed in the programme. I recall some delusional old bat talking about how the spirit of Charlotte directed her own musings, When Barker said " I think we're all a little scared of the Bronte Society !" , you could see what she meant. Mind you, some of her own theories are highly questionable; there's not a shred of evidence for her claim that Charlotte destroyed a second novel by Emily after her death.
Thursday 4 October 2018
1113 You've Been Framed
First viewed : Uncertain
Like Mr Bean , this started in 1990 and I've no idea when I first caught it. You've Been Framed was basically It'll Be Alright on the Night with the crucial difference that the content was supplied by the viewing public, empowered by the camcorder boom, rather than the ITV archivists. In that respect the show was genuinely groundbreaking. Jeremy Beadle was the first host, followed by Emmerdale actress Lisa Reilly, Jonathan Wilkes and since 2004, a voiceover by Harry Hill.
It was pretty lowbrow stuff, lots of pet antics and babies falling over, but it would be hard for anyone to avoid finding something amusing. There was also an increasing suspicion that some of it was staged, the mishap being well signposted.
You might have thought that YouTube would have put it to bed by now but it's still going strong and we're now onto series 30.
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