Robert Kirby
CHANNELVISION
I am not by nature a violent man. The excesses of my physical reactions to being
grandly pissed off are confined usually to the slamming of doors, loud and vivid
cursing and the occasional attack on inanimate objects. I once heaved a miscreant typewriter out of an SABC third-floor window and kicked down a door
that shouldn_t have been locked. I once even threw a full teapot at a smirking
wife _ and missed.
Last Friday evening, between 9.30pm and 10pm, all my civilised restraints fell
away as in 25 enraging minutes I became determined to track down, cruelly mutilate and eventually slowly and as painfully as possible dispose of a certain
BBC television presenter. It is a she, I am sorry to say, a blonde overweight
horror with a backside looking like a smallish denim-coated oil tanker _why do
so many women with spectacular arses insist on displaying them in this way? _
whose style of presentation is a sort of vile coyness. She sports a permanent
plastic smile while her hands make little mincing movements. You know the sort,
a BBC speciality, forever ramming her head into otherwise pleasant scenes.
Why is it that television producers believe women should be used as the presenters of decidedly unwomanly pursuits? It is not chauvinism that inspires
this question, rather plain suitability. I do not think any female can possibly
be the best choice when it comes to describing how things smell in, say, the
middle of a rugby scrum, or what it_s like driving in Formula One _ things and
pursuits entirely devoid of female participation.
It was in a similar category, deep-sea small commercial trawler fishing, that
our heroine made her appearance, sporting a lurid yellow plastic sou_wester as
she mawked on about the harsh and perilous lives of fishermen. It was about as
apposite as having a husband explain what it_s like to give birth.
The programme was another in the current BBC World series The Physical World,
and judging by previous episodes the series is aimed at what might be termed
_inquisitive adults_. Last week_s edition tried to explain the propagation of
radio waves. It was about as bad as a television educational documentary can
get, what with madam presenter_s inane presence and her manner of talking to
people as though they are somewhat slow children.
Her name, by the way, is Angela Lamont and she is hereby given fair warning that
I am coming after her. I_ve acquired the necessary implements: the thumbscrews,
scold_s bridle, the iron shackles and fingernail extractors, the portable rack
and the tongue crusher. I_ll be grateful to hear of some remote cave or dungeon
where I may take at least a week to wipe that smug little smile off Angela_s
face and replace it with the screams of agony she causes in those unlucky enough
to see her on the box.
John Cleese was the victim of a vicious little cartoon in a recent Spectator
magazine. A small boy asks his father, _Dad, can you remember when John Cleese
was funny?_ By sheer coincidence Cleese was on the box the very day I saw the
cartoon, interviewed for nearly an hour on BBC Prime. Under the benign scrutiny
of the show_s host, Michael Parkinson, Cleese came across as a man of curious
depth.
We have all encountered John Cleese, the antic performer, but here he was to
reveal not so much the corny _serious_ side of the clown, but an alert and penetrating intelligence. Sick and tired of being identified with one or two hit
sketches _ the dead parrot, the funny walks and, of course, Fawlty Towers, Cleese revealed as much an intense distaste for as a deep personal fear of his
celebrity status. That is, of course, an old ploy of the illustrious, the _I_m
just an ordinary guy_ line. But in Cleese the longing for a truly private life
seemed sincere. As did his obvious joy in the _business_ of entertainment.
The answer to the small cartoon boy_s question was there for all to see. John
Cleese has resigned his position as a senior British clown. He now wants to do
something else, and who can blame him?
No matter what the persuasions, Cleese and Connie Booth turned down writing and
performing in a second series of Fawlty Towers. It_s a finished product; a copy
would not have been as good. The same kind of decision, to leave well enough
alone, obviously still engages John Cleese.