Television
Song and dance
Wendy Cope
The first time I saw The Importance of Being Earnest I was a schoolgirl and Alec McCowen was playing Algy. Since then I've seen so many productions that I was in two minds about watching yet another on television on Sunday night. But the play seems to be inexhaustibly entertaining, with good lines coming so thick and fast that there are always a few one hasn't properly appreciated before. 'His voice alone inspires one with absolute credulity' should really be saved up until the oppor- tunity arises to apply it to a television presenter. And next time you are irritated by a self-consciously perfect couple, you might like to remember Wilde's dig about 'washing one's clean linen in public'.
The BBC 2 production featured Alec McCowen as Dr Chasuble and Joan Plow- right as Lady Bracknell. It's supposed to be a challenge for anyone to play this part since Dame Edith Evans's classic perform- ance in the film. I find it easier to forget Evans and enjoy a new interpretation of Lady Bracknell than to forget Joan Green- wood and accept any other Gwendolen. Amanda Redman wasn't quite stylish enough for my taste and Paul McGann's Jack looked a little too young and inno- cent. But despite the imperfections Theatre Night was a treat. And this Sunday there's The Rivals to look forward to.
The first time I saw Gaby Agis she was a ten-year-old pupil at a South London primary school, where I was one of the teachers. She was an attractive child and she still looks good, even when she dresses in baggy trousers and covers her face in mud, as she did at one point in `Freefall', a specially devised offering for Dance on Four (Channel 4). Shot on various loca- tions in London, this opened with five women dancers on rooftops, signalling to each other in a kind of balletic semaphore. It ended with Gaby alone on a rooftop at dawn, performing a sequence that owed something to exercise routines. Sometimes optimistic, sometimes expressing a sense of futility, her dance was a touching portrait of a woman attempting to lead a healthy, fulfilled life in the inner city. I liked it a lot.
Meanwhile on ITV there was the Tele- thon. 'Two and a half minutes to Tele- thon!' Ten seconds to Telethon! Ten, nine, eight. . . .' At zero the studio audi- ence burst into applause and Michael Aspel bounded on to the set, immaculate in• his dinner-jacket and luxuriant grey hair. First attraction was a song-and-dance team called the Telethon All-Stars. Lulu was one of them and the other three were probably famous as well. They performed a special version of 'I've Got Rhythm', which incorporated the names of personali- ties appearing in the programme. 'We've got Molly, We've got Freddy' and so on. As they sang, the All-Stars danced around the personalities, who had to stand still, looking rather foolish. One of them, doing his best to smile, was Melvyn Bragg. 'Melvyn Bragg and/ Peter Howitt/ What a wow it/'s gonna be!' Oh yes.
Then Dennis Waterman introduced a film about the people Telethon is trying to help. A family living in one room, a woman dying in a hospice, a boy with a muscular disease, a baby fighting for its life. The background music — soft, sen- timental electric guitars — was outstan- dingly tasteless. But if it's raising money for the needy, perhaps we shouldn't make a fuss about taste.
In Cover to Cover (BBC 2), Hermione Lee expressed concern about the motives of NCR in endowing a book award for non-fiction. NCR 'make cash dispensers and computers, which they sell to Mexican restaurants, air-conditioning firms and the like.' Hermione explained this in a disdain- ful tone of voice, which seemed to imply that nasty cash dispensers and Mexican restaurants pollute the pure air of our lovely world of books. I cannot see that NCR's motives matter very much, as long as they appoint competent, fair-minded judges and the prize goes to something good. It seems to be agreed that David Thomson's Nairn in Darkness and Light is a worthy winner and the book will now be read by a large number of people who would not otherwise have heard of it. NCR could spend the money on advertising instead, or on office carpets, but I don't think they should be encouraged to do so.
'That Descartes, just who does he think he is?'
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