From LSHG Newsletter 51 (Spring 2014)
If you examine the zeitgeist there is something of a mood at the moment to look back to the early 1960s. There has been an extensive celebration of the 50th anniversary of Doctor Who. Just in time for Christmas the BBC has brought out a double CD comprising most of the Beatles live recordings for the Corporation which were done in the first half of the 1960s.
The BBC is also running a Cold War theme on TV and as part of that the right‐wing cultural historian Dominic Sandbrook presented a three part series on the Cold War on BBC2. Sandbrook has a written a number of histories of the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s. They are entertaining reads, particularly for those, unlike Sandbrook, who are old enough to have lived through them and can remember those times.
His method is to look at the important events of history through the prism of popular culture , that is music, sport and what people were spending their money on. His conclusions however are unfailing right‐wing and Sandbrook’s opinion pieces appear in the Daily Telegraph and Daily Mail.
His TV series, based around the books, are also highly watchable and while we may disagree with his judgements on history, Sandbrook’s interpretation of modern British history does represent a serious challenge for the left.
He is engaged in a project to bring the recent history of modern Britain to an audience who mostly don’t remember it, and to draw the conclusion that a reading of the post‐1945 decades is that the left were wrong and the right were right.
His Cold War series has drawn more criticism than his earlier efforts, perhaps because it is about quite a specific time and issue where a good number of the participants are still very much around.
Sandbrook’s general view across the three part series is that the West ‘won’ the Cold War not so much because it was able to effectively combat the East ideologically, but because post‐1945 Western posterity proved more attractive to people in Eastern Europe, ultimately, than the societies they actually lived in.
By that Sandbrook means that it was pop music and consumer goods that were the decisive Western weapons in ending Communism not armed might or cold war warriors detailing how the East was evil.
He devotes considerable time across the three programmes to detailing how he feels the West was rather weak in fighting the alleged red menace, by inviting Russian football teams and astronauts to the UK for example.
He does take the issue of nuclear war a little more seriously, discussing Peter Watkins’ The War Game, banned by the BBC in the 1960s for an all too realistic depiction of what a nuclear war would actually mean. However when it comes to CND, the biggest post Second World War protest movement in Britain until Stop the War, of which it is part, Sandbrook can only sneer that it was comprised of the ‘well meaning Guardian reading middle class’. Since there is published research on who actually did support CND in the 1960s, which was well beyond readers of the Guardian, it is a particularly sloppy piece of history from Sandbrook.
The final programme concludes with Sandbrook talking in some detail on how the Beatles didn’t play in Russia and how Phil Collins brought down the Berlin War by playing a pop concert in Berlin.
We may grimace but at the moment Sandbrook’s version is not being challenged by a better informed history from the left. It needs to be.
Keith Flett
Showing posts with label TV Review. Show all posts
Showing posts with label TV Review. Show all posts
Sunday, 9 February 2014
Thursday, 10 March 2011
Saturday, 30 October 2010
The People Speak
The People Speak. Directed by Anthony Arnove and Colin Firth. The History Channel, 9pm, Sunday 31 October
The People Speak promises to be an inspiring antidote to sanitised and top-down histories of Britain.
Actors play the roles of ordinary people to tell their stories in their own words.
It includes Paul Foot’s speech at the funeral of Blair Peach, who was killed by police while protesting against fascists.
Co-director and actor Colin Firth said, “Corruption, sexual deviation, rebellion, struggles for power—none of that made it into my history lessons.”
He described The People Speak as “the perfect response to the abject misery of my history class”.
From here. On the American version, see here
The People Speak promises to be an inspiring antidote to sanitised and top-down histories of Britain.
Actors play the roles of ordinary people to tell their stories in their own words.
It includes Paul Foot’s speech at the funeral of Blair Peach, who was killed by police while protesting against fascists.
Co-director and actor Colin Firth said, “Corruption, sexual deviation, rebellion, struggles for power—none of that made it into my history lessons.”
He described The People Speak as “the perfect response to the abject misery of my history class”.
From here. On the American version, see here
Saturday, 24 October 2009
TV Review: The Devil's Whore
From LSHG Newsletter, Spring 2009
The expression “a little knowledge is a dangerous thing” seems to apply to watching historical dramas with
historical knowledge. The numerous historical inaccuracies of the recent series of the Tudors is an example; too small, too young just being two of them.
It was with some trepidation therefore that I began watching the eagerly awaited “Devil’s Whore”
(Wednesdays, Channel 4). The publicity before hand did not auger well with a fictitious character being so central and a part for a Devil with a long tongue!
It is though extremely rare for any drama about the English Revolution (there I have nailed my colours to the mast in calling it a revolution) with significant parts for John Lilburne and Thomas Rainsborough. There were
though a number of important absentees: Fairfax and Ireton from the Grandees, Wildman, Walwyn and Overton from the Levellers and finally, in the month of the 400th anniversary of Milton’s birth, it might have been appropriate to find a space for him.
The plot of the first two episodes has weaved itself through a number of the significant events of the 1630s and 40s starting with the public whipping of Lilburne in 1638 and concluding the second episode with the death of Rainsborough in 1648. There is less concentration on the battles with only Edgehill and Newbury shown and Marston Moor mentioned. There is far more emphasis on the political which is to be welcomed.
There was though a missed opportunity with the Putney Debates. In the second episode it was not clear what the purpose of the meeting was when Rainsborough uttered his immortal line about “I think that the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live as the greatest he.” It then truncated the rest of that speech. Surely there would have been drama in the exchange between Rainsborough and Ireton.
The third episode dealt with the execution of Charles and had a totally improbable simultaneous scene with Sexby giving the fictitious Angelica Fanshawe the kiss of life having brought her down from the gallows.
The third and fourth episodes seemed to concentrate on the fictitious element more than historical events but
there was a brief tour through other radical groups such as the Diggers and the Ranters. There was though a welldone trial scene of Lilburne which included some of the actual dialogue. The revolt of some of the troops at Burford and the subsequent execution of some of the alleged ringleaders was also dealt with.
Peter Flannery (who also wrote “Our Friends in the North”) has a knack for creating drama around historical or political events but I am a bit wary of mixing historical and fictitious characters to the extent that he does with having Rainsborough and then Sexby marrying the fictitious Angelica Fanshawe.
There are some historical inaccuracies/omissions in the first two episodes but not enough to become annoying and these are made up for by other significant events being given unusual prominence, e.g. Lilburne’s imprisonment by both the King and Parliament and the important role of his wife Elizabeth. The role of women in the Leveller campaign has often been overlooked. In addition Flannery suggests that Cromwell had a hand in Rainsborough’s death. There is no historical evidence for that, but it is an interesting theory.
Certainly after Putney Cromwell and the Grandees had reason to fear Rainsborough and the Levellers. In the
subsequent episodes there were more inaccuracies with Lilburne dying in Jersey. He had been imprisoned at one time there but in fact died in England. It also had Sexby killing himself after a failed attempt at assassinating Cromwell; in fact he died in the Tower.
I do though appreciate the comments that Martine Brant made in the Observer about the need to take liberties in historical dramas to bring them alive. The most important lesson established though is the highlighting of the scandalous disregard of this most important period in our constitutional history. The embarrassment of admitting that we had a Revolution and the fact that Lilburne, Rainsborough and others are not household names is a national scandal. Time for statues to Lilburne and Rainsborough I think!
Richard Ascough
The expression “a little knowledge is a dangerous thing” seems to apply to watching historical dramas with
historical knowledge. The numerous historical inaccuracies of the recent series of the Tudors is an example; too small, too young just being two of them.
It was with some trepidation therefore that I began watching the eagerly awaited “Devil’s Whore”
(Wednesdays, Channel 4). The publicity before hand did not auger well with a fictitious character being so central and a part for a Devil with a long tongue!
It is though extremely rare for any drama about the English Revolution (there I have nailed my colours to the mast in calling it a revolution) with significant parts for John Lilburne and Thomas Rainsborough. There were
though a number of important absentees: Fairfax and Ireton from the Grandees, Wildman, Walwyn and Overton from the Levellers and finally, in the month of the 400th anniversary of Milton’s birth, it might have been appropriate to find a space for him.
The plot of the first two episodes has weaved itself through a number of the significant events of the 1630s and 40s starting with the public whipping of Lilburne in 1638 and concluding the second episode with the death of Rainsborough in 1648. There is less concentration on the battles with only Edgehill and Newbury shown and Marston Moor mentioned. There is far more emphasis on the political which is to be welcomed.
There was though a missed opportunity with the Putney Debates. In the second episode it was not clear what the purpose of the meeting was when Rainsborough uttered his immortal line about “I think that the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live as the greatest he.” It then truncated the rest of that speech. Surely there would have been drama in the exchange between Rainsborough and Ireton.
The third episode dealt with the execution of Charles and had a totally improbable simultaneous scene with Sexby giving the fictitious Angelica Fanshawe the kiss of life having brought her down from the gallows.
The third and fourth episodes seemed to concentrate on the fictitious element more than historical events but
there was a brief tour through other radical groups such as the Diggers and the Ranters. There was though a welldone trial scene of Lilburne which included some of the actual dialogue. The revolt of some of the troops at Burford and the subsequent execution of some of the alleged ringleaders was also dealt with.
Peter Flannery (who also wrote “Our Friends in the North”) has a knack for creating drama around historical or political events but I am a bit wary of mixing historical and fictitious characters to the extent that he does with having Rainsborough and then Sexby marrying the fictitious Angelica Fanshawe.
There are some historical inaccuracies/omissions in the first two episodes but not enough to become annoying and these are made up for by other significant events being given unusual prominence, e.g. Lilburne’s imprisonment by both the King and Parliament and the important role of his wife Elizabeth. The role of women in the Leveller campaign has often been overlooked. In addition Flannery suggests that Cromwell had a hand in Rainsborough’s death. There is no historical evidence for that, but it is an interesting theory.
Certainly after Putney Cromwell and the Grandees had reason to fear Rainsborough and the Levellers. In the
subsequent episodes there were more inaccuracies with Lilburne dying in Jersey. He had been imprisoned at one time there but in fact died in England. It also had Sexby killing himself after a failed attempt at assassinating Cromwell; in fact he died in the Tower.
I do though appreciate the comments that Martine Brant made in the Observer about the need to take liberties in historical dramas to bring them alive. The most important lesson established though is the highlighting of the scandalous disregard of this most important period in our constitutional history. The embarrassment of admitting that we had a Revolution and the fact that Lilburne, Rainsborough and others are not household names is a national scandal. Time for statues to Lilburne and Rainsborough I think!
Richard Ascough
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