Twilight in the Gods

Channel Five Marxism Today November 1981 31 audiences would, in the main, be attracted by granted is no longer there. The tourists who light entertainment programmes. The com- used to fill West End theatres between May position of the boards, and day to day and September failed to turn up. The holiday- management, of these companies reflected to makers who could be relied on to support the a very high degree the existing available seaside theatres either stayed at home, due expertise in the declining field of variety. largely to the recession, or went overseas in Jack Hylton, Prince Littler, Lew Grade search of better value as well as guaranteed acquired their 'licences to print money' in sunshine ... As the summer season comes to this fashion and through the range of their an end with considerable licking of financial contacts and know-how new empires were wounds, the whole question of the provision built to replace the old. and particularly the marketing of The club boom of the sixties was based entertainment must be under close upon a relaxation of the law pertaining to examination during the months ahead.' places of entertainment to allow gambling The solution offered by The Stage is to extend and live performances to take place in the the marketing of holidays to include free same building. Taking advantage of the entertainment on a par with package holidays comparative affluence of the times, and abroad and to build more multipurpose, TWILIGHT combining three working class pastimes in weatherproof centres like that at Great one, drinking, gambling and entertainment, Yarmouth (which in all fairness has held its IN THE GODS for the first time since the 1850s, a sudden business level when all around have fallen) to mushroom growth of clubs provided further compete with continental resorts and those in Clive Barker outlets for the established television stars and the United States. The answer, therefore, is in turn formed the seedbed for the in the marketing: but could this be more than development of new talent. The profits from marginally successful? The editorial contains There are two long-running cliches in the the gambling and the beer, kept the entrance some glaring contradictions. If the punters world of entertainment. The first is that the fees and the food cheap and paid high fees to stayed at home because of the recession they theatre is in a state of decline. The second is the performers to the extent that programmes are unlikely to come out for package holidays that popular comedy is dying out. When an could provide a long list of acts in any one swollen in price to accommodate the present examination is made of the first of these it can evening. A lot of people made a lot of money inflated fees of star artists. Can a chain of be seen that the decline of the theatre has and, in all fairness, even more people enjoyed multipurpose all-weather centres ever been a subject of complaint since at least the themselves, on a good night out. compete with foreign sunshine and where, early seventeenth century. In spite of this it So, what has gone wrong? If, as John indeed, would the money come from in these has managed to survive with sufficient Fisher has said, 'Music Hall will never die', it days of local authority cuts? And, then again, potential potency for John Arden and is certainly putting up a good appearance to would there still be a product left to present Margaretta D'Arcy to have their play The that effect and it is difficult to see where the in several years time when the buildings come Ballygombeen Bequest proscribed by law and next kiss of life will come from. The into commission? Mary Whitehouse to rise to the defence of our programme ratings for the week in which I It is in any case arguable that a revamping sensitive souls by seeking punitive action write (September 24) are astounding even to of the packaging and marketing processes against the perpetrators of The Romans in someone like myself, who has been charting will in any way restore confidence in a Britain. the steady decline over the last three years. product which, from the television ratings, The decline of popular comedy has been There is, as there has been for sometime, a has suffered a loss of public confidence. This less consistently argued (except on the wealth of comic talent Blankety-blanking; loss of public confidence might well be the grounds of moral corruption) and has tended Generation-gaming; Punchlining. In fact, root cause of the general crisis of confidence to take a wave pattern. Whilst always doing anything but their acts. But worse, far in solo and double-acts that seems to have seeming to be on the point of collapse, it has, worse, is the position in the ratings of those affected media planning. The number of acts until now, found some source of rejuvena- brave heroes soldiering on. Morecambe and presented on television is dwindling season tion. The music halls died, but transformed Wise achieve only sixth place in the overall by season. It is no fault of Morecambe and into variety. The variety theatres closed with ITV ratings, a disaster on a par with England Wise that Morecambe's health restricts them a plethora of tawdry nude revues, but comedy losing to Norway. In no single region do they to half-hour slots but it is symptomatic of the was rescued by radio (some would argue the rise higher than third (East Anglia). In crisis that the Benny Hill repeats are theatre were partially killed off by radio). several regions they don't even make the compilations of 'the best of Benny Hill' and As radio declined, television provided the ratings. Last week, at least, they were tops in restricted to a half-hour, when the originals life-saving injection and, in conjunction with London. Just as alarming, Benny Hill and were a full hour and that Frankie Howerd is, the great club boom of the sixties, popular Frankie Howerd don't feature in the ratings on a first run, restricted to that length of time. light entertainment flourished as never at all. It would be wrong to ignore the complex before in this country. Outside of television, light entertainment web of economic factors that have The economic basis of this boom is clear to seems to be going through a parallel bad contributed to the crisis. The introduction of see. The rationale behind the formation of patch. The editorial in a recent issue of The the breathalyser and the 1971 repeal of the the commercial television companies in the Stage, headed 'Time to reassess', gives the gaming laws, which separated again the mid-fifties took a strong line on the necessity following dire warning: provision of gambling and entertainment, of attracting working class audiences as 'What this summer has shown — and the has driven most of the clubs out of business. potential consumers for the advertised warning signs have been visible for the past Those that have survived do so with smaller products. It was conceived that working class few years — is that what was once taken for programmes and at higher prices. The 32 November 1981 Marxism Today economic recession has extended beyond this to force the curtailment of entertainment in working men's clubs. The level of fees has been kept down by rising costs and the reduced number of venues has forced artists to travel farther and farther afield in search of engagements, with the expenses coming out of their own pockets. Very little new talent is getting through. It has been axiomatic traditionally for one new star to emerge each year. In the last four or five years, only Paul Daniels has made the big time. The ironic joke now runs 'If you make it big in the clubs, you'll get on television and if you get on television, you'll make it big in clubs.' It would be futile to attempt to detail here the way that this complex web of economic factors interlace, if it could be done at all, but the result is quite clear in one respect. The new talent has little chance of maturing. The established talent has less and less reason to work, when there-is easy money to be made on television games which do not use up material nor cost the provision of new scripts. With the possible exception of old regional stalwarts like Bobby Thompson, playing the heartland of the North East working men's clubs, the business is losing contact with its audiences. The cult of the personality has finally triumphed over the social function and specific material of the comedian as the spokesperson for widely held views and opinions and as the comic shield, if most often defensively, against the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune. On present evidence Morecambe and Wise soldier on, Benny Hill endlessly repeats himself, Frankie Howerd is a pale parody of the man so pungently abrasive in the Macmillan era. Only Dave Allen remains, countering the common sense of the established hegemony with a more pointed common sense of his own, and we haven't seen a great deal of Dave Allen of late. Meanwhile the working class audience appears to have switched its allegiance to soap operas, sit-coms and give- away quiz shows, gambling by proxy. d.

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