Games of Thrones season three - 1

The third season has ended of transforming the epic George R R Martin’s Fire and Ice, into the televised production of A Game of Thrones. This covers all of the first book of A Storm of Swords Steel and Snow and part coverage of A Storm of Swords Blood and Gold volumes three and four in the series. The television series has become mega in terms of world wide popularity including in countries such as Russia and China, winning awards including public vote BAFTA and is doing wonders for the economy in Northern Ireland where the 2014 season is being produced. I recently reported that a young woman who I had not met before engaged me in conversation while waiting for different trains at Newcastle station on the strength of my reading a George Martin volume of the series.

There is no doubt that in terms of television series A Game of Thrones ticks all my boxes and those of many others because of its spectacle, great acting and storylines. It is great escapism with moments of shock and disappointment because of the turn of events as characters who have engaged and who one wants to do well are murdered, the equivalent of Harry Potter or two of the main characters in Lord of the Rings meeting an unpleasant end at the conclusion of the first book of 4, 7, or how many more volumes Martin intends to write of his fantasy set in a middle ages Europe in terms of any historical, geographical and climatic clues. The books are also a splendid read full of vivid and detailed descriptions although creating an unease which the TV series does not. This is because in terms of all the killing, violence and forced marriages many of the key characters are adolescent children.

Because there is no evidence that Martin intends readers and viewers to read too much into his work, it remains divorced from the involvement of children in the current horrors say going in Syria when out of revenge a school age teenager is known to have beheaded an enemy, filmed and broadcast. With this note of caution for anyone turning to the books because of the TV series I will move on to explaining how I propose to summarise my experience of reading the 1182 pages plus the appendixes of the two volumes on which the third season is based and because I cannot remember all that happened only in the TV coverage I am not going to attempt to remember where the cut off points occurred in relation to the individual storylines rather than how the whole developed and in this first writing I will attempt some kind of overview as well as concentrating on my favourite of a number of favourite characters the gorgeous mother of Dragons, Daenerys Targaryen the Queen Across the Water. She is the last survivor of the House of Targaryen already a widow at the age of fourteen years.

She now resides in a land which has the appearance of the Mediterranean middle east and is attempting to amass an army to cross the water to claim control of the seven Kingdoms of Westeros, a mythical land painstakingly created and which has three distinct areas. The south where the climate is warmer and the North which continue until a great wall of iced covered rocks upon which are fortresses manned by the Nightwatch who like the Kings Guard in the South and men of other Kingdoms are required to make an oath of allegiance to die defending and performing their role celibate so that nothing can deflect them from their duty.

For the first book called A Game of Thrones, and to some extent the second in the series, A Clash of Kings, the land north of the wall remains unknown although parties of the Nightwatch go to explore and check on the state of things.

I mention the climate, something which is of great concern in my every day life as days of warm sunshine have become something of a rarity and in this fantasy land the seasons last not within a year but for years and sometimes for generations and are also associated with times of darkness in events and spirit as well as of light and joy. The first books occur during summer but with the threat winter about to descended upon them all.

Although it is a land of seven Kingdoms and great Houses of extended families with their castles, Knights called Ser, squires, servants and citizens much akin to what we understand as the middle ages in western Europe, two of the Houses joined forces and controlled the seven separate Kingdoms through one King, the King of the Iron Throne Robert Baratheon who was succeeded by the boy considered to be the legal heir until the information became generally available to those of the great Houses and as gossip among the hoy purloy that Joffrey, a boy of thirteen years when he became King, his sister Princess Mycella and young brother Prince Tommen were in fact the incestuous children of the twin brother of the Queen.

The Queen Cersie was of the great House of Lannister and it was she who organised the death of her husband to place her son on the throne and where she hoped to rule, for as a woman a Queen could not rule even if she and the support of the little or great council of state. She had effectively used her sex to control her twin brother Jamie and continuously plotted to outwit and side line the brains of the family, her brother Tyrion, the height challenge man we would say, but for the purposes of the writing books and TV, a dwarf, whose mother had died at his birth thus alienating from his father the most ruthless, coldly cunning of the House, the Lord Tywin and the man with the money, military power and connections to sustain the Kingship by his family members.

The twin brother, Jamie, is known as the Kingslayer because he was the person who killed the former King, King Aerys II of Targaryen, the father of Daenerys, while King Robert killed her eldest brother with her sister also murdered along with another son. Daenerys escaped with her brother who is also now dead. The Targaryens once ruled the Kingdoms with the help of Dragons, now believed extinct throughout Westeros, except for their skulls kept at the HQ of the Kingdoms at the palace castle at Kings Landing and an ancient belief that one day someone would come who would bring back the dragons out of stone. It also should be mentioned that that the Targaryens are reported to have accepted incest as a way of life and indeed the Daenerys and her elder brother are said to have played in the way of Caligula and his sister.

Joffrey who can be described as a ruthless spoilt child prone to tantrums with disastrous consequences, is challenged by three men who proclaimed themselves Kings. The first two are the brothers of the King or more accurately I should say were as the King in the Highgarden, Renly Baratheon, the younger of the brothers has been murdered at the behest of the older brother Stannis. My memory of Renly is of an essentially good and honourable man while his brother is under the influence of the Red Priestess ( she has red eyes) Lady Melisandra of Asshai of a religion with a God of Fire and with supernatural powers with shape shifting, who conjured a shadow through a conception by the King, which killed the brother while in the presence of the mother of the King of the North and also by a trusted female warrior. More of the warrior lady later.

King Stannis Baratheon has a calculating wife, Selsie of the House of Florent and they have children including a daughter who is disfigured and kept away from company. Stannis has a seafaring former pirate made up as his right hand man called Ser Davos Seaworth commonly referred to as the Onion Knight who tries to Counsel the King against precipitous action but is repeatedly out manoeuvred by the Red Priestess at every turn who claims that Stannis is the man who according to prophecy will arouse the now stone dragons back into life.

The role of the right hand man is called The Hand and is the first Minister chief adviser, organiser and fixer to the King. The right hand man for murdered King Robert had been the brother in law of the father of the King of North. When the Hand of King Robert was murdered, he visited the Lord of Winterfell in the North, Eddard Stark, whose wife Catelyn of the House of Tully was the sister in law of the former Hand.

King Robert commands Eddard who had fought with him to gain control of the seven Kingdoms to become his Hand and Eddard goes South with his two daughters, both children, Princess Sansa a maid then of twelve years who had become betrothed to Joffrey and with young sister Ayra, a tomboy then aged ten years.

After Sansa was betrothed and Ayra, escaped but in the crowd witness the beheading of Eddard at the command of King Joffrey Robb Stark when only a boy of fifteen years is encouraged by his mother and with the support of other nobles in the North to declare themselves independent of Joffrey and with Robb as the crowned King of the North. Robb has a younger brother Brandon, who becomes a cripple when thrown from climbing the outside wall of the castle and unintentionally over hearing Queen Cersie with her twin brother. In certain conditions Bran has the power to see the future. He has a young brother Rickon then only four and the children also have an elder half brother Jon, called Snow the name given to illegitimate children. John Snow is brought up as a member of the Household and to the discomfort of Catelyn and little is known about the boy’s mother with whom Eddard had a relationship before his marriage.

Jon Snow goes to the Wall as a Knightwatch guard at the suggestion of his father’s brother who has now disappeared on a exploration and checking visit north of the Wall where here are reports of disturbing movements and events and where there is lives Wildings or free people as well as in the past dark almost invincible creatures of the undead.

Early in the first volume Eddard finds a dire wolf, a large, intelligent and loyal form of wolf, creature now extinct for 10000 years mainly in the Americas. One of the creatures was killed at the demand of Joffrey, that belonging to Sansa while that belonging to Arya was sent away to save him ad his present fate is unknown while a third, that belonging to Robb is to feature strongly as that of Jon to lesser extent in the latest two volumes.

There are around 500 characters associated with the great and lesser Houses and their courts although fortunately the storylines do concentrate on the fortunes and misfortunes of specific characters and the first two volumes amounting to 1500 pages have been reported on in some length previously in terms of the first two TV series..

In terms of the quality of actors employed and the acting in general, the range of sets and locations, the numbers includes and use of the latest visual technology the Game of Thrones is without equal. However as already highlighted there is a fundamental and important difference between the books and the TV series which has to be reminded and this in the age of the principle characters Daenerys, Joffrey, Sansa, Ayra, Robb, Brandon, and the others to come is that they are children who become directly involved in the killing or being killed, as principal game players, married off and with the girls at constant threat of sexual assault. The TV series therefore has the characters looking and described as older thus conforming to the law and mores of the day.

I begin my first update with my favourite character The Queen across the Water.. It should be remember that this adorable young woman was effectively sold by her brother in marriage to the war lord of the nomadic Dothraki tribe of warrior huntsmen in exchange for using his forces to help regain his position as King of the seven Kingdoms of the land across the waters, Westeros. The two “pretenders” aided by a knight guardian adviser Ser Jorah, who secretly coverts the girl, have been beholden to the rulers of lands presented as Mediterranean North African always sunshine, with deserts and walled cities. The flaw in the deal between the brother, the adviser and the Dothraki war lord is that his men have a fear of the sea and therefore he and they are unenthusiastic about immediately setting off to invade Westeros. Presented first as a Genghis Khan type of figure her husband proved to be a kind and considerate man who dies despite her turning to dark arts in an attempt to save him after her brother is killed with her blessing because of his inadequacy and treachery. His death is the first to reveal that many of the characters we come fo admire and hope to do well is to be eliminated, thus making predicted outcomes a challenge..

Daenerys undergoes a transformation after being in the great flames of the funeral pyre of her husbands body and appears to become immortal and to grow in wisdom and military guile.

Throughout the epic todate there is reference to the age of Dragons where on the mainland only their skeletons remain, but on her wedding day she is presented with the last known three dragon eggs by her adviser and through the ordeal by fire they are hatched and begin to grow. And during this series are able to breathe their fire and destroy but it will be several years before they can be ridden and directed to create havoc in battles.

Having acquired three ships from her exploits in the in the second season she sets said for a kingdom of slave masters who have created a great army of warriors who have been turned into eunuchs and then trained as fighters. Pretending not to understand the language of the slave masters she puts up with his insults appearing to accept the strongly edited translations and much to the horror of Ser Jorah appearing to offer one of her dragons in exchange of all the able bodied trained warriors over ten thousand in number. What she does not disclose until the deal is agreed is that dragons select those they will serve and the dragon taken as part of the deal immediately turns on the Slave master leader and kills him with fire and as the deal has been agreed Daenerys now has control and command of the army. However she makes the point that in new deal world no one can be a slave and therefore they are given the option of going off as free men or serving as her army and to a man they chose her, the Mother of Dragons as she become known and all the other slaves and their families are freed and decide to join in the quest so that now she has the responsibility for an ever increase population in their tens of thousands.

This is the first of three cities and their people that Daenerys confronts with her growing forces during the two volumes of A Storm of Swords.

She has to use all her skills in outwitting men on reaching the second walled city and she enlists the attention of a young warrior who beheads his two confederates including the leader who tells her to submit or he will take her and then pass onto his men for their use and pleasure. By the time she reaches the third city she is having to overcome her emotions and desire for an adult relationship. She considers using both Ser Jorah and the young warrior with lustful eyes but contents with a female servant.

She is also saved from an individual personal attack by a knight who has sought her out and who once protected her father but was forced to accept duty with the man who has killed her father and other family members before she had escaped with her brother.

When Ser Jorah points out who the new arrival is her first reaction she is horrified but decides, subject to a test, to keep him at her side. He retaliates against Ser Jorah by revealing that throughout the exile of Daenerys and her brother the Court at kings Landing had been receiving reports of their whereabouts, some hundred reports if of more and that the source fo these was Ser Jorah Mormont formerly Lord of Bear Island exiled for slaving. This he admits saying he had been promised being able to return to Westeros one day, but as a consequence of these reports the attempted assassinations on her were made.

In order to minimise the loss fo life and because the growing population of followers as well as army of the Unsullied need food and water, she decides that Ser Jorah and Ser Barristan Selmy, formerly of the Kings Guard to King Robert should attempt to enter the city through the sewers and open the gates to allow her forces to take the city with the minimum of bloodshed. This is successful and with now responsibility off a third city to have responsibility she makes an important decision. First she effectively pardons Ser Barristan and decides to keep him with her but she cannot forgive Ser Jorah and banishes him from her side.

The decision she takes arising from finding that having given people their freedom many have wanted to become slaves again to the households of the wealthy where they will lead a better life than fending for themselves She decides to put on hold her ambition to take an army across the water to reclaim her father‘s crown and concentrate on managing her growing realm to ensure the people are well provided for. While the dragons Drogon, Viserion and Rhaegal are growing, can fly freely and breathe fire it will be three years before they can ridden and until then their use is therefore restricted. It has occurred to me that the prophecy quoted by the Red Priestess applies to Daenerys and not to King Stannis and that perhaps she does know this!

Inspector Nardone

Staying up late one evening I came across yet another Italian cops and robbers series Inspector Nardone, six stories and 12 episodes over all became must see viewing. The story is set in Milan just after the end of the second World War and features the Inspector Nardone who has moved to the north from the South with a very traditional southern approach to policing, to woman and life generally, but he also is prepared to adapt to the demands placed by the development of a ruthless criminal gang and to undertake the job in hand regardless of the status, wealth and power of those involved. In this respect he can be described as a forerunner of Inspector Montalbano and the Inspector in Romanzo Criminate. He brings together the best talented young men and operates in a creative but also professional way.

Early on like the two other Inspectors he forms a relationship with an influential woman who provides sexual favours to those who can afford her “High Maintenance” lifestyle although in this stance his relationship remains professional and it is another member of the team he assembled who becomes infatuated and then obsessed, despite the fact that she marries a wealthy older man who gives her a night club to manage.

Nardone quickly establishes a relationship with the manger of a firm and finds her wish for individualism difficult to cope with but they marry and have a child together with the next hurdle when as the child grows up his wife takes a job in a car selling firm. As with the other two series mentioned this programme combines the tacking of individual crimes with the development of relationships within the team and their relationships with others.

One of the relationships is between Nardone and a journalist photographer with both continuing to assist each other of the subsequent decade. The relationship is not corrupt but there are breaches of ethical standards which should not be tolerated in this post Leveson era.

As with Romanzo Criminale the youngish Inspector has an elder assistant whose experiences becomes pivotal when he is gunned down into a coma by the young villain whose capture becomes the focus of the series. Because of the success in bringing down a leading citizen friend of the local police Chief, Nardone successful team is broken up through promotions to other parts of Italy. Each has a significant story to tell. One is obsessed with studying to become a lawyer and also the search for a Fascist who betrayed his family and the love for daughter of landlady.

The individual eventually tracks down the mother of the fascist who has left the country and when later the man returns the police officer relies that killing him makes him no different and resorts to using the law. The girl becomes pregnant by a boyfriend and the police officer decides to accept the young woman and child and hen is further disappointment when child’s father returns and girl goes off again. However she returns and they marry and he passes the exams to become a magistrate

Another a former fascist has become an excellent driver a is provided with vehicles which can out chase those acquired by the criminals. I am not sure if it he or the other young member of the team ( one of whom becomes the forensic specialist and is engaged to be married) who also becomes obsessed by the former prostitute. He does not go ahead with the marriage despite beginning to sleep with the young woman and I think it is he who eventually married the other woman and who abandons her high maintenance lifestyle for a meaningful relationship.

All three now established officers in their thirties return to Milan and reform as a group after their elder colleague appears at deaths door. The man is single having decided not to marry a young woman because of the demands of his work when younger. It emerges that although the woman married and had a child the girl is his and the woman, never stopped her original love something which the man she married understood and accepted. The woman has now died but the girl reappears and having found her true father is horrified when he decides that he must return to duty as part of the original successful team. She cannot cope with this and goes off and when he goes in search of her she cannot be found. It is then revealed that she has gone off to train as a police woman. Another story line which I believe was later taken up in the Swedish series of Wallander in relation to his daughter in TV version..

There are many twists and turns including a real; threat to the ife of Nardone before the team are able to capture the villain who has caused so much harm to the city. The series ends on this high note and I presume was not resurrected and as a consequence I for one felt satisfied with a sense of completeness and good feeling rounded off but which had otherwise been what I felt a very realistic portrayal of the times and what policing would have been like.

　

　

Our Girl (2013)

There has been so much great television over past months that I have struggled where to begin but the best single programme has been Our Girl first broadcast a month ago 24 March 2013 with an outstanding performance by Lacey Turner as the young Eastender good time loser, the eldest of a struggling large family with an out of work family in a estate flat who finds in the army a surrogate family. Contrary to some critics I thought depiction of training realistic and unlikely to lead to a increase in recruitment for the film proved that determination and grit is not sufficient to make a career in the modern army. True it offers an opportunity to those who have failed at school or find getting a job which satisfies difficult to impossible but without having qualities which need to brought out the majority of young people will not make the combination of quick thinking, common sense, courage, and physical ability required.

Our girl trains as a medical assistant and after qualifying goes out to Afghanistan. Her father rejects her after she turns down the offer of marriage from someone who an provide him with fresh start employment after the accident which led to his unemployment and general hostility to the

world. Her former female friends also reject when she is not prepared to slip back into her former ways of heavy drinking and casual sex. She overcomes the disappointment when her parents fail to attend the passing out parade after basic training although her mother finds a way of having a brief meeting before the girl goes overseas. The film ends with the return of a coffin with military honours and flowers made out into Our Girl. It is not our girl in question where both parents are relieved and proud when she returns home.

The critic who reported this as a recruiting film for the army must have been watching a different edition. A memorable acting performance and a memorable film.

 

Endeavour- the young Morse

The best of recent TV has been Endeavour a prequel to Morse and Lewis featuring the young Morse as a Detective police constable moving from the Met to Oxford following his good work in the pilot which was shown two years or more ago and before the most recent series of Lewis which has come to an end.

I had planned to do a piece of the last series of Lewis but other events overtook me There is just opportunity to record again that after a hesitant start and uncertainty on my part I thought Kevin Whalley did an excellent and credible as the Detective Inspector together with his university educated priest in the making sergeant. The series ends with Kevin retiring from the force and his sergeant decides against putting in for the post and leaving he force as well.

I thought the first of a four two hours programmes in this first series of Endeavour was good but the second shown last Sunday 21^st April was a brilliant portrayal of a young man in the process of becoming Morse senior. He possessed the creative intellect to see what others cannot and the drive and ambition of youth to go it alone, question authority and follow up his intuition. He is yet to acquire the experience and skills usually honed from having undertaken slow methodical policing as well as acquiring a detailed knowledge of the law,

Shaun Evans plays the Young Morse, the young man who failed to complete his Oxford degree but who maintains links singing in a University Choral group. His champion is Detective Inspector Fred Thursday played by Roger Allam who sees the potential in Morse and in the first episode uses him as a drive assistant much to the anger of the Sergeant usually allocated the task and who understandably is resentful and a thorn in his side. Some one else who is not a fan of young Morse is Chief Super Reginald Bright with another excellent characterization by Anton Lesser. The daughter of John Abigail Thaw plays the editor of the Oxford Mail Dorothea Frazil.

In both the openers the 2013 series two deaths which appear unconnected form the basis of the detective mysteries. A secretarial student dies and a doctor is shot while in an area where his presence is unexplained. The initial trail leads to a family where its head is a scientist who assisted in the creation of the Atom bomb in the USA and is now an Oxford Don with echoes of Strangers and Brothers and a recent Foyle episode. He receives threatening letters and there is anti nuclear protests with the credits both of which are red herrings in relation to solving the deaths.

His daughter is married to the GP who is killed and she cares for the child of her younger sister, portrayed as an unstable young women who has been placed by the family in an expensive care institution before being allowed to leave and move to London. Later it is revealed that the doctor befriended the sister and is the father of the child which he has financially supported giving the mother a 10 shilling postal order each week which she cashes at a local post office paying in half a crown to a saving’s account for the son.

Morse is attracted to the girl who offers herself as a means of gaining his attention and company but he behaves in a professional way but their bonding as friends means that he forgets to undertake a record check which shows that she has committed a crime of violence when in the care unit. Morse is put back on general duties by the Chief Superintendent and the girl charged and kept in custody despite Morse protesting her innocence. This is confirmed while in custody as a Vicar whose bicycle was discovered at the scene of the Doctor’s murder is also murdered. The vicar like Morse is an expert on crosswords and it is only late on that Morse works out the clue left in the form of the numbers of form hymns left on display for the next service.

I can no longer remember the details the full details of the plot but the guilty man is the father who runs the post office, protecting his son who frustrated and bored with his expected life assistant is father after the death of his mother has been earning an income selling drugs obtained from the GP. The young man has supplied the secretarial student not knowing that she had a medical condition where the combination led to her premature death. The vicar is killed because he comes in on the scene where the post master is killing the GP

Morse also discovers that the scientist has accepted a post in the USA taking his widowed daughter and the grandson with them. Morse uses his newly acquired knowledge of the law to prevent the child being taken out of the country and in the final scene he sees off the girl reunited with her child on a coach to London thus commencing his career tendency to fight for the underdog and take an unconventional approach. The episode is called Girl

The first two deaths in the second episodes Fugue only appear connected because of references to the last words of different operas which Morse discovers. However early on I worked out who the villain was because of the similarity to another a story vaguely remembered. In that story a patient assumes the identity of a psychiatrist who he has killed. In this programme a psychiatrist comes forward to offer his assistance and who suggests someone else, someone who does not exist, a former patient who he suggests could be the killer.

It is however the editor of the local newspaper who remembers the case of a 15 year old boy who murdered his mother in a horrific way because of a phrase used at the time and then repeated in the present cycle of crimes which includes four of five planned murders and where the killer kidnaps a child to keep the authorities occupied while he carries out her fourth. The memory of the editor is a name and a residential location which unmasks the killer and his adopted identity,

he then kidnaps the sister of a talented but emotionally unstable concert pianists as another diversion so he can trap the intended victim - Inspector Thursday as a stand in for the Detective Inspector responsible for his previous capture and imprisonment. because of the opera connections. The others killed were witnesses and the judge.

Morse is brought back from general duties to assist and during the episode he receives a surface tummy flesh wound and prevents the killing of Thursday although in fairness it is Thursday whose fearless action prevents his own death.

Young Morse is given the opportunity of meeting Thursday wife, young adult son and daughter when he collapses from exhaustion. The episode is full of glorious music from grand opera and Morse is shown to have vinyl copies of the music plus the libretto’s from boxed editions. Albeit a single man in a well paid job I am nevertheless surprise that he was able to afford what would have been expensive items, The photography of Oxford at sun rise and sun set was also gorgeous. Despite his heroics and cleverness he is returned once more to general policing duties.

Mr Selfridge season 1 ends

The series on the creation of the Selfridge Store in Oxford Street is more rooted in fact although it also follows in the tradition of Upstairs and Downstairs and Downton Abbey. I previously introduced this ten week series recounting my own experience of the store and of departmental stores in Croydon where I was born and spent my childhood close by.

 

According to Wikipedia the creator of the enterprise started work at 14 he made his way to become a partner in the department store of Marshal Field in Chicago where he is said to have originated the Christmas Sale and x shopping days left to Christmas as well as the customer is always right. He married well and indeed it is argued that his wife was his backbone with his life rapidly deteriorated after her death. He grew up without a father which is an important factor and his mother lived with him for the greater part of his life until her death.

 

Coming to London on holiday with his wife he realised there was a great opportunity for an American style store. He purchased the buildings in Oxford Street before demolition and having the store purpose built to meet his purpose. His reported to have spent £400000 of his money. However in the TV series he is dependent on a financial backer who pulls out and on another backer introduced to him by an aristocratic married women socialite with a young lover and lots of good connections.

 

In the BBC production his wife was first portrayed as the responsible mother of his four children rather than a force behind the business. She is concerned at the business risks he takes and appears to accept that he takes up with young women but discretely and always returns to her and the family. In this instance he becomes infatuated with an actress who he employs to give publicity to the store and sets up with a property in St John’s Wood. She sees herself as the second Mrs Selfridge and when he decides to drop her she confronts his wife at the family home and attempts to commit suicide. She sets on a new course to become a serious actress with the help of Frank, the former editor of a newspaper drinking and gambling companion of Selfridge who when he loses his job turns to Selfridge for help unfortunately on a bad day and is turned away. Frank who always fancied the actress provides help in the rewriting of the play.

 

However Mrs Selfridge is also not the selfless woman initially presented when she meets an artist painter on a visit to a gallery and agrees to sit for him to create a portrait for her husband.  He is unaware who she is and becomes infatuated with her. She is attracted and considers responding to his advances but her upbringing makes her hold back. He retaliates by becoming acquainted with their eighteen year old daughter who with the help of Lady May comes out to London Society.  Selfridges realises that his wife and developed strong feelings and remains attracted and tempted. She considers taking her family including the eldest daughter back to America and Chicago.

 

Through the help of Lady May, King George decides to make his first visit to a store and comes for an evening shop complete with cash. He meets Mrs Selfridge and invites the couple to spend a weekend with him at Sandringham and we have seen what this could mean in the interpretation of the King by Poliakoff. Lady May then passes on the request of the King that that the Selfridges, his mother and eldest daughter should attend the opening of the new play, a satire, in which Selfridge’s mistress is the star. The play is a great attack on Selfridge his way of life and that of Lady, whose husband lives in the country while she lives in town. It is a great humiliation which result in their daughter realising what had been going on. It is he last straw for Mrs Selfridge who takes the children back to America shortly afterwards leaving Selfridge alone in London with his mother. In real life Mrs Selfridge died prematurely and Selfridge went on to become a man about town with several mistresses although he never remarried.

 

Playing Don Juan is not the only flaw in the man. He has dismissed one of the 1300 staff who stole medicines for her sick mother who dies. She is met by one of the other staff, a gentle hearted young woman while taking tea in a cafe adjacent to the store. She appeals to the head of staff to give the woman a reference but when approaches Selfridges he is refused and the woman then throws herself in front of a tube train leaving a letter to Selfridge not blaming him and saying that she is going to join her mother. The suicide which led to a number of store staff arriving late took place on the day Shackleton gives a talk at the store. His theme was about team work and he importance of acting and not putting the lives of others before ambition and this appears to have a positive affect on Selfridge, a man who intends well but lacks self control and relies on others. 

 

One of these is the stuffy disciplinarian head of staff but who also leads a double life. His wife has been an invalid for a number of years and at least once a week he stayed over with one of the departmental heads at the store and who he has been with for many years before this. When his wife dies she has the expectation they will marry but his first reaction is to insist on a temporary break. He then is taken with the young woman who appealed to him to give the sacked woman a reference. He asks her to marry keeping the engagement secret until he has opportunity to tell his former mistress. When she learns she is devastated and is even more shocked when he suggests that they should continue their previously illicit relationship. She has already agreed to attend a meeting of the suffragettes and consoles herself with this new involvement.

 

She has been invited to join the suffragettes by another head of department who shares the front of store one with perfume and cosmetics, a feature with Selfridge introduced from Paris and is now a common feature of all stores along with accessories. This brings me a senior assistant working for accessories. I previously reported that Selfridge on visiting another store in London had noted that the goods were not on display but kept in cupboards and drawers to prevent theft. He had persuaded a young assistant to show him all the gloves which led her to be sacked and following the announcement of staffing for his new store she had successfully approached him for a job, visiting his home.

 

She lives with her brother a rather weak young man who allows himself to be bullied by their father who becomes violent when drunk. They have moved away in secret to get away from him and she gets him a job in the store and packaging department. When the father returns and persuades her left him stay and then returns to his old ways, gets drunk and visits the store it is Selfridge who intervenes and buys him off to stay away.

 

She is courted by a waiter with ambition to own his own restaurant. He is sidetracked by being required to provide personal services for Lady May and who offers to fund his restaurant if he continues to meet her needs. She is a woman partial to young men but has grown tired of her previous attachment and his gambling debts.

 

Meanwhile the senior assistant has also developed her own love interest. She has caught the eye professionally of the window designer and close friend of Selfridge, a Frenchman who in turn has failed to capture the attention of a close friend and another creative designer who moves to New York. It was inevitable that the senior assistant and window designer should have an affair which continues until the head of the Perfume department finds out about the relationship and warns the senior assistant that they cannot afford to have relationships and remain employed as the store had a policy of not hiring married women, a custom which most enterprises also followed.

 

When the French woman returns and persuades him to go to New York the assistant and the waiter get back together as he has broken off with Lady May when he finds out she has no intention of financing the restaurant. It is the waiter who also prevents her brother being arrested and sack as eh unwittingly has become part of scam where goods ordered for the firm and resold elsewhere by staff, he takes a shine to a female assistant who eventually agrees to go out with him to the pictures. The series ends at Selfridge now alone finds the young man still working late at night and encourages him by saying that he started out in the same way. The young man comments that Selfridge has everything including his fine family laving Selfridge to rue his fate.

 

The last word is not for Selfridge but for the great Lady May. A suffrage sponsor, a collector of adorable young men, she has advanced the cause of Selfridge, his wife and his daughter. She is also the butt of the new satirical play but we suspect she will survive better then Selfridge. No doubt we shall find out more when the series returns.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dancing on the Edge

The interesting and intriguing series Dancing on the Edge came to an end a week ago with the promise of an epilogue interview the purpose of which was not clear and which was shown on Sunday evening. When the series commenced I was not sure where it was going in terms of an encounter with one of central London Masonic lodges for the aristocracy, the rich and the politically powerful based in a hotel, or why the series included a son of King George as well as appearances from himself. King George who also appears in the last episode of ten in the Series on the opening of Selfridges   store in London which also ended on Sunday,

 

Dancing on the Edge is written by Stephen Poliakoff whose work is always interesting and some times controversial and this is his first TV production for over five years. I was attracted by the advance publicity that at its core was to be a Jazz band but this proved to be a sideshow for his exploration of the role of the Masons in British Society before the Second World War and the extent of racism against Jews and non white people. Although historical for the generation of today the work is a contemporary one for me and is likely to prove a commentary on “Society” today in much the same way Selfridges also had several stings, especially in the last trio of episodes and where the involvement of Royalty was have a bearing on the outcome.

 

Stanley Mitchell  Matthew Goode) is a creative journalist editor (with a  typing assistant who he beds called Rosie) for the Musical Express where he appears to live most of the time although he has a home with his working class single parent  mother. I used to buy the New Musical Express in the late 1950’s along with Melody Maker, two weekly papers which published information on Jazz. The NME was created only in 1952. I am sure the NME will have enjoyed the publicity whereas Royalty and the Masons will not and it is interesting the limited extent to which there is mention in Wikipedia article which in several respect and unusually, is a travesty of this richly textured work

 

The young editor catches only the end of the set of a black jazz swing band and suggests that with his help he can get them into the big time especially if they employ a singer. They get two, friends, one pretty Billy Holiday looking, the other not unattractive but with a bulkier red hot mama frame. This has significance!

 

Stanley gets them a job with a posh London hotel which tends to attract elderly conventional customers who have no experience or interest in jazz or contact with black men before. The deal is that the band will bring a new generation much like the position of the Tory Party today, where at Eastleigh the Party has only a hundred elderly members or the Catholic Church which elected a South American Argentinean of Italian parents as Pope.

 

When the band performs one evening they please a table of aristocrats. The most influential appears to be Arthur Donaldson a wealthy man played by Anthony Head who develops into a treacherous and dangerous man who has two young children with him who he claims are a nephew and niece but the implication is that he is a paedophile and they are orphans. One of his friends is a son of King George.

 

Also at the table are a brother and sister whose parents are anti Jewish and racists. The young man played by Julian Luscombe (Tom Hughes) appears a weak, emotionally disturbed and dependent on his sister Pamela (Joanna Vanderham) who appears to take an interest in Stanley. Sarah is the English born daughter of a Russian immigrant who is an amateur artistic photographer and takes an interest in the piano playing band leader Louis Lester (Chiswetel Ejiofor) English born but assumed to be American whose mother worked for a succession of rich families and became devout Christian. He obtained work on ocean liners which in additional episode provided him the opportunity to listen to the lives of the worldly that carried on as if he was not here. The band is managed by another English born man who lived in the USA for many years and where there is an arrest warrant. Julian is a kind of assistant to an American tycoon who uses the hotel as his UK base Walter Masterson (John Goodman), one of the richest men in the world.

 

The band is only given a short term contract at the hotel until asked to play at a Garden Party at the home of Walter although the guests although the small number of guests view the band at a distance in the house but where they emerge one of the party is a son of the King who plays with the band and takes an interest in the lead singer lead singer Jesse. When the Prince visits the band at the hotel they are made, helped by the publicity given to the band in the Music Paper.

 

The band are given a long term contract and allowed to use musician’s quarters at the hotel and with the increasing attention the singers are allowed to use the hotel main entrance. Louis helps out John Goodman when a young aristocratic woman is found battered in his suite. Goodman takes up the leading members of the band and invites them on a picnic which takes place using a private train which appears to have the freedom of the railway and which takes them to the country home of Lady Lavinia Cremone played by Jacqueline Bisset, (who also has a suite at the Imperial), and is also a fan of the Musical Express which she has in bound copies because of her love of Jazz but is now a recluse following the death of her two sons in the Great War. She thinks the band and singer great when they play for her and is it she who arranges for a BBC big wig to listen to the band in the original Jazz cellar which he attends reluctantly until finding a Prince present.

 

The band then becomes internationally famous and makes records after the BBC do a live broadcast from the hotel in the presence of Royalty. The band is asked to play at a service dinner at a regimental headquarters in the presence of the King. The King dances with the wife of the commanding officer who realises she will be expected to sleep with the King for the night. Meanwhile the world of Louis is about to fall apart.

 

After performing the service for Goodman Louis and Stanley had been shown a peep hole at the hotel by Julian enabled them to see members of one of the London Masonic Lodges for the powerful and rich in the basement of the hotel. Goodman and Walter are also members.  It was not immediately clear the significance which this reference to the Masons was going to have in the series. The development of a sexual relationship between Louis and Sarah and between Matthew and Pamela is also unclear in its significance and I remain unsure how Sarah became part of this circle of the aristocracy and the super rich.

 

Stanley also develops a positive friendship with Lady Cremone who he interviews and places on the front cover. Matthew and Goodman also develop a friendship.

 

Julian coverts Jesse and persuades her to pretend she is unwell and not to attend the dinner at which the King will be present because he has arranged for her to meet a Hollywood film producer. Louis is concerned about the situation and returns early from the dinner at which the second singer comes to the fore and impresses.

Jesse joins Julian, Pamela and Sarah at the hotel, seemingly quickly recovered and Julian and she go upstairs. Louis then finds Jesse battered and close to death and is sure as we the audience that Julian is at the end of the corridor. Julian departs taking leave of his sister late to join Goodman in Paris. The nation is shocked by what happens and one possible avenue being followed by the police is a fan some of whom had commenced to follow her and they now vigil outside the hospital.

 

Louis is interviewed by the police and is not regarded as a suspect. He tells them of his concerns about Julian however when the police check and report back that there are two witnesses who saw Julian on the scheduled boat train and  he has his passport appropriately stamped.

 

The band plays at the hotel at Christmas before a party   from the German Embassy who walks out on seeing that the band is Black. Julian and Stanley arrange for the band to play at German Embassy which causes another walk out. The band is invited to play for the Mason’s at the Imperial Hotel. Louis discovers that the two witness who said they had seen Julian on the train ferry are members of the Lodge. It later emerges that Goodman had arranged for his private plane to get Julian to Paris and that officials are assisting in the cover up. Why Goodman went to Paris by the boat train is therefore a mystery or perhaps my memory of this aspect is faulty.

 

The performance before the Masons ends quickly with the news of the attempt on the life of the USA president. Goodman takes the party to premises which he has acquired for the expansion of the Musical Express to listen to a long wave radio. He has suddenly shown great interest in the magazine offering Matthew the Editorship at a fantastic salary, with Sarah the professional photographer which he sees as the way forward. He also persuades Lady Cremone to become his agent in charge. The current owner had brought in a co editor to develop the paper to cover radio and other technological developments. He is also to feature in the new enterprise as a kind of Chief Executive. Everyone is being well paid to work for Goodman except Pamela, something which she comments on.

 

New Year is spent back at the estate of Lady Cremone and in the village which is on the estate. Julian reappears explaining that he has been in France developing the idea to create a business selling British made Cheeses. Louis tells Sarah of his concerns about Julian which she disregards.  Goodman who refers to Julian as the son he never had  and is moving back full time to the USA and wants Julian to be with him.  Julian’s fascist mother thinks this is a great idea but Julian is concerned about losing the influence of sister. She spent Christmas day with Stanley at the home of is mother.

 

When Jesse who seemed to be recovering and regaining consciousness has a relapse and dies, Louis is wanted by the Police for her murder, goes on the run and finds that everyone turns against him.  Not only does he band lose it contract at the hotel but the American owners visit but want to sell the property for the site to be converted into apartments. The Masons also look for another hotel.  Louis goes to see Arthur who promises help through his solicitor. However Arthur emerges in his true colours as he has contacted the police. Arthur had previously offered to help the band’s manager establish his British status thus avoiding extradition to the USA but fails suggesting he wanted the manager out of the way to be able to exercise greater influence over the band, Louis and the female singers

 

Louis gets away and comes to Stanley for help who hides him with suburban relatives where he is joined by Sarah about whom he is suspicious. Goodman has posted a large reward for the capture of Louis and used the press to ensure that everyone is on the lookout for him. Lady Cremone who with everyone else turns her back on Louis begins to query why Goodman has adopted such an aggressive position. Stanley and Sarah also begin to realise that something more sinister is to hand but all appear to accept that Julian with his alibi had nothing to do with the assault and death of Jesse.

 

Louis is still wearing his DJ and therefore conspicuous and leaving Stanley’s relatives because neighbours have called him police they use the premises of a bowling club to change into clothes brought by Sarah and Stanley then takes Louis to hide at the Jazz club where the band originally played above which there is a dance studio. The owner manager is reluctant to provide sanctuary especially as she has a function.

 

An elaborate plan is devised for the band including its singer to take boat train to France with the help of money from Pamela and Sarah. One problem is that the second singer does not have a passport. Louis nevertheless makes his escape to France and we later learn that he has made his way to Marseilles where is able to earn living from his music. Lady Cremone saves the hotel and has the rest of the band on contract to play a set in which the music of Jesse is kept alive. The Musical Express returns to its original premises with Stanley in charge once again.

 

Julian fails to make his Rendezvous with Goodman to go to America and takes a hand gin from his parent’s home and goes to the home of Arthur where it appears he is going to kill the man although why is not clear. Arthur takes him to meet Goodman at a train station where again it looks as if Julian intends to kill both of them. Instead he gives a confession to waitress and commits suicide. Arthur and Goodman quickly leave.  Sarah was force to reveal the location of Louis blackmailed by the British Secret Service who threatens to revoke her father’s permission to reside in the UK. She now says she will find Louis.

 

The postscript episode comprises the incomplete interview between Stanley and Louis and which suggests a follow up series. Louis has told Stanley to interview Jesse before her death) and she talks of fan mail she has been getting and that some of it is quite weird although the significance of this is unclear.

 

Louis then tells   the story that he was telephoned by the wife of a friend of Pamela who needed to tell him something, although why she needed to tell him is not clear. Her husband is one of those belonging to the Masonic Lodge he had spied on with Louis. She tells of another lodge at another hotel much grander, where there was one member who foretold of the great crash and advised members on how to survive the happening but they had largely ignored him. He had then warned of the Second World War. Louis had told Stanley about this before his flight to France making him promise not print anything because his informant appeared frightened of her husband. It was not clear to me if she was the same young woman who Louis had rescued from Goodman’s apartment or someone different. Stanley says he intends to follow this up.

 

Poliakoff has written the series full of implied conspiracies with the ability of the rich and powerful to operate outside the law and with the assistance of the law and the state to then cover up and if necessary frame others. He ahs also set the series in such a way as to imply real life events. I once heard a conversation on a flight to Gibraltar in which two worldly and educated men stated that forces within the USA had been responsible for 9/11. This series had a similar feel and a host of inanswered questions and issues.