"The Reckoning" - A Personal View

 

"The Reckoning", which is a four-part TV series about the late and unlamented Jimmy Savile, played by Steve Coogan, both of whom are seen above, concludes on BBC 1 tomorrow night. It has received a mixed reaction from the media, and I shall be drawing on two reviews, one from The Guardian and the other from The Independent to provide insight. I shall begin, however, by relating a personal experience that shows how much Savile was part of our national life for many years before he died.

In the very early 90s, I was teaching a Year 5 class at a school in Liverpool. Two very nice young girls wanted to send a fan letter to Sting (I forget why). Nowadays, I could find contact details on the internet, but in those days it was next to impossible to find contact details of that kind. Instead, I suggested to the girls that we could write to Jim'll Fix It, asking Savile to pass the letter on to Sting. We did, first receiving a reply from the BBC, and then one from Sting's PA, promising to ask Sting to write back to them upon his return to the UK (Sting never did write back). 

I think this illustrates the widespread trust that existed for JS at that time. Fortunately for the girls, they never met the old roue, but, after Savile was exposed as the pervert that he was, years later, I breathed a huge sigh of relief. The two girls involved will now be in their 40s, but were I  to meet them again, I would offer them an apology. Still, my story, insignificant as it is, is yet another example of how JS hoodwinked the vast majority of us, from me, all the way up to Margaret Thatcher and The Pope. 

So how did Savile do it? "The Reckoning" sets out to answer that, but has drawn criticism from before, and during screening. As we all knew, this was a highly sensitive subject, which promised to reawaken victim trauma and public revulsion at Savile's vile crimes. Yet, as The Independent says:

"... despite the obvious futility and derangement of the undertaking, BBC One has given it a go anyway... The trauma of Savile is still fresh for many of his victims, who have only had since his death in 2011 to process it openly. (It should be noted that several of them collaborate on this show and appear as talking heads.) But, more strikingly, how can you turn the story of Savile... into entertainment?

Concern for the victims in understandable, but, having watched the series, I would not class it as entertainment. After all, we watch films about wartime, based on fact, that are far more gruesome than "The Reckoning". Admittedly, there have been a number of hard-hitting documentaries made about this issue, but sometimes, dramatization can have greater impact. There are problems with that process, but we'll come to that.

The Independent goes on to say that the whole programme is founded upon the strength of Savile's charisma, which reduces all other characters in the drama to gullible dupes, apart from a perceptive view:

"In the end, it is Coogan (often a magnetic performer himself) as Savile, a whirlwind of malign glamour, that holds the eye".

I find this rather a puzzling criticism to make. After all, JS is the central character, and as Steve Coogan said about the divisive reception to the programme in "Leeds Live":

"I think that's because Jimmy Savile played a trick on the entire nation so there’s a real feeling of antagonism about it. But you need to look at someone like that to understand how they’re able to operate and to prevent it happening again. If you sweep it under the carpet and just don’t talk about it anymore, then those people are destined to come back."

And I support that; if war films remind us how terrible war is, "The Reckoning" reminds us to be alert for the return of another Savile (which God forbid).

Anyone who has not watched the programmes will naturally be concerned about how Savile's crimes are portrayed. We are dealing here with sexual abuse of all kinds, from indecent exposure to rape. However, as The Guardian says (and I agree): 

"The scenes in which he terrorises, assaults or rapes girls, young women and occasionally young men – at home, in clubs, in hospitals, anywhere – are handled very well. I don’t think I have seen many dramas that evoke that particular terror so well..".

The Guardian, though, finds that the series offers no comprehensive analysis or convincing explanation for why Savile committed his crimes. It does tentatively, and with no evidence, suggest that he felt rejected as a child by his mother - "The Duchess". The Guardian suggests that more attention should have been given:

"..to the failures of NHS staff to protect their patients at the various hospitals Savile was allowed unfettered access to, to editors caving in to pressures to shut down a Fleet Street exposé, and the many other failings by individuals and institutions.."

All these were deplorable failures, and the BBC does get off rather lightly, but dramatization can only cover so much. The Reckoning, to be fair, at least points to the need to ask further questions, as well as call for vigilance.

I do have one criticism of the programme, though...

The young lady in the photo was named Claire McAlpine. She was a regular attender of Top of the Pops  broadcast audiences, Tragically, she died from an overdose in March 1971, just 15 years old. She had been seen entering Savile's BBC dressing room more than once and had written in her diary about having sex with a presenter in a hotel. Savile was questioned after her mother discovered what had happened. True to form, he denied everything, even though a photo was produced that showed him with Claire - with his hand on the girl's bottom.

Curiously - at least to me - Claire's case is not portrayed factually in "The Reckoning". Instead, a character called Sara, a 15-year old Asian girl, played by the actress, Tia Dutt, seen below, echoes Claire's story. Sara is driven to suicide by overdose, like Claire McAlpine.

For "dramatic purposes", the BBC, when probed by the Daily Mail, decided to use the character of Sara to symbolise all of Saville's victims from his Top of the Pops days: A BBC spokesman insisted: 

'Sara is not Claire McAlpine. We know many of Savile's victims were driven to thoughts of suicide and the drama has a duty to reflect the impact of his abuse in full."

This was not accepted by businesswoman Kelly Gold, a friend of Claire McAlpine and who says that she herself was assaulted by Savile. Ms Gold says:

"I don't know why they changed Claire's character to be Asian. Also they said she left a suicide note but Claire actually left a diary, naming more than just Savile." (My italics - Blogmeister).

Mark Williams-Thomas, the investigator who blew the lid on Savile, remarked on the story:

 'It has made me very annoyed and has really undermined the integrity of the series...This massive deviation from a very important fact shows no sensitivity to Claire as a victim of abuse.'

Upon consideration, I have to agree with this point. I accept that there was a need for dramatization for artistic purposes and narrative pace, but I think that the late Claire McAlpine deserved recognition as Savile's only known fatality. This is no disrespect to the living victims, some of whom appear in the series.
 To conclude, I would refer the reader to a poll conducted about "The Reckoning" by Leeds Live. Leeds has good reason to feel sore about Savile, as Leeds Live says:  

"For many, the unmasking of Savile is still incredibly raw, particularly for those in Leeds where the former entertainer resided in Roundhay Park."

Leeds Live asked readers to vote on whether the BBC were right to screen "The Reckoning". They say:

" We’ve had an overwhelming response from our readers to the poll. Perhaps, surprising to some, 67 per cent of our audience feel the The Reckoning should have been made with 33 per cent feeling differently. These figures are correct at time of publication."

I can only end by saying that I found this programme of interest. Despite what The Independent and others say, I did gain fresh insight and food for thought. In fact, it confirmed my suspicion that Savile had been only too ready to use violence against his victims when he was young enough (there is an enjoyable scene in the final programme where a young nurse pushes the aging Savile out of her way and calls him a dirty old man). Altogether, this is a divisive programme, albeit with some fine acting, especially by Steve Coogan. This is a lame way to end, but I can only urge interested readers to watch "The Reckoning" and draw their own conclusions.