It was Woodward and Bernstein who made me want to become a journalist. This was back in the day when journos were heroic and portrayed as such, without irony, in films and television shows. Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein were the reporters who broke the Watergate story, which led, perhaps circuitously, to the downfall of Richard Nixon.
In those days I loved their leftwing, campaigning newspaper, The Washington Post, and reviled Tricky Dicky. I have since reversed my position on both. It wasn’t just Alan Pakula’s film All The President’s Men, magnificent though that was, that inspired me. There was also Lou Grant, its title character played by that charming old leftie Ed Asner, and its team of reporters at the Los Angeles Tribune, including one whom I modelled myself on, Joe Rossi.
I watched a rerun of Lou Grant recently and Rossi came across as obnoxious and hilariously useless, so my role model was well chosen. My point, though, is that those were the Seventies — days when there was a rather agreeable, wide-eyed acceptance that we hacks were on the side of the angels, fighting to uncover the lies and perfidy of the establishment, quite often while enjoying seedy, drunken sex with women who patiently tolerated our multitude of personal flaws.
Edward Asner as Lou Grant
CBS VIA GETTY IMAGES
You couldn’t say the same thing now, could you? The noble journo, as a trope, has disappeared. We are more often scorned for being a part of the very establishment we were meant to hold to account. Or just scorned, full stop. Fair enough.
The nadir for our reputation has been reached in The Paper (Sky Max/Now), in which the newspaper, the Toledo Truth Teller, is the least valuable part of its parent company’s portfolio and, in terms of earnings and status, ranks way below both the branch that produces lavatory paper and the one that does cardboard.
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The few hacks there are idle and stupid, and the paper is filled by cutting and pasting such stories as “You won’t believe how much Ben Affleck tipped his driver”, described by the managing editor — the ludicrous Esmeralda Grand, horribly overplayed by Sabrina Impacciatore — as being a great example of the paper’s “long-form journalism”. That is one of the better lines from episode one. If not the only one.
The Paper is a kind of offshoot of The Office (American version), and the same mockumentary technique is employed. Trouble is, while I thought the British version of The Office was a work of something close to genius, the hugely successful American franchise left me cold, despite my admiration for Steve Carell. Insufficiently cruel, insufficiently self-aware, insufficiently funny.
I found precisely the same problems with The Paper and was unconvinced by Domhnall Gleeson as the new editor-in-chief, an ingenu who wishes to restore the Truth Teller to journalistic glory. But I suppose if you were among the many who really liked the American version of The Office, this might draw some sort of wretched laugh from your spavined nucleus accumbens.
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That probably also means you’ll be OK with Taskmaster (Channel 4), which is somehow back for its 20th series, the ghosts of Reeves and Mortimer still haunting almost every utterance from its awkwardly convened cast. In the first episode, the contestants — comedians of varied abilities — were enjoined to bring something for the host, Greg Davies, that was pleasantly “soft”. Reece Shearsmith brought a mechanical fortune-telling raven, which at least demonstrated a kind of Vic’n’Bobbish vault of imagination.
Taskmaster with Greg Davies and Alex Horne is back for its 20th series
CHANNEL 4
Otherwise, it was slightly tired silliness and whimsy, perfectly inoffensive and at times close to amusing, but never possessing the edge you got with Reeves and Mortimer, which left you wondering how close to true derangement the two of them actually were. Taskmaster has a big cult following and Davies is a likeable, laconic host. But I can’t quite sign up. I like a little more grit in my oyster.
Meanwhile, my enjoyment of The Rumour (5) was ruined because I couldn’t work out where it was set. My OCD is to blame for this, not the programme-makers. I thought maybe somewhere like Letchworth — beyond the M25 but not more than 50 miles from London.
Anyway, the shtick is this. A single mum, Joanna (Rachel Shenton), moves to “Flinstead” (deffo Letchworth, I’m telling you) and ingratiates herself with the mums at the school gates by suggesting to them that a notorious child killer has also moved to the town. That’s all it takes. From then on, the rumour mill does its reliable grinding and trouble is afoot.
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It should have been called: “Why Are Women Always So Bloody Nosy?” Because they so often are, aren’t they? Endlessly jabbering to one another, sotto voce — it’s why they make better journalists than either Woodward or Bernstein could have dreamt of being. Anyway, the excellent Emily Atack plays one of the rather catty and cliquey school mums and Joanna’s kid looks like a girl but is referred to as a boy at every turn so I don’t really know what the hell is going on. I will stick with it for a bit, until it becomes clear to me that it’s not Letchworth at all but Welwyn Garden City, or Basildon, or Bicester (although I haven’t seen hordes of Chinese shoppers heading for the outlet centre).
Can someone please have a word with Adil Ray? Please tell him he doesn’t need to try to work every word guessed by contestants on his show Lingo (ITV Quiz) into a sentence. I’ve got into the habit now of guessing how he’s going to do it and it is detracting from my enjoyment of the proceedings.
A contestant will guess at “final” and Mr Ray OBE (pour quoi?) will immediately say something like: “And is that the FINAL guess?” I don’t want to criticise Ray too much because however much he succumbs to his penchant for making stupid puns he is still better by far, a million times over, than RuPaul, who has hosted celebrity editions of the same show.
The other night, there were a couple of Brummies who had guessed three of the four letters of their word in order. The board read “WAN*” and the Brummies were laughing themselves stupid. From old Adil, though, there was not even a flicker of recognition, or mirth, or censure. He just ploughed right on. I was yearning for the lads to say “K!” but of course it never happened. The word was wand. Still, child that I am, it kept me chuckling for a few minutes, which is all we can hope for from life.
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