IAN HYLAND on last night’s telly
Cliff Richard: 60 Years In Public And Private, ITV ★★ H aving spoiled us with nightly I’m A Celebrity delights, I fear ITV’s cupboard may now be bare. Sure, the narrator did her best to make this documentary/album promo sound like a big deal.
“We’ve been given exclusive access to Cliff Richard” was a rather empty boast though. For a start, I doubt ITV had fought off an aggressive rival bid from the BBC. More worryingly, as this hour-long film wore on we discovered what exclusive access to Cliff really means. Cliff chatting to fans and posing for selfies at his vineyard in Portugal.
Cliff visiting Abbey Road studios to record an interview with Paul Gambaccini – for a different TV show.
Cliff delivering a (miserly) tray of beers to a Wimbledon car park attendant to thank him for his hard work.
And Cliff playing tennis and doing a sound check before a gig in Newcastle.
Turns out Cliff is a private person or – as he put it – “I refuse to be fodder to journalism”.
That’s his right, of course.
It just makes it hard for a fly-on-the-wall journalists to fill an hour.
To be fair, Cliff also told of his four-year ordeal following that infamous police raid. Thing is, he’d
already “exclusively” given pretty much the same interview to Jonathan Ross and Gloria Hunniford – both on ITV.
Still, this lack of content did mean we were got some fine anecdotal filler from Cliff’s showbiz pals. I particularly enjoyed Janet Street-Porter’s personal take on Cliff’s sexuality. “Maybe Cliff was never interested in sex. Maybe he looked really sexy but he just wasn’t interested in sex.” Maybe, Janet. Or maybe he just wasn’t that into you, dear?
‘‘ I doubt ITV had fought off an aggressive rival bid from the BBC