Forget ‘gritty’ realism, we just want escapism
of chocolates they are bound to appreciate more readily a savoury snack. It follows that a person who spends their life glued to the small screen sits up and takes more notice when something challenging appears. For “challenging” you can substitute “gritty” (a word that TV critics love), “edgy” (another favourite), or “stimulating”. Now, most of us enjoy being stimulated. The difference is that we are stimulated from nine till five in our daily jobs and when it comes to 6pm we are only too happy to pour a measure of our favourite drink and flop down in the company of something soothing, amusing or transporting. We can cope with “stimulating”, and even “enriching”, but “gritty” and “edgy” can, if encountered too frequently, lead to brain fatigue and world-weariness, not to mention ill-temper and depression. So it is, that you will find Mrs T and myself happily watching repeats of Foyle’s War, Lewis, Endeavour, Inspector Lynley and, when all else fails, Poirot. I say “when all else fails” simply because we have seen most of them at least four times. That’s not to say that period dramas are our only predilection. I am a sucker for Grand Designs and Mrs T will chuckle along with Frasier and Everybody Loves Raymond while she’s ironing. We’ve passed on The Village and Broadchurch but loved The West Wing and Bleak House. Does this make us brainless couch potatoes? I don’t think so. Are we fugitives from reality? No; we face up to it all day every day; and we are avid readers and theatregoers. But, aside from the news and weather, we like television to take us out of ourselves for a while and that’s something we don’t get from EastEnders and the increasingly gloomy Coronation Street. Like The Archers, both these soaps are now too busy emulating real life. Don’t they realise that we have enough of that at home? Not that our own life compares in any way to that of EastEnders or Corrie, heaven forbid, but I can have my fill of divorces, murders, car and plane crashes, arson attacks, grievous bodily harm and the like thanks to the daily news. Time was when Coronation Street offered humour and pathos as well as drama; now it seems to exist on a diet of argument and tragedy. Our detective series might give us all of this and more but the issues are decorously handled, which is appealing at the end of a challenging day. Of course, we could watch the goings on in Big Brother and I’m a Celebrity… Get me Out of Here! But I have always been a great one for avoiding confrontation, and watching someone meet it head on twice nightly is not my idea of entertainment. A trouble shared is, after all, a trouble dragged out till bedtime, and if you are going to watch somebody else’s troubles it is preferable that they are beautifully filmed and held at arm’s length by virtue of being historic. Downton Abbey still suits me fine and until it returns I shall be happy to sit in front of Indian Summers with that lovely Julie Walters. Work tomorrow; escapist pleasure tonight.