The Herald - The Herald Magazine
TV review It is never too soon for a history lesson on The Donald
ALISON ROWAT
INITIAL reaction when seeing the listing for
it was too soon. The US Senate had just begun the impeachment trial of the 45th President, and here was a new documentary series attempting to fix his place in the history of international diplomacy.
It was like taking an accident report from someone lying dazed and confused at the foot of the stairs. When it comes to The Donald, most of the world is still at the stage of, “Huh, what just happened, where are we?” and will be for some time yet.
Then again, this three-parter was from Norma Percy, the producer behind Inside Europe: Ten Years of Turmoil, which charted the long road to Brexit, and The Death of Yugoslavia, among many other standout documentaries. Percy’s films specialise in hearing from the people who were in the room when history was made, be they an adviser, minister or prime minister. If someone has something illuminating, amusing or gossipy (particularly the latter) to contribute, they’re in.
Sure enough, the first film covered much we already knew, the withdrawal from the Paris Accord on climate change, the train wreck Nato meeting, the disastrous press conference when the American President sided with Vladimir Putin against his own agencies. But it was the colour the talking heads provided that brought history alive.
One observer spoke of the US President “careening from topic to topic like a squirrel caught in traffic”. Another adviser considered faking a medical emergency just so the cringeinducing awfulness of the Russia-US press conference would stop.
Then there was former British Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt, who had given an interview to Fox News that was mildly flattering about the President. Trump rushed to congratulate him, later telling everyone in earshot: “I don’t know who the hell that guy is, but he’s doing a great job.”
Oh Donald, missing you already. Or maybe not.
Newsflash: Scotland has been invaded. Follow-up newsflash: I think we survived. Last summer, you will recall, staycationing was all the rage, not least among celebrities making travel programmes.
Among the first of the resulting shows to surface was
Dame Darcey was thrilled to be island hopping on the west coast. Having heard all about the country from her Glasgow-born grandfather, Tommy, it had been a lifelong ambition to visit.
She saw an otter fishing, tried her hand at weaving, had a go at Scottish step dancing and ate freshly collected scallops at the lochside, having been shown how to collect the meat. “I shucked the scallop out of the shell,” she said in a “rain in Spain” way.
That sentence could have gone so wrong, but we were always in safe hands with Dame Darcey. There was nothing here you had not seen many times before, but her enthusiasm was engaging, and I could look at that perfect posture of hers for hours.
found the ab fab one in Scotland. She went to Harris wearing a Jean Muir tweed coat (natch), Eilean Donan Castle, Corryvreckan, a distillery, passed by Jura, and drove around Glasgow with Janey Godley in an old bus. Joanna Lumley is 74 and I want to be exactly like her when I grow up.
I’m delighted to say that Glasgow still has a horse in the race that is
Even better, Barbara Romani is coming further out of her shell. In the opening week she seemed reluctant to speak up for herself; this week she assumed control of her team faster than you could say “room divider”.
“I cannot be on that couch again,” she vowed, referring to the sofa where losers are given their marching orders.
Barbara had made a 3-D computer model of the office the teams had been asked to design, and by Jehovah she was going to use it. The model was a smart move because it allowed the designers to keep everything in proportion. Amy could have done with one. The first sign she might be in trouble was when she suggested putting two swings in the office. It was almost as daft an idea as Peter’s ping-pong table.
But Amy’s piece de resistance was a over-sized, tiered seating area made out of cheap wood, which Carr called “a plywood Stonehenge”. Amy went to the losers couch. She was not coming back.
Carr is proving to be the star of this series, jollying everyone along and keeping the laughs coming. I’m particularly loving the way he sends each loser off with cries of, “She’ll have an amazing career”, after everything he has said about their creations.
As for our Barbara, her team’s office was praised as a professional looking job. There can be no higher compliment among interior designers it seems. Next week there are bedrooms to be given a luxury makeover. Come on the Babs!
What’s the story?
Grand Tours of Scotland’s Lochs.
Aren’t we still in lockdown?
Correct. This is a TV programme. You don’t need to leave the sofa.
Tell me more.
Paul Murton returns with a new six-part series – the fourth to date – in celebration of the nation’s lochs and lochans. The opening episode finds him on Skye, travelling from Loch Snizort to Loch Dunvegan and into the heart of the Cuillin mountains.
His packed itinerary includes learning about the singer Donovan’s one-time dream of a hippy colony, going in search of a Viking ship canal, being given a crash course in the intricacies of spear throwing, and delving into the fascinating tale of mythical Celtic warrior woman Scathach.
Murton also stands atop what he describes as “the roof of the West Coast.”
The roof?
He tackles one of the longest rock climbs in the Cuillins – and Scotland – the Dubhs Ridge.
What about future episodes?
Well, there’s Loch Glashan to Loch Shira; Kinlochleven to Loch Laggan; the lochs of the northern Trossachs to Loch Tay; Loch Hourn to the Great Glen; and finally, the forgotten lochs of Morvern and a loch that never was.
When can I watch?
Grand Tours of Scotland’s Lochs begins on BBC One Scotland, Wednesday, 7.30pm.
SUSAN SWARBRICK
ALISON ROWAT
HELICOPTERS have become such an accepted part of the television news landscape they barely merit mention any more. If a story needs an aerial shot to capture the extent of flooding, say, the size of a protest march, or any live event, up go the choppers. Did you ever wonder, though, who first had the idea?
has the answer, and what a story it is. Matt Yoka’s film for the Storyville documentary strand is a tale of changing fortunes; for the City of Angels in which it is set, for the news business, and above all for the couple at its core.
Marika Gerrard and Bob Tur met at university in Los Angeles. She remembers that he always had a video camera with him. For their first date they went to take pictures of the latest victim of the Skid Row Slasher. Other evenings were spent visiting the scenes of car crashes, air accidents, and fires. It was never just a movie or dinner with
Tur. She found him exciting, “irresistible”. Gerrard had fallen for a news junkie.
The two turned their interest into a business, the Los Angeles News Service. Equipped with a radio scanner, a fast car and a truck load of chutzpah, they chased stories in the city the way some go after storms, selling the footage on to the ever growing number of news shows. After a while, Tur started to grow exasperated with the hellish LA traffic. He had an idea, and the rest was TV news history.
Over the course of an awardwinning, 20 years-plus career, Gerrard and Tur captured the LA riots, were the first on the scene for OJ Simpson’s white Bronco flight, and notched up many other scoops.
Professionally and financially they were a success. Personally was something else, for Tur in particular.
Tur’s tendency to shoot everything, from inside the