Television
Andrew Billen - Purple haze
Published 06 March 2006
Television - A tale of 1970s corruption is an exercise in confused nostalgia, writes Andrew Billen
The Lavender List (BBC4)
A few years ago I happened to no-tice on my shelves a book by Joe Haines, Harold Wilson's former press officer, entitled The Politics of Power: the inside story of life at No 10. "Never," claimed the blurb on the paperback, "has a book made such an impact - now read for yourself the book which has become the biggest news story in history." I was naturally impressed by the perspicacity of my 19-year-old self in spending 85 pence on this remarkable document. I would have been even more so had I been able to recall what this biggest news story "in history" actually was.
Now BBC4 has reminded me. The Lavender List (9pm, 1 March) was a drama-documentary built on Haines's "sensational" claim that the Labour prime minister's resignation honours list of 1976 had been compiled by his kitchen-cabinet rival, Marcia Williams, now Lady Falkender, who had written her chums' names on a sheet of her lavender-coloured notepaper. Although no sources were credited, it can be assumed that the playwright, the meticulous journalist and biographer Francis Wheen, gleaned further details from the 2003 autobiography of Wilson's former policy adviser Ber-nard Donoughue, Donoughue's Downing Street Diary of last summer and from Joe Haines's most recent book, Glimmers of Twilight: Harold Wilson in decline, which claimed that Williams became such a danger to the regime and her boss's health that Wilson's doctor, the late Joe Stone, suggested bumping her off.
What we can be sure of is that nothing much was taken from the lady's book, Downing Street in Perspective, a 1983 effort which did not, as I recall, contain the biggest news story in history. Lady Falkender's contribution to this TV history did not extend beyond the programme's concluding caption: "She denies having an affair with Harold Wilson. She also says he authored the resignation honours list." Given the defamation laws and the fact that, unlike her boss, she is still alive and kicking (or at least still attending the Lords), Wheen and the BBC took quite a risk taking the men's word against hers.
The producer, Alison Willett, chose video footage to give an impressionistic account of a period of industrial chaos, mainland terrorism and mounting distrust of Wilson - on one side by the unions, blackmailed into a "social contract" to reduce wage claims, and on the other by the far right, which had potentially useful contacts in the armed services. Interiors were darkly lit and filled with smoke - Wilson was actually more a cigar than a pipe smoker - so it was hard to see the period detail, but it was probably near enough the No 10 bunker of the day.
There was one night-time shot, outside Downing Street, in which Kenneth Cranham looked extraordinarily like the late-vintage Wilson. Otherwise, it was not much of an impersonation, Cranham's Wilson being more avuncular and northern than my memory of the man. The cuddlesome portrayal, however, was part of the programme's thesis. Wilson had re-entered office as a shadow of his slick 1960s self: aware that senile dementia was clouding him, and best friends with the brandy bottle. Every day, and in every way, he became nicer and nicer. By the end, all he wanted was to fulfil the promise of John Betjeman's tribute to his wife: "Dear Mary/Yes, it will be bliss/To go with you by train to Diss,/Your walking shoes upon your feet;/We'll meet, my sweet, at Liverpool Street" (except that, by resignation day, Harold was unable to recall how the verse actually went).
The mystery of Wilson's retirement was no mystery at all then: he was old, tired and vague and wanted to go. The mystery the 60-minute drama set about solving instead was the resignation honours list. Its conclusion was that Williams, faced with school fees, a tax bill for a land deal and the costs of living in London, was indeed rewarding rich men on whom she relied financially. Arise then Joseph Kagan, the raincoat manufacturer later jailed for fraud, Eric Miller, a property tycoon who shot himself while under police investigation, and the rabidly right-wing Jimmy Goldsmith. They were her "pension".
If this was true, however, it still left one mystery: why did Wilson let her get away with it? Haines, played here creepily by Neil Dudgeon, claimed that in a fit of jealousy Marcia told Mary Wilson that Harold had slept with her six times in 1956. Wilson denied it, but also seemed relieved: having dropped her "atomic bomb", Marcia could no longer harm him. So why did he remain in hock to her? The possibility that, after so many years' service, he was simply fond of her was not explored by Haines, Donoughue or Wheen.
As an exercise in nostalgia, the piece was enjoyable but, as usual with drama-documentaries, unsatisfying. Shakespeare provided the heroes of his history plays with psychological motives, but Wheen, even aided by as fine an actress as Gina McKee, was unwilling or unable to penetrate Williams's soul. If, on the other hand, he simply wanted finally to prove her corrupt, a straight documentary would have been the fairer medium. But then who, 30 years on, really cares? It wouldn't exactly make a Panorama special. The Lavender List affair was hardly the biggest news story in history.
Andrew Billen is a staff writer for the Times
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