Chart Throb (27 page)
Authors: Ben Elton
‘That was genius, Emma. I have never claimed to be a genius or to be looking for genius. If you judge people by that sort of standard nobody would make anything.’
‘Yes, but there were lots of great bands around in the sixties, too many to count. It was almost as if The Beatles were leading by example, as if their example raised everybody’s game. Now
you’re
the biggest thing. You are the example. People are following you. Your talent has made you powerful. I think that brings with it responsibility.’
you’re
the biggest thing. You are the example. People are following you. Your talent has made you powerful. I think that brings with it responsibility.’
‘So what do you think I should do about it?’
‘I don’t know. I’m not the clever one. I just feel . . . you know that term “dumbed down”?’
‘Of course. Hear it all the time. Fucking snobbery.’
‘Well yes, I expect often it is but whenever they go on about how more kids vote in your shows than in general elections you can’t help wondering if there isn’t some truth in it. I mean nothing is
about
anything any more, nothing
means
anything. Everything’s a laugh, every-thing’s disposable. You’re the richest, cleverest man in TV and yet everything you create is gone like a puff of smoke.’
about
anything any more, nothing
means
anything. Everything’s a laugh, every-thing’s disposable. You’re the richest, cleverest man in TV and yet everything you create is gone like a puff of smoke.’
‘A good soufflé doesn’t last beyond the eating, does that make it any less valid?’
‘Not everything in life should be a soufflé, Calvin. For instance, what about the royal thing? What about the Prince of Wales?’
‘Keep your voice down, Emma,’ Calvin said gently. ‘Public place and all that.’
‘You’re going to make a fool of him.’
‘We may allow him to make a fool of himself.’
‘Oh, come
on
, Calvin, don’t try that one. Don’t forget I’ve been in the team. I’m a professional. You will make a fool of him. He thinks he can find an audience through you. Poor bastard, I can’t believe he’s so naïve as to think
he
can use
you.
We
know
what will happen. You’ll lure him in, select the edits that make him look a complete fool, chew him up and spit him out. That’s what you
do.’
on
, Calvin, don’t try that one. Don’t forget I’ve been in the team. I’m a professional. You will make a fool of him. He thinks he can find an audience through you. Poor bastard, I can’t believe he’s so naïve as to think
he
can use
you.
We
know
what will happen. You’ll lure him in, select the edits that make him look a complete fool, chew him up and spit him out. That’s what you
do.’
‘Look, I didn’t come here to talk about the Prince of Wales or the show. I came to talk about you. You and me. My therapist says that I’ve fallen in love with you . . .’
‘Your
therapist
?’
therapist
?’
‘Yes. I never had one before. See what you’ve driven me to? That’s how serious my feelings are.’
‘How romantic.’
‘Yes, well, let me assure you that personally I feel a fool even uttering the word “therapist” but there you are. It is what it is and somehow or other I’ve got to get beyond this. I don’t know how or where it will lead but somehow I’ve got to get this knot out of my stomach and this confusion out of my head . . . Now you won’t sleep with me . . .’
‘No.’
‘And you won’t come back to work for me?’
‘No.’
‘Then tell me what I can do to make you see me at least. Not sleep with me, let’s leave that aside, just . . . see me.’
‘Do you mean you want to “go out” with me, you want me to be your girlfriend?’
‘Yes. I think that’s what I’m saying. I want to start again. Forget everything that’s happened and just . . . see each other. I don’t know. Find out where it leads. I suppose that’s what people do, isn’t it?’
‘Yes, it is, Calvin. But we can’t forget what’s happened. At least I can’t. I just don’t trust you.’
‘Well, somehow or other you have to find a way to trust me. Think about it. Concentrate. Tell me how. Tell me what I can do to make you trust me.’
Emma sat for a little while in silence. Then a thought struck her. It wasn’t an idea that she had come prepared with but suddenly it seemed obvious. ‘I’ll tell you what you can do,’ she said, ‘if you really want to prove yourself.’
‘Yes?’
‘Deselect HRH.’
‘Deselect him?’
‘Yes, turn him down for further audition. Dump him, don’t bring him in. You threw out plenty of others at final selection. Chuck him out too. Do the decent thing. You know he’s completely out of his depth. Protect him from making a fool of himself.’
‘But . . . but he’s already been notified,’ Calvin stammered. ‘He’s been offered an audition.’
‘Denotify him. You’ve read the rules, you wrote them, and the main one is that you can change them at any time. Tell him you’ve changed your mind.’
‘But he’s fantastic telly.’
‘Exactly. That’s the point. Show me you can give something up. Show me you can do something for reasons other than profit, just because it’s the right thing to do, something like preventing a middle-aged man from making a mockery of his life’s work, degrading his position and all the principles he’s stood for and which may even have inspired other people. If you do that, then maybe I could be your girlfriend . . . and . . . well, we’ll see how it goes.’
Calvin did not answer for a moment. Instead he poured himself another cup of coffee. It was clear that he was struggling with something. His usual easy smile had gone and the spout of the coffee pot rattled against the edge of his cup as he poured.
Emma saw his hesitation and it made her sad.
‘You see,’ she said, ‘you can’t do it, can you? You can’t give up a single puppet in your show. Not for me and not, I think, for any girl. Remember what I said to you the last time we had this conversation, Calvin? One day you’re going to be a very lonely old man. Goodbye.’
‘Not HRH!’ Calvin pleaded. ‘Ask me to drop any of the others . . .’
‘Why should I, what’s the difference?’
‘I have my reasons . . . Reasons outside the show. Please.’
‘No, Calvin. You said you loved me and I asked you to do one thing for me and you won’t. You don’t need the Prince. Yes, it’s an amazing thing to get him but you don’t
need
him. You can’t get any more successful than you are, and besides people are so punch-drunk with royal and political compromises that nothing surprises anybody much any more. How can the poor bloke’s stock get any lower? You’ll get one good bunch of headlines out of him then chuck him out. But you won’t even give up that, will you? Not even for the woman you say you can’t stop thinking about. This really is goodbye, Calvin. Please don’t call me again.’
need
him. You can’t get any more successful than you are, and besides people are so punch-drunk with royal and political compromises that nothing surprises anybody much any more. How can the poor bloke’s stock get any lower? You’ll get one good bunch of headlines out of him then chuck him out. But you won’t even give up that, will you? Not even for the woman you say you can’t stop thinking about. This really is goodbye, Calvin. Please don’t call me again.’
‘Wait! No! Hang on, you’re wrong,’ Calvin said. ‘Of course I’ll dump him if you want, I’ll dump any of them, but I can do better. I can do more for you than that.’
Emma had been halfway out of her chair. She hovered for a moment before resuming her seat for the third time. She raised her brows as if to say ‘go on’.
‘You say that I was going to use him. Chew him up and spit him out.’
‘Well, weren’t you?’
‘Yes, of course I was. Because we don’t deal in ideas or substance. We deal in personalities and disposable emotions. In fact, along the way we’ve actually made ideas and substance look boring and stupid. Chucking the heir to the throne off our show will be the ultimate proof of that.’
‘That’s right, which is why I don’t want you to have him on in the first place. Surely something should be left that’s worthy of respect? If not the man, at least his position.’
‘How about this? We don’t use him. We let
him
use
us
.’
him
use
us
.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I’ll tell you what I mean,’ said Calvin, suddenly becoming excited. Excited, it seemed, by a fresh idea. ‘Not only do I let him on to the show but . . . I let him win?’
Calvin allowed this to hang in the air for a moment before pressing on.
‘How about I don’t chew him up and spit him out? How about instead we have him back week after week? We give him time to talk. We edit him sympathetically; we bring the public on to his side. We show that he was right to put himself and his ideas and principles on a new and democratic platform, to reach out to his people in a
modern way.
And then I find a way for him to win.’
modern way.
And then I find a way for him to win.’
‘The Prince of Wales? The fox-hunting, tax-absorbing, plant-chatting, seed-nibbling, “doesn’t know when to shut up” Prince of Wales
win Chart Throb
?’
win Chart Throb
?’
‘Yes. Wouldn’t that be proof of me using my skills for something of substance? Preserving something, not destroying it? You’re a posh bird, you went to a private school, you respect the monarchy, surely you have to accept that that would be a
good
thing?’
good
thing?’
Suddenly it was Emma who was excited.
‘I think it would be amazing. It would be a cultural watershed . . . Do you really think you could do it? I mean getting His Royal Highness into the finals of a pop contest would strain credibility enough, but once the public start voting? How could you possibly manipulate that?’
Calvin stared straight into her big blue eyes. He spoke quietly, sincerely. Like a father.
‘I don’t know. It’s a whole new idea for me. I’m acting on impulse here but hey, that’s what I like to do . . . busking, improvising, dancing on the edge. When I get given a challenge by someone I admire, I like to double it and then some . . . It would of course be
incredibly
hard, I don’t know if I could even
start
to pull it off and I’d certainly be risking the credibility of my show . . . risking my whole career. But I’d do it for . . .’
incredibly
hard, I don’t know if I could even
start
to pull it off and I’d certainly be risking the credibility of my show . . . risking my whole career. But I’d do it for . . .’
‘For me?’ Emma whispered.
‘Yes. For you, Emma. If I prove to you that I’m not just in this for myself, if I show the world that our programme has substance, that it’s not just a tawdry showbiz money-making machine which is all about phone-line revenues, if I turn the Prince of Wales into the nation’s Chart Throb . . .’
‘Yes?’
‘If I do that, will you sleep with me?’
‘Yes.’
Shetland Mist Prepare to Rock Dundee
For a pub that was licensed to provide entertainment for as many as two hundred and fifty punters they really should have put in a dressing room.
‘The
toilets
!’ Iona exclaimed in disgust to the enormous ginger-haired man who had greeted them in the car park. ‘You want us to change in the toilets?’
toilets
!’ Iona exclaimed in disgust to the enormous ginger-haired man who had greeted them in the car park. ‘You want us to change in the toilets?’
‘I don’t care where you fockin’ change, darlin’, but it’s the toilet or on stage which I’m sure would make a lot of fellahs very happy but we don’t have a licence for the lewd stuff.’
‘But it’s the
public
toilets,’ Mary, the bass player, protested. ‘We can’t change in front of the fans!’
public
toilets,’ Mary, the bass player, protested. ‘We can’t change in front of the fans!’
The big man just smiled at that. The girls had of course put on their stage gear in the toilets many times in their careers but usually there was at least a staff toilet in which to do it. There was something considerably more demeaning about having to don their little glittery hotpants and boob tubes in front of the crowd before whom they would shortly be appearing.
‘It’ll take away all our mystery,’ Mary lamented.
‘Come on,’ said Iona. ‘Let’s do it now before the pub fills up. We certainly won’t be bothering with the second cossies so leave them in the van, Billy.’
Billy, Shetland Mist’s roadie and sound mixer, had been in the process of pulling the ‘second half’ trunk from the van. Now he nodded and returned it.
‘But if there’s no back-stage area, where are we to wait once we’ve got our gear on?’ asked Fleur, the keyboard player. ‘I can’t sit at the bar with my tummy out, it’s bad enough having it out on stage.’
‘You have a coat, don’t you?’ Douglas, the fiddle player, replied.
‘No. I thought we’d have a dressing room. It’s all very well for you and Jamie. You boys don’t even bother to change.’
The girls trooped into the barn of a pub and made their way to the ladies, leaving Billy and the boys to set up the gear on the stacked rostrum which had been erected as a stage.
There was at least a mirror and the floor was moderately clean but it was nonetheless a depressing way to begin an evening’s work.
‘Let’s ring our manager,’ said Mary. This comment was greeted with hollow laughs, for their manager was none other than the elusive Rodney Root.
‘He doesn’t even bother phoning back any more, the bastard,’ Iona reflected bitterly. ‘I’m off to get a chair to stand on while I take my jeans off, I don’t want them touching this floor.’
Iona returned to the main room, where Billy called out from the stage.
‘You girls had best keep your trainers on!’ he said. ‘This stage is just boxes, like a kettle drum. With heels you’ll sound like a herd of elephants every time you move.’
Iona nodded. They were used to this. Solid stages were something of a luxury and often the girls were forced to perform in trainers, which looked pretty good with the hotpants but terrible with the gowns. Iona was glad they would not be bothering with the long dresses that evening.
She gathered up a wooden stool from beside one of the tables and headed back into the toilet. Fleur had commandeered the mirror. She always claimed most mirror time because, at nearly forty, she said she needed the most make-up.
‘I don’t know, Iona,’ Fleur said, blowing on her mascara and rubbing it between her hands in an effort to warm it up. ‘I’m beginning to think it’s time you shopped that bastard to the
News of the World.
Once the show comes back on, I bet you could get a packet for the inside story of how he wooed you, promised to wed you then weed all over you.’
News of the World.
Once the show comes back on, I bet you could get a packet for the inside story of how he wooed you, promised to wed you then weed all over you.’
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