:: Encore Theatre Magazine ::

Encore Theatre Magazine

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::Front Page::

:: Wednesday, August 02, 2006 ::

Nurse? Simon Reade's Out Of Bed Again!

His second career as a columnist has gone to Simon Reade's head. Fresh from his peroration on the work-life balance, he has now announced that he is contemplating voting Tory. And just like one of those fucking awful Sunday columnist who sit next to someone at a dinner party who also has a Latvian nanny and therefore writes a column about how the whole of Britain has gone crazy for Latvian nannies, he thinks his political wobble is being replicated across the country.

Unlikely, I would think, unless the whole of the arts world has had an attack of the stupids. Because what's his argument? Here he is, cutely addressing Tony Blair.

When I voted for you nine years ago, you seemed keen, eager, enlightened. You were the right man to lead us in a liberal, secular age. You listened to your children when they told you to champion green issues. My children loved you for that. You were a pioneer of the work/life balance by bringing your family to live with you at the office. You encouraged ethical foreign policies. You were pro-European. You brought in the Human Rights Act. You were an inspiration.

Right, well, I certainly remember the exhilaration of kicking out the Tories, and there were good things about the incoming Labour Government, but did we ever think Tony Blair was a genuinely progressive politician? The attachment to green issues seemed paper-thin (where was the evidence? where were the policies?); the encouragement of ethical foreign policies was more associated with Robin Cook than Tony Blair; his role as a champion of maintaining a good work/life balance is a Reade bugbear so let's not be detained; and if you thought he was 'secular', you weren't paying attention.

And you settled a great deal on the arts in exchange for access and participation, cultural diversity, education and equality, ideals we all cherish and foster and champion in our non-partisan way.

Fair enough. New Labour was partly about cultural renewal and he wanted the cultural industries (death to the inventor of that term) on side. Indeed, let's not be grudging: Labour after 1997 was financially good for the arts. Let's be even less grudging and note that the introduction of the National Lottery in 1994, under the previous government, helped too.

But then you rapidly went rightwing - on university fees, on the NHS, on pensions, on civil liberties and so on - reneging on all the trust we gave you.

You put trust in him not to be a hardline ideological free-marketeer? Some people can't be trusted to place their trust wisely.

You may call it cross-dressing, but I call it neo-conservatism in disguise.

Does Tony Blair call it cross-dressing? I think it's unlikely. 'I'm going to part-privatise the NHS; don't think of it as a drift to the right, just think that your prime minister is slipping into a pair of frilly pants'. Hardly sounds like an effective political strategy. And while we're at it, why do you think it's neoconservatism in disguise? What disguise? But now he moves onto the main burden of his argument:

Although I have voted for other parties, I have never voted conservative in all my 40 years. But I fear I may have to consider following the route pursued by Peter Hall and others who voted for Thatcher in 1979. He believed that, if he didn't, "our present decline into a land without opportunity will continue". I am not blaming Sir Peter. I admire the honesty of his May 1979 entries in his seminal Diaries. The arts world voted Tory for all sorts of reasons - and later regretted what was unleashed on the nation for the next 18 years.

Can you follow the logic of this? Try reading the sections of this backwards and you'll see how pitiful the logic:

1. Lots of people in the Arts regretted voting Tory in 1979.
2. I don't blame them.
3. I'm thinking of doing the same.

People like Peter Hall did not turn against Labour because they were too right-wing. If anything, they wanted the smack of firm leadership; they wanted a more authoritarian government to deal with the unions (Sir Peter's diaries are full of his troubles with the highly unionised National Theatre technical team - though it would be interesting to read their diaries of the same period. ). So what is the relevance of quoting Peter Hall's silly lament for a country without opportunity? But he recognises the differences:

the late 70s were different after all. In our present land of opportunity it is easy to forget the challenge Thatcher had in crawling out of an era of three-day weeks, of blackouts, of Murdoch toughing it out with the unions at Wapping, and of Peter Hall himself facing action from staff at the National Theatre.

Excuse me? Are you saying Thatcher saved Britain? So should we in the arts regret voting for her or not? Hold on, let's calm down, he can't really think that Thatcher was a good thing.

Oh, hold on, he can.

Callaghan had been weak, taking over from Wilson mid-term, never elected as prime minister in his own right. But maybe you have morphed into Callaghan from your own Wilson, Tony - metamorphosed into a Major when once you were a Thatcher.

If you once thought he was a Thatcher, why are you surprised when he appears to be very right wing?

Your politics are retreating into the refuge of the reactionary.

Is it just me or is this turning into internal monologue?

Your apparent lack of interest in the arts makes me sad.

(By now Tony will be sobbing into his cornflakes.)

I know you have appreciated music, theatre, poetry in the past. So are you really going to squander nine years of investment and growth in the arts with a measly spending review settlement that threatens all the economic and social benefits of the UK's artistic renaissance?

Aha, at last, a good point. And now would be the moment to draw a line in the sand between the right-wing bean-counting utilitarian approach to the arts and something more stirring, bolder, more visionary.

Many of these benefits are quantifiable.

I said - oh, forget it.

But you of all people ought to be able to understand the added value of people having a good time, of the intrinsic, spiritual value of the arts.

The 'added value' of 'having a good time'. Is that seriously the best you can do? And precisely what the fuck does 'intrinsic, spiritual value of the arts' mean? Do we do ourselves any favours by draping ourselves in this kind of woolly crap?

And the rest of your current agenda is unnerving. Nuclear power? Iraq? Criminal justice? No wonder Cameron upstages you when he entreats us all to care for hoodies or to go green. He is an opportunist and yet, crucially, he captures the public mood.

It doesn't help Simon's case that he is so inarticulate about these things. Nuclear power may unnerve you, but are you actually aware that 20% of your current electricity use comes from it? What aspect of criminal justice unnerves you? Could you say more than 'Iraq'? With such banalities on the tip of your tongue, it's not surprising that hug-a-hoodie seemed like serious policymaking.

Since we know you're going, please go. The longer you stay, the longer you strengthen Cameron

This is turning into The Lord of the Rings. Remove the ring of power, Blair, the longer you wear it the greater in strength grows the Dark Lord...

But before you go, Tony, you've got a chance to redeem yourself. Do the arts a small favour: don't let the well-being of society flounder by disinvesting after all that's been achieved.

The problem here, Simon, is that you're falling into the same trap with Brown that you fell into with Blair. Who do you think ordered the spending review? Brown. Who supported the Iraq war? Brown. Who has been championing Public-Private Partnerships in health, education and transport? Brown. Who is the economic architect of New Labour? Brown. Who has been standing up in defence of civil liberties, against nuclear power, and in favour of high levels of arts subsidy? Erm, certainly not Gordon Brown.

Then do the world a big favour - and this is my personal view

...does this mean that the rest of this article is official policy of the Bristol Old Vic?...

stop kowtowing to Bush's isolationist foreign policy.

Isolationist? Bush? What are you talking about? Bush is anything but isolationist. His foreign policy is neo-realist and interventionist. Iraq? Afghanistan? Syria? Iran? Cuba? Have you been following?

Then you can go. Because if you carry on the way you are, I and others like me, might be seduced into voting for someone who could unleash who-knows-what over the next 18 years.

But if you know that you're being seduced into it, if you recognise that they could unleash who-knows-what, then don't do it. There are other parties if you want to express a protest vote. Above all, Simon, let us make this very clear: if you are cross at having a right-wing government, it makes no fucking sense to vote Tory. Is that clear enough for you?

:: posted by Theatre Worker at Wednesday, August 02, 2006

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Comments:

Beautiful, thank you for that.
I've never known anyone so apparently determined to confirm the widespread view that we are all a bunch of prissy wankers as Mr Reade.
And who the feck is he, anyway? A fairly talentless hanger-on who got lucky.

# posted by  Anonymous : 3/8/06 10:30 am

 

Reade's production of The Turn of the Screw was the worst piece of professional theatre I have possibly ever seen.

What is he in rehearsals for at the moment? Some kind of Greek tragedy...I can see I'm going to bring misery upon the world by my actions, but I just can't help myself...

# posted by  Anonymous : 3/8/06 11:18 am

 

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