We are in financial meltdown, currently in the middle of an election for the world’s most powerful job, and there is a "human catastrophe" unfolding in the Democratic Republic of Congo. So what story has been dominating the UK news this week: ‘prank calls’ made by Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand to veteran Fawlty Towers actor Andrew Sachs.
As a regular listener to Russell Brand’s Radio 2 show, this week has really hammered home to me how the strongly the media can whip itself up into a frenzy – and just how quickly it can happen.
I originally listened to the fateful program as a podcast on my ipod as I was running home from work. I must admit that although it was pretty close to the bone, I was laughing so much that at one point I had to stop (and not just to catch my breath!). It would appear that most listeners felt as I did since it initially drew just two complaints.
A whole week then went by before there was coverage in that custodian of moral sentiment, the Mail on Sunday. Since then, of course, it has exploded. The BBC has received more than 30,000 complaints and counting, the story has become front page news and the prime minister and leader of the opposition have both waded into the situation. Russell Brand and the controller of Radio 2, Lesley Douglas, have both resigned, Jonathan Ross is suspended without pay and Mark Thompson, the BBC’s director general, has issued a grovelling apology.
So how did it come to this? Why are so many people up in arms? For me it is an illustration of how the media can portray a situation in a substantially different light from how it might otherwise appear. It would seem that context, particularly when applied to comedy, really is everything. Here then is my reading of what happened:
Three weeks ago (yes three weeks ago) Russell Brand had his friend David Baddiel on his show as a guest presenter. Badiel was explaining that Brand might not be the most appropriate baby sitter for his kids. This was because the last time he had gone around Brand's house, it was the morning after he had invited an exotic dance group called the "Satanic Sluts" back with him the night before. You can imagine the scene that family man Baddiel was greeted with. Rather surreally it turned out that one of the "Satanic Sluts" was the grand daughter of Manuel from Fawlty Towers.
By a rather incredulous coincidence, Andrew Sachs is then due to appear on the very next week’s radio show to promote his programme "The Bill Made Me Famous" about actors who all started their careers on the police soap opera (a list which includes both Brand and Sachs).
Now surely any publicist who sets up an interview on a late night radio show which is prefaced by the warning "this show contains adult material", which is hosted by a comedian whose entire act is centered around revelations about his sex life, who has allegedly slept with your client’s granddaughter, who is in a dance group called the Satanic Sluts and that this is public knowledge, courtesy of the previous week’s show, should have expected what was likely to follow...
For whatever reason, Sachs doesn’t answer his phone when they are due to have the interview and so Brand and Ross have to quickly improvise the famous ‘lewd’ message. Feeling sorry about what they have done they then subsequently try to apologise by leaving a follow-up message, and then another and then another…
Looking at various coverage and subsequent discussion there doesn’t seem to be an obvious focus of outrage. Some are complaining about obscene language but this isn’t unusual for a late night comedy programe. Some complain about the abuse of a celebrity, but again this happens all the time without eyebrows being raised – Alan Carr’s comment that Kerry Katona was "the face and, lets face it, the body of Iceland" springs to mind. Many are describing the messages as malevolent premeditated ‘prank calls’ to an unsuspecting 78 year old grandfather – the verbal equivalent of ‘happy slapping’ with all of the negative images that this portrays. The reality is of course a bit different – again, context is everything.
There is a great deal of hypocrisy about the moral stance that has been taken with this. It is ironic that the tabloid newspapers have in the past made a lot of money by publishing kiss and tell stories from aspiring models who have claimed to have slept with Russell Brand, and yet they are up in arms when the roles are reversed. Sachs' granddaughter Georgina Baillie, doesn’t appear to have been inconvenienced too much since she is also an "aspiring model" who has now sold her story to The Sun, complete with her topless back catalogue.
Sachs himself does seem to have been upset by the messages, but any initial embarrassment has been greatly exacerbated by the incredible media amplification – in the media spotlight outside his house, he seems bemused by the whole thing and wishes it would all "go away".
Reading the coverage you are led to believe that the whole nation is outraged. The Daily Mirror’s media editor, speaking on BBC Radio 5 live, claimed that no one could say that the programme hadn’t overstepped the line by a considerable margin. And yet a poll in the Metro showed that the majority of people supported Russell and Jonathan agreeing that "it was a bit of fun", especially given that the pair had both apologised. Rod Mcenzie, the editor of Newsbeat has said "When we started covering the story, the audience response was running two-to-one in Ross's and Brand's favour - now it's swelled to six-to-one."
Is there a news agenda against the BBC? Quite possibly, after all, let's not forget that the other media sources are competing with the corporation. Many don’t like the competitive advantage the BBC enjoys from its recession proof license fee when their advertising revenues are declining. It has been interesting to see The Guardian being critical (particularly in a number of interviews on Channel 4 news over the week) given how The Guardian’s website competes directly with the BBC’s.
The government has often had disagreements with the corporation, reaching its nadir with the David Kelly affair and we have seen how swiftly senior figures such as Gordon Brown and Jack Straw have commented. Former BBC reporter Andrew Kelly (who knows a BBC crisis when he sees it) suggests that even Ofcom has an agenda since it has "ambitions to take the BBC under its regulatory wing".
There appears to be a strong age divide on the issue with the older generation being quick to condem, while a younger audience (the people more likely to have listened to the show) being more supportive. And this seems to be the biggest problem for the BBC. The old structure of a mainstream organisation, with a mainstream license fee, for a mainstream audience doesn’t work in the modern media world. Today's audiences are hungry for tailored media content that reflects their own views and interests.
As BBC Media Correspondent Torin Douglas justifiably asks "The BBC can never please everyone. But is there a danger in the fragmented, digital age, that it will end up pleasing nobody?"
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