Little Lady Fauntleroy - Last Night

Up until that point, he asked questions strongly, treating his interviewee as an intelligent person. No-one got upset with him until the end. And that 'acting class'.

The "drama lesson" where Keith sat and watched Lauren "coach" a student is probably the most disturbing thing I've seen on TV for quite a while.

Curiously, I came away from the programme feeling absolutely no dislike for Lauren Harries. Watching her at karaoke night down the local pub or singing (atrociously badly) in the family kitchen was just desperately sad.

Highlight of the programme for me was a brief glimpse of Lauren's Big Brother audition tape. Just imagine....

i've got a pretty high tolerance for intrusion and sneering in the name of low grade entertainment but i was really appalled by this programme. keith allen seemed to think he was paxman or roger cook or something when in fact he was just bullying the mentally ill. shouting 'you're fucking mad' at people who are clearly, well, fucking mad, doens't strike me as something to be particularly proud of.

Should instead have just let it run - I thought by focussing more on Allen's ego it diminished the power of the whole denouement a bit.

But then I am a trendy documentary maker.

Even his closing "You have to be much more on-the-ball if you are living these lies all the time, you're not good enough at it!"

The end was frustration. They clung to their lies, treating him as dumb enough to believe it.

i do love fat les though

Do you get the impression that James Harries' 'gayness' was perceived to be a problem to 'sort out'? "We took him to Gay nightclubs, but that didn't work, so he had a sex change". I'm not saying that it was wrong in his case anyway, but the idea that all the 'counselling' was kept within the family?

Yeah, but who would complain? Their removal from school gave the school one less headache (three obv)

The Nipper is utterly on the money. The programme made me angry, in a way. I was amazed at its... hypocrisy? Allen is talentless, I think. His own burst of anger at the end was either false or a major character flaw. It is nice that some people on this thread can see the thing in this perspective.

One thing that has been puzzling me is -- was this the only child prodigy of the 1980s? Cos I don't remember antiques being a big deal - I seem to remember a prodigy who was a great mathematician, went to Cambridge at 13 (?) (PS / no, not YMOF) - but this clearly cannot have been Harries.

I say her last year in Swindon, shopping, with her dad, so I guess all is resolved there.

Sport is so arse by the way.

Yes!!

I'd have probably watched this if I had a telly, but I'm sure I'd have got really annoyed. K allen + V lewis smith = major shitehawkishness ahoy.

The freezeframes on facial reactions told.

KA certainly less manipulative/fake than Louis Theroux, mostly saying what was on his mind rather than 'giving them enough rope to hang themselves with.

btw, how many of you arguing here actually saw it?

S Davies's Dad: True enough.

S Davies: And I don't have to ask you to lend me money anymore, do I?

S Davies's Dad: That's true too.

S Davies: In fact, I always said I'd help you out if *you* were short of a bob or two.

S Davies's Dad: Indeed so. Let's go shopping!

Howard Gardner's Seven Intelligences: Musical, Bodily Kinesthetic, Logical-Mathematical, Linguistic, Spatial, Intrapersonal.

Presumably you can be a prodigy in any of these - he gives the examples of Yehudi Menuhin (Musical), Babe Ruth (BK), and TS Eliot (Linguistic).

I have a few problems with his theory, but thought I'd throw it into the pot anyway.

haha I read that as 'slowdiver' -- must be a thames valley thing.

Theroux is manipulative but not disrespectful -- but define 'manipulative' here, any doc has an angle on things.

Fifteen-year-old Babe Ruth played third base. During one game his team’s pitcher was doing very poorly and Babe loudly criticised him from third base. Brother Mathias, the coach, called out, “Ruth, if you know so much about it, YOU pitch!” Babe was surprised and embarrassed because he had never pitched before, but Brother Mathias insisted. Ruth said later that at the very moment he took the pitcher’s mound, he KNEW he was supposed to be a pitcher and that it was “natural” for him to strike people out. Indeed, he went on to become a great major league pitcher (and, of course, attained legendary status as a hitter) (Connor, 1982). Like Menuhin, Babe Ruth was a child prodigy who recognised his “instrument” immediately upon his first exposure to it. This recognition occurred in advance of formal training.

what world are you all living in? are you honestly telling me that these people should be respected and treated like normal human beings? i'd have fucking blown my stack with them way before the end. they were liars, they turned their son into a one-man freakshow by the age of 10 and then when he began to develop his own personality (ie his gayness) took control of him yet again and basically maimed him for life. they are sick, sick individuals. i didn't like the way it was filmed, did think it was exploitative and i do hate keith allen, but he was indisputably the most normal person involved. i really do feel for james/lauren, but his/her parents should be locked up and the key thrown away.

I actually do like KA's stuff. But the point is the same.

about half of everything i watched on sunday (mostly bbc4's sixties weekend programs about experimental music / radio phonic workshop etc) were voiceovered by VLS and done for his Associated Redifusion company.

their 'halftimbering' using creosoted planks was dreadful.

mockumentaries?

VLF really should be killed. I don't think that of many people.

I think KA was probably chosen especially because he is so reviled, I doubt it was a project initially close to his heart. Equally the family have probably signed consent forms up to their arses, and have always been complicit in this kind of behaviour. Suggestion partially by the programme is that television itself made Lauren what she is, it being hungry for eccentrics and freaks (I remember that Jeff Goldblum, Frank Skinner Wogan interview being one of the most uncomfortable shows I ever saw even at the time).

I think VLS is consistently interesting, if sometimes lazy, contributor to the debate about television.

also, Frank Skinner's crack about a clip round the ear...

I suppose on the most basic level the programme was a success because we're all talking about it (and a few people who came into my shop today were talking about it). I feel that it was kind of slapped together though. Why was Terry Wogan not interviewed for it? I'd love to know if he met The Mother beforehand and therefore decided he hated James.

The other interview, the hideous daytimey one showed exactly what Alan Partridge was based on (and indeed the prodigy epidoe of KMKY did a pretty accurate facsimile of it).

But, after all, Wogan does/did 'use' these kinds of people for his programme, so should be accountable in part. But then, nobody died.

It's not like he was uncovering Watergate. And a show like this is likely only to deepen that fucked-upness, like a continental shelf. It was a cheap holiday in other people's misery, and Allen acted like he should be applauded for it.

He even says 'continental' shelf, not 'coastal'.