Nigella Lawson - classic or dud, dahlings?

Nigella is nice, pretty and does not have a fat tongue. this is not enough to ensure classic status alone, but it helps.

Also her cook books are incredibly well written and easy to follow.

erm, isn't this thing supposed to be about music?..............

OK: unlike every other TV cook ever, Nigella CAN WRITE (in her own right) and is generally intellectually able. This is almost always a disaster on TV: writers are the kinds of people who think ahead to wonder "What CAN I be looking like?" — and consequently freeze up on camera, fail to deliver decent bodymove TV or relaxed-chat blather. To me, she looks nervous, all the time. (Jamie O too dim to be nervous, obviously: plus a beautiful mover actually in the Act of Prep... )

Can write: I don't mean her column, I mean her cookery books. How to Eat is good. Very readable, very sensible, not particularly posey (except maybe over equipment). A good test of lack of unnecessary ponciness is always the cooking for kids section.

Because she's plainly a babe (and because people probably feel sorry for her, what with J.Diamond blah blah), and because more TV programme commissioners are intimidated by unexpected things than you'd, er, expect, yes, second series. Undeserved.

My sister's boyfriend thinks she's, well, I won't even say... : but he deserves mention because he told me the following story. That when Jamie Oliver did his New York-based TV show, all his "friends" were just hired for the evening. This is too great.

This alone merits classic status.

Bill

You'll also have the money to piss away round there instead of looking for special offers in Tescos.

To be fair Nigella isn't as bad in this respect as some other food writers, but even though I have plenty of good delis close to me, it's still irksome.

Personnel:

PAUL COHEN gtr A PETER COHEN bs A LENNY FEDERER violin, viola A JEFF LYONS vcls, gtr A RICHARD PLOSS flute, sax A PETER TUCKER drms A

ALBUM:

1.(A) GUNS AND BUTLER (Cotillion SD 9901) 1972

A very marginal case for inclusion because this is an underrated progressive as opposed to garage or psychedelic album. An unusual combination of instruments works well with all tracks interesting and a couple particularly good - all were penned by the group. An all Jewish line-up with a hint of traditional Jewish music in their sound. Closely followed by Lloyd Grossman, who co-produced the album and wrote the sleeve-notes.

Just in case anyone thought Scott was tripping

- and i thought i wazza nasty-pastie !

Dominic Lawson edits the Sunday Telegraph (I believe he edited the Spectator previously) which is, yes, the embodiment of the send- everything-from-1965-onwards-back-where-it-comes-from idea of ruralism and the countryside that is, yes, the exact opposite of Skylarking. There's no doubt that the ST defines the set of values which, in my mind, Skylarking subverts and works against.

I find this *very* nearly impossible to believe; Dr C, are you winding me up here? Or is this genuinely true?

My perspective, somehow, shifts violently.

This makes my Green-Gartside-as-Martin-Carthy-fan moment (and my resulting theory on the song structure of "The Word Girl") seem insignificant ...

(for Norman's original question; don't care either way.)

I have vivid memories of a friend of mine moaning to me c1982 that Loyd Grossman had ruined his band's demo.

Next thing I know, though, someone will reveal Charles Moore's secret life as a Fairport Convention fan (or maybe even a prep-school hippy, a la his only decent columnist, Craig Brown).

My view of "Skylarking" is of a progressive rural community rooted in tradition but which doesn't try to keep anything modern out, and also believes in concepts of social equality, not landowners acting like they have a divine right to treat rural working-class people like peasants (protectionism and tight class structures being two vital elements of the Telegraph's particular vision of England outside the cities and suburbia). Obviously Lawson could never see it in the way *I* do(my guess is that he doesn't see it any way at all) because, if he believed in a progressive countryside, he wouldn't have anything to do with the Telegraph or the Spectator. The man rants about William Hague representing the voice of non-metropolitan Britain, for fuck's sake.

I don't hear this AT ALL, Robin. It doesn't appear to be a thematic work at all, and I don't see much connection between the songs other than the overall *sound and feel*. The characters and subjects don't appear to be rural in the main. What am I missing?

The vast majority of the audience for Skylarking *won't* hear what I hear in it, and that's fine by me. I can even imagine it being appropriated by Tories, because it's lyrically obviously apolitical, and there's far more explicit socialist content in a lot of English folk music which has become a key part of the "unchanging" idea of the countryside which Tories, almost by definition, love.

You really don't have to politicise it, Dr C. I just found it curious that someone whose politics are so utterly oppositional to mine liked XTC.

Cheers,

a resident of darkest Dorset :).

Next you'll be saying you find it weird that Hitler liked Mozart* or something.

* I have no idea if Hitler or Robin Carmody likes Mozart, btw, but I'm you know what I mean.

:-)

I hate this hypersexualised environment. When does the return bus leave?

As a matter of interest are you using this turn of phrase 'ironically' or is that really the way you talk/think?

Elizabeth David also left a trail of corpses, didn't she? It's the curse of the culinary social pioneer. "Most cooks use rubbed sage here, but I think aconite has a tarter, more authentic presence..."

However, a question from a non-British person: What's the deal with your cooking shows, what with all these intercuts of pasty boys on their Vespas, underscored by peppy jazz lite? Jamie Oliver is just too too much. Actually, what's with the motorbikes at all--re the disgusting 2 fat ladies program? And I can do without Nigella taking the kids to school, and the general here are my lovely chums features. US cooking shows--the decent ones at least--don't include the lifestyle crap. Are we supposed to envy these folks' zest for life?

Just pray that We don't export the Emeril cooking show to you all. It's done live, in front of a screaming sycophantic audience, with interludes from a dreadful Cajun/jazz lite band.

A thing I liked abt two fat ladies: THEY WERE ALWAYS MAKING JOKES ABT NOT WASHING THEIR HANDS!!

Things I saw on my holidays:

Night Fever: c-list celebrities doing karaoke while the audience sings along and the lyrics are superimposed on the screen

Eurotrash Smut Awards (or some such title): Various losers get semi- naked at pseudo awards ceremony. Includes live Puppetry of the Penis segment.

Eastenders; I come back to find Phil is now the bad guy; last I recall, he was the good brother; show has more ridiculous subplots than Dallas or Dynasty ever managed

100 Greatest TV Moments of 2001 program included the following delights:

Mascot race; people dress up in furry animal costumes and jump fences

Taboo; woman talks in serious, scientific way that only Brits can do in sex programs in front of giant picture of man with erection; erection hidden by rotating colored squares

Touch the truck; competition in which contestants must hold hands on giant SUV in mall; last one to pull hands away wins; winner talks about selling the truck and starting a new political party with the money

Various appearances by laughing-stock politicians the Hamiltons on daytime talk shows, including giving relationship advice on the Big Breakfast (no US politician could ever get away with this)

UK is of course also responsible for raising the TV bar worldwide with such quality fare as Survivor, Big Brother, Who Wants to Be A Millionaire, Weakest Link et al

Where does Big Brother originate then? I know it's not US.

I'd love to think that "Clarissa and the Countryman" (she was the One Fat Lady that didn't die, right?) was recommissioned as a means of annoying me based on my posts upthread ...

good for her, i completely believe her description of this past long summer.

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand there it is, what the papers have all been hanging on for.

what what what?

Smokin' weed in front of her kiddies

As well as snorting coke like a madwoman

By the way, this nonsense is the lead story on the BBC website, fuck yer licence fee, ya cunts

i still don't understand what any of this has to do with the two women who swindled her

lol who

can we fucking destroy the entire media plz

where's the smoking weed bit?

smokin weed rules

just wonderin how much money will be earned by journos and columnists right now penning lucrative reponses to nigella's cocaine hell, and how much of that money will itself be spent on cocaine

smokin weed rules

― New York City Garden(?) (Bananaman Begins), Wednesday, December 4, 2013 4:27 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

TB

i still don't understand what any of this has to do with the two women who swindled her

Because of a specific email allegation that Saatchi made that was directly related to the case and brought up in court.

"She claimed the incident was actually sparked when she commented on a person walking by with a baby.

"I said 'I'm so looking forward to having grandchildren'," Ms Lawson told the court.

"He grabbed me by the throat and said 'I'm the only person you should be concerned with'."

This is her claim as to what happened at the restaurant. True, jury savvy or too clever?

too weird not to be true imo.

Yeah. Whereas his "I grabbed her by the throat so I could get some cocaine out of her nose" strikes me as too weird to be true.

She said it in the same way as she'd say "I do love sprinkling garlic into my cheesecake flan"

and he said "Will you stop talking like that?"

If anyone here knows anyone who bought one of Saatchi's interminable stream of books, please groinkick them

Saatchi kept money 'in the fridge' and never uses credit cards. what's the benefit of that? serious question.

http://gifrific.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/ron-swanson-computer-throw-out-parks-and-rec.gif

Jeremy Irons should play Saatchi in the eventual movie version of this.

https://vine.co/v/hxnwlJj6WV6

<3

http://instagram.com/p/hipvMFEugL/

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BaqRjv4CcAAxLIk.jpg:large

in stoke newington obviously

Grillos acquitted, which means that Nigella might have committed perjury over the last couple of weeks?

Was there proof that she was lying or were the Grillos acquitted just cos there wasn't enough evidence either way?

yeah, muddying the water isn't the same as proving somebody a liar

Good work, Cameron

Birds of a feather though, eh? Knowwhatimean?

YOU MEAN DRUGS

It won't stand up in court... it's a miracle Nigella did, knowwhatime... oh stop it

I ask a question I feel sure he’ll dodge: about the trial of two of Charles Saatchi’s former housemaids and the revelation that his ex-wife, Nigella Lawson, used cocaine. Her fans have rushed to her defence: ‘Team Nigella’ is used as a hashtag on Twitter and even sprayed on city walls. So when I ask “Are you on Team Nigella?” I expect him to stay out of it. Instead, he offers a direct answer.

http://orderorder.files.wordpress.com/2011/01/dave.jpg

This fuggin guy

is it me, or does all this shit about "Team Nigella" imply the existence of "Team Domestic Violence"??

Saatchi has been raked over the goals in the Times and Sunday Times. They are reporting that he tried to arrange for drug allegations to go in to both papers months ago on the condition his role was kept a secret.

Hey uk folks, I don't get what she's in trouble for? This can't just be about her recreational drug use??

Yes it can.

The Mail have dedicated their front page to 'Saatchi's plot to use daughter to ruin Nigella' so it looks like even the moralist right thinks worse of him than her.

so they were acquitted because nigella is presumed to have been off her face on cocaine & weed 24/7 and so couldn't reliably say whether she had or had not authorised them to spend hundreds of thousands of pounds on her CC?

^their argument ws that nigella authorised the spending so they'd hide her drug use from saatchi. makes more sense

their argument was that they weren't fraudsters they were blackmailers?

they were acquitted because they'd muddied the waters sufficiently that it couldn't be proven either way iirc

and came close to unseating the PM

from the kick off i thought Saatchi must be out of his mind thinking he could drag Nigella down considering her national treasure status, it reminds me of Heather Mills trying to take down Macca and coming a cropper.

She's going to come through this without taking major hit points? I haven't been paying close attention.

I really hope she does. And I hope Saatchi is profoundly damaged by it all.

Saatchi clearly called in favours all over the media for this, but everybody irl still thinks he's a cockroach. w/e about Nigella really.

he has made himself look even worse and her more sympathetic but i expect he is too much of a bully to understand that.

I'm watching The Taste on Hulu - she's terrrrrrible.