Wonderful, woeful, and all in the name of the father . . .
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THERE’S a lot of TV these days featuring childbirth and motherhood, but has anybody delivered a better programme about the father’s side of that experience as well as Kira Phillips A Dad is Born: A Wonderland Film?
It followed three very different men’s stories in the run-up to, during and after the birth of their children. Viktor, a Hungarian-born London minicab driver working 18 hours a day, Jamie, an angst-ridden recruitment consultant who read avidly to ensure he was as best prepared as possible for father/parenthood and Greg, a fantastically rich motivational speaker who mildly lamented the fact the birth had caused him to miss three hours of business in Australia that would have netted him £3.5m (“money for a trust fund and private education up the age of 18” etc, etc).
With Viktor, a victim of paternal physical abuse who wanted to be “the gentle one” to his own child, you couldn’t fail to be moved watching his reaction to the birth with the camera doggedly fixed on him from the moment of delivery to the scene minutes later when he sat weeping with pride and relief.
Greg may have had the gift of gab and been happy to share his Lamborghini and Chelsea Harbour penthouse with us, but he seemed oddly insecure at any suggestion he might no longer be top dog in his girlfriend’s eyes. An imminent, messy divorce from his estranged wife (who’d taken legal proceedings to prevent the TV filming him at any stage with his other son), suggested his personal life was far from a perfect circle. Their daughter was born after an elective caesarean and, surprisingly quickly, he was back on a plane to Sydney with the baby handed to a maternity nurse.
Jamie was perhaps the most interesting of all, fighting back tears as he returned to work, exhausted, after paternity leave. He seemed magnificently well-prepared for birth (too prepared arguably) and yet when the big moment came we saw him stagger blinkingly into the street asking: “So when does it all kick in? I don’t yet feel like a dad”. He hadn’t obviously found a book that told him there is no textbook reaction to such an incredible experience.
One downside to writing on TV is having, on occasion, to watch claptrap such as Daddy Daycare, which, in my view, should never have got to Channel 4 commissioning. The premise was this: Stick three men in a south London nursery staffed entirely by single mums and see how they fare And you’ll have, guffaw, guffaw, a hoot.
So there’s Gary, a Dennis Pennis lookalike who’s too busy to spend much time with his three kids; Jay, who’s response to his firstborn is to book a vasectomy and “ex-soldier” Stefan, the sensitive one, who’d loved boarding school but feared following in his father’s footsteps (who’d left his family on the night of his silver wedding).
Naturally, the nursery staff opined thus: “Guys don’t know what to do, they have no instinct whatsoever”. Presumably in the same way they might be sneered at when confronted with fitting a kitchen under the watchful, dismissive eye of a dozen fitters.
I’ve never had any issues caring for my two boisterous boys, but dealing with a dozen (completely unknown) kids all at once would be daunting regardless whether or not my world view centred on having vasectomy as a priority. The kids did run rings round them (shock horror), but gradually – as they always seem to do in these wretched programmes – the men vaguely found their feet and possibly some other parts of the anatomy too. It’s possible to get almost any daft idea on telly these days and if you’re really clever, they’ll ask for three episodes of it. Don’t waste your time. Avoid.
One place not to avoid if you’re a foodie, seemingly is Lyon, the gastronomic capital of France (with a rather good football team to boot). Raymond Blanc dropped anchor there this week for an utterly mouth-watering tour of this fine city, famous for its love of good food, everything from tripe and andouillette (a sausage made of pig’s intestine) to divine cheese and chocolate. Blanc’s French accent has stuck like a barnacle, but he oozes passion in either language He really does say “Ooh La La“, a lot in between sampling some fantastic French cooking or market pickings, and he dished up a feast fit for a king, featuring tripe canape, a pike mousse, Bresse chicken and a chocolate tarte to die for. On the way he met up with the legendary Paul Bocuse (three Michelin stars since 1965) and tucked into calf’s head, lamb’s feet, pork and pistachio sausage and much else besides. During the 1998 World Cup I spent two nights in Lyon (in what laughably called itself a hotel, but was more like a homeless shelter, circa 1931). But on both nights, the pennies we saved on a bed we blew on food. Blanc’s wonderful epicurean journey simply whetted the appetite for a return.
Big Fat Gypsy Weddings passed me by completely last year and watching the opener to a second series I know why.
It told us an iota about some gypsy fashion (bling, very short skirts, orange spray tans), but not a lot about genuine lifestyle. As for the wedding element, one especially orange bride’s father and groom had their faces blurred out. Odd.
There was a creepy interview with a nine-year-old preparing for Holy Communion, who repeated verbatim the words being whispered to her by her (mum?). And then there was the optimist booking a nightclub to host a UK-wide beauty contest for gypsy girls. Four judges turned up, which was one for each contestant. A very odd little programme.
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