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The Reckoning: Jimmy Savile - BBC1 9 Oct SPOILERS

240 replies

YokoOnosBigHat · 09/10/2023 11:48

I couldn't see a thread for the five part drama The Reckoning starring Steve Coogan as Jimmy Savile, so thought I'd start one.

I'm in bed with Covid so have decided to start watching. Half an hour into the first episode and I can safely already say that Coogan's performance is extraordinary. The voice, the mannerisms, they're amazing.

For anyone interested and who isn't familiar, the framing device of Savile telling his life story for an author interested in writing a book is based around Dan Davies's research for his account 'In Plain Sight'. Well worth a read for anyone who wants to know more about how the establishment wilfully ignored what was going on right under their noses.

Interesting article on the drama by Mark Lawson for The Guardian here and Lawson's account of how he tried and failed to report Savile at the BBC in 2006 here.

Look forward to discussing this all. Have marked it as spoilers as all parts are on iPlayer and are there really any spoilers possible for this story?!

OP posts:
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9
x2boys · 14/10/2023 09:25

YokoOnosBigHat · 13/10/2023 23:04

@CurlewKate I have posted this on the other non-spoilers thread, but I think it's an argument as to why this needed to be made:

As part of a job I do I reviewed the show this week. I made this point about Russell Brand in it. I think that it's a very valid point and further emphasises why this needed to be made. The article from the LRB is well worth a read too.

This is the extract:

Last month, when the accusations about Russell Brand's various sexual misconducts some while on the payroll at the BBC- -were laid bare in another TV documentary expose, I thought about the Brand of the mid-noughties. I will admit that I was a huge fan of Russell Brand back then, with his mad hair, madcap antics, and mad leatherette trousers. As the accusations led to further accusations, I thought of his eccentric, jester-like clothing back when he first hit the comedy scene and of his verbal affectations, all so funny, but even at the time, all so weird. I remembered too, something that I had read by Andrew O'Hagan in the
"London Review of Books' back in 2012, a piece called
"Light Entertainment' (https://www.Irb.co.uk/the-paper/v34/n21/andrew-o-hagan/light-entertainment), which described a certain television personality:

'Let's blame him for all the things he obviously was and blame him for a host of other things we don't understand, such as how we love freaks and how we select and protect people who are 'eccentric' in order to feed our need for disorder... [because] no one said, not out loud, 'What's wrong with that man? Why is he going on like that? What is he up to? ' He was an entertainer, and that's thought to be special.'

O'Hangan was writing about Savile in 2012, but he might as well have been discussing Brand in 2023.

I don't think you can compare Russell Brand and Jimmy Savile
Russell Brand wasnt a national treasure for a start
And he's always been seen as having dubious morals ,whatever's he's done I don't think he would ever Been allowed to.wander freely around hospitals and abuse anyone and everyone
And he certainly didn't have connections s with the Royal.family and Politicians.

Lalgarh · 14/10/2023 13:19

bronkie · 13/10/2023 09:26

Other Buggers Efforts!

Show quote history
Pay Me Kim Kardashian GIF by GQ

Order of the Brown Envelope more like!

bronkie · 14/10/2023 14:34

I was somewhat disappointed with the last episode - probably I wanted to see more of his fall from grace as it were. I did read that AP refused to film a particular scene so the morgue one is a watered down version. Ive seen other people on here saying it is providing too much exposure about him but I really believe this series was about the victims and that it did end with them - the real faces.

Aquarius1234 · 14/10/2023 18:59

For some reason I thought there was 5 episode so felt it ended too quickly.
Really annoying he showed no remorse or admitted anything but that is what he was like.
I didn't really like the actor playing the journalist.
Could have done without dome of the tedious scenes.
Sounds like JM mainly volunteered in the hospitals for being able to sexually abuse anyone he liked.
That seemed the main motivation over the charity really.

Aquarius1234 · 14/10/2023 19:00

Excuse the errors.

OneFrenchEgg · 14/10/2023 20:39

bronkie · 14/10/2023 14:34

I was somewhat disappointed with the last episode - probably I wanted to see more of his fall from grace as it were. I did read that AP refused to film a particular scene so the morgue one is a watered down version. Ive seen other people on here saying it is providing too much exposure about him but I really believe this series was about the victims and that it did end with them - the real faces.

SC? 😂

bronkie · 14/10/2023 23:44

Yes @OneFrenchEgg oops 😂

Aquarius1234 · 15/10/2023 01:15

Steve Coogan does like younger ladies himself. Comes across creepy at times.
He made that sex fim https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Look_of_Love_(film)

Shame he's another one obsessed with ..

The Look of Love (film) - Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Look_of_Love_(film)

Aquarius1234 · 15/10/2023 01:16

Younger as in half his age..no illegal obv.

FictionalCharacter · 15/10/2023 02:28

Aquarius1234 · 14/10/2023 18:59

For some reason I thought there was 5 episode so felt it ended too quickly.
Really annoying he showed no remorse or admitted anything but that is what he was like.
I didn't really like the actor playing the journalist.
Could have done without dome of the tedious scenes.
Sounds like JM mainly volunteered in the hospitals for being able to sexually abuse anyone he liked.
That seemed the main motivation over the charity really.

Professionals who work with sex offenders say that they are extremely cunning. They will plan very patiently to get access to victims, sometimes for years. That is what Savile did. He created the madcap eccentric persona to throw everyone off the scent. The philanthropy made him appear to be a good hearted righteous person. He developed manipulative relationships with very influential people in the media, police, government and royal family.

All of this gave him free access to vulnerable victims, and a suit of armour against being caught. He really was a master criminal who planned very cleverly.

JMSA · 15/10/2023 06:13

Aquarius1234 · 13/10/2023 21:17

Did any of the victims end up pregnant?
Secret abortions etc. Horrible.

I wondered about this.

My heart went out to all the victims, of course. But that poor, poor lass who was already in hospital due to being abused by her grandfather Sad

IncompleteSenten · 15/10/2023 06:21

Sooooo... Are the BBC accurately portraying how they enabled and covered for him and have actors playing all the BBC people who knew? Are they making this series about the massive problem at the BBC historically (and still)?

Or are they trying to rewrite history to make themselves blameless?

Aquarius1234 · 15/10/2023 09:08

I would really like to see the BBC admitting why they kept covering it up.
Just in case there was something else.
I know half of them are probably dead now but it would be good to see real footage or interviews.
Was it only cos of TV ratings etc

x2boys · 15/10/2023 09:14

IncompleteSenten · 15/10/2023 06:21

Sooooo... Are the BBC accurately portraying how they enabled and covered for him and have actors playing all the BBC people who knew? Are they making this series about the massive problem at the BBC historically (and still)?

Or are they trying to rewrite history to make themselves blameless?

They are definitely minimizing their role in helping him become a national treasure and untouchable.

RosaMoline · 15/10/2023 09:48

Steve Coogan is an excellent actor and The Look of Love is superb. It’s a biopic of Paul Raymond - NOT a ‘sex film’
I finished The Reckoning last night. It was chilling. I actually shed some tears at the end for his poor victims.

CesareBorgia · 15/10/2023 09:56

Aquarius1234 · 15/10/2023 09:08

I would really like to see the BBC admitting why they kept covering it up.
Just in case there was something else.
I know half of them are probably dead now but it would be good to see real footage or interviews.
Was it only cos of TV ratings etc

The Dame Janet Smith review (available in full on the BBC website) goes into detail about this. Essentially it was bound up in the culture at the BBC at the time, where sexism, 'casual' assaults such as groping, bullying and untouchable higher-ups were taken for granted.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/bbctrust/dame_janet_smith.html

JackieQueen · 15/10/2023 16:07

Watched 3 episodes, had to have a break. Chilling. Don't think my blood's ever run colder. It would be unbelievable if it was a made up drama.

Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g · 15/10/2023 17:27

paranoidnamechanger · 13/10/2023 09:49

As a drama, this didn’t work for me because of the revisionism. I just don’t buy that pretty much everyone he came across knew what he was up to, and were talking about it with each other. I would have much preferred for there to have been a focus on his victims, like in The Long Shadow. Maybe it could have been a six-parter.

I love Siobhan Finneran, but even she couldn’t convince as a thirty- something in the 1960s, same as the actor who played her husband. But Steve Coogan was extraordinary as Saville, a performance that could easily have come across as caricatured with an actor less talented.

Mark Lawson suggests here that just about everyone at the BBC did indeed know what he was up to. https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2022/apr/01/the-day-i-thwarted-jimmy-savile-mark-lawson-on-trying-to-stop-britains-worst-sex-offender

It's a very shocking article. As a BBC presenter, I am intermittently invited to so-called “talent lunches” with one senior manager or another. At one such meal, I question why Jim’ll Fix It ended, in July 1994, after 19 years and two months, rather than let Savile depart after two full decades, a neater break point. “Yes, well,” says the BBC manager, “child protection laws are stricter now than they used to be.”

^A meeting of production staff to discuss possible future guests for Mark Lawson Talks To … on BBC Four. Flicking through birthdays, someone notices that Savile will be 80 in October. After swapping rumours about whether he only molests young women or dead bodies as well, we rule him out.
None of those present reach higher management positions at the BBC, so this conversation does not contradict a position the BBC will take in future years: that no one at the top at any point had ever even heard rumours about Savile. Yet, if in my experience of more than 20 years, so many junior BBC staff knew the stories, it must mean that only those who didn’t were ever promoted to senior roles. What are the odds?^

He also describes the sexual assault Savile perpetrated in plain sight in a meeting room at Television Centre on a female producer, observed by several other people, only ended (commendably) by Lawson physically separating him from the woman, which the BBC did nothing about at all. This was on the occasion of the last ever episode of TOTP and it later came out that he had earlier sexually assaulted an audience member. He was 79 at this point.

I don't think it's possible to conclude from this that very few people at the BBC knew what he was like. They just didn't care enough about the children and teenagers he preyed on to do anything about it. Their lives and wellbeing counted less than ratings.

Netaporter · 16/10/2023 03:39

Just finished it all. I think Steve Coogan captured JS really well and it was quite brave of him to take the role on I thought . I also read the article written by Dan Davies (Dr Wordsmith) in the Guardian last week which was really interesting and worth a read. If you ever watched the original Louis Theroux interview with JS there were very similar vibes as portrayed with the Dan Davies scenes.

I do hope the victims felt they were vindicated after watching this, it is clear they were badly let down by the system.

Twilight7777 · 16/10/2023 03:57

Binged watched the entire thing in two evenings, Steve coogan portrays him perfectly, I got the creeps watching him, especially with the mortuary bit and the bit where he gets that young girl to touch him to search for a present in his pocket 🤮 it’s a shame it hasn’t been made into a film, coogan would probably have won an Oscar for it! I think it’s really good, doesn’t feel insensitive to the victims like some portrayals do.

catwithflowers · 16/10/2023 10:28

I rewatched the two Louis Theroux documentaries after watching The Reckoning. They were even more chilling after watching the Steve Cougan series and you could really see the kind of manipulation Jimmy Savile used. I also started to read the full report (linked to earlier in this thread). Horrific.

catwithflowers · 16/10/2023 10:29

*Coogan

GonnaGetGoingReturns · 16/10/2023 10:35

catwithflowers · 16/10/2023 10:28

I rewatched the two Louis Theroux documentaries after watching The Reckoning. They were even more chilling after watching the Steve Cougan series and you could really see the kind of manipulation Jimmy Savile used. I also started to read the full report (linked to earlier in this thread). Horrific.

The two Louis Theroux interviews which I’ve seen too, it just shows with the first one, it can be so easy to dupe someone as Savile did with Louis. Things Savile said or did, he managed to persuade Louis that they were normal, even I think when he was talking about getting men roughed up at the nightclub.

GonnaGetGoingReturns · 16/10/2023 10:46

Netaporter · 16/10/2023 03:39

Just finished it all. I think Steve Coogan captured JS really well and it was quite brave of him to take the role on I thought . I also read the article written by Dan Davies (Dr Wordsmith) in the Guardian last week which was really interesting and worth a read. If you ever watched the original Louis Theroux interview with JS there were very similar vibes as portrayed with the Dan Davies scenes.

I do hope the victims felt they were vindicated after watching this, it is clear they were badly let down by the system.

It’s not been made clear in the documentary but have the victims received any compensation at all?

I googled this and went down a sort of rabbit hole onto a site which supports Savile’s innocence. Of course we all know he’s guilty but it’s bloody scary to think there are people out there who believe he’s innocent, the target of a witch hunt, the women and men he abused are lying and so on.

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