Jo Bartosch article in MoS on Graham Linehan exclusion

[Abitofalark]

The ever excellent Jo Bartosch on how GL / Glinner is being frozen out of a musical of his own creation, Father Ted, by producers' fears of trans extremists getting it shut down.

This is reminiscent of Rose, the dancer choreographer being shut out of her own company by young dancers, and JK Rowling being denounced by her young actors and her name almost erased from her own creation's film by a Hollywood company:

"Hat Trick had asked Mr Linehan to remain silent on the subject, but he had found it difficult.
‘The warnings from the production company became more insistent,’ explained Mr Linehan.
‘After a while, I had a very funny meeting with a top public relations guy at the company.
‘I’d hoped it might help improve my image. Instead he said: “Graham, I have to tell you, there are some people in the office who won’t work for you”.’
Mr Linehan added: ‘In almost every company I’ve worked with there are now young employees who are ferociously authoritarian.
‘They seem to think that unless you believe the same things as them then you have no right to take part in society.’ "

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10324511/Father-Ted-creator-claims-trans-zealots-forcing-stage-version-show.html

It's interesting to see Jo Bartosch moving up from Spiked to the mainstream press, at first to The Times where she had an article recently and now to the mass circulation Mail on Sunday. Similarly Julie Bindel has made the Mail very recently. Good on them.

@Grimbelina

What can we do about this? I want to see the musical. Glinner, if you are out there, what would be the best co-ordinated action?

@Glinner

@Cuck00soup

I could have sworn Hat Trick productions were all about poking fun at absurdity. I loved drop the dead donkey for example.

This is beyond satire unfortunately. I hope one day Graham will be able to write about the captured.

Indeed. You would think not backing Glinner would actually be quite harmful to their brand.

Hat Trick used to be at the forefront of edge comedy. It's a company founded by (and I believe still run by) Jimmy Mulville, who used to front a comedy sketch show in the 80s called Who Dares Wins (which I remember mostly because Tony Robinson used to be wandering around naked in it a lot). Hat Trick's company blurb says they were, "Established with the principle of putting writers first." What a fucking (unfunny) joke that is.

Who dares wins: if one has the courage and audacity to take risks, that person will succeed in life.

Thanks for the kind words! Nothing to be done at the moment. And if I have to remove myself for the good of the show I'll do so but I'm hoping it won't come to it.

Oh Graham, this is sickening, I'm so sorry. And angry!

So sorry to hear that Graham. So many women are enduringly grateful for your unwavering commitment and aware of just how much you've sacrificed.

Are people still buying you coffees? I seem to remember this from a while ago.

I’m very angry on your behalf Graham. Hat Trick need to get a grip.

Graham

What they said. I hope it doesn't come to that, Mr Lineham.

Please hold out as much as you can Graham. Down with this sort of bollocks!

Everything that others have said

Glinner

@glinner
Don't you dare remove yourself. You have 100 times the support of the TRAs. Are they seriously saying that Father Ted fans are woke and wouldn't go to the show? Fuck off with that. If you aren't involved I won't go and neither would any of my friends. Seriously most of the Father Ted generation are in their 40's now and have no truck with gender ideology. TRA wokesters in their early 20's are not your audience and I doubt they are the ones with the money to shell out £60 for a theatre ticket. I'd be happy to run a gauntlet of TRA supporters trying to picket the theatre. Infact it is sort of in the spirit of Father Ted. Stand your ground. This is bullshit.

I am so sick of these people having such sway

@SolasAnla

Wasn't Father Ted funded in the UK because they could not get funding in Ireland at the time because it was seen as too anti-catholic?

No solasanla that's never been true but the rumour went around at the time as a nice bit if of anti Irishness. Too stupid to make this show where we laugh at them, dumb Paddy's. It was never pitched to Irish TV.

“Graham, I have to tell you, there are some people in the office who won’t work for you."
I feel very old. In my day the boss told you what to do (within the confines of the job description) and if you wanted to keep the job, you did it. Since when did employees get to pick and choose which bit of the job they feel like doing?
Hattrick should be going down the improvement plan / disciplinary route.

I can just imagine if I went to work and told my manager that I didn't like what I had been told to do because it 'triggered' me. I mean for crying out loud do people not realize that you can have your opinions, but it's best to leave them at home, if you are being asked to do something lawful at work? Perhaps they aren't suited to this sort of work?

[quote Apollo441]@glinner
Don't you dare remove yourself. You have 100 times the support of the TRAs. Are they seriously saying that Father Ted fans are woke and wouldn't go to the show? Fuck off with that. If you aren't involved I won't go and neither would any of my friends. Seriously most of the Father Ted generation are in their 40's now and have no truck with gender ideology. TRA wokesters in their early 20's are not your audience and I doubt they are the ones with the money to shell out £60 for a theatre ticket. I'd be happy to run a gauntlet of TRA supporters trying to picket the theatre. Infact it is sort of in the spirit of Father Ted. Stand your ground. This is bullshit.[/quote]
Agree with all of this.

This is a kind of madness. Most Father Ted fans are a bit older now - it came out in the mid-1990s, after all. And opinion polls have shown time and time again that most people are opposed to self-ID. The only people really buying this nonsense are a very particular demographic: young, white, middle-class people who imagine themselves to be socially liberal.

Secondly - and I realise I'm repeating what's already been said - employers shouldn't let staff dictate the terms of their employment. "You don't like working with Graham Linehan? The door's over there."

Finally, is it just me who is enraged at the stupidity and hypocrisy of these people whose principles apparently allow them to work on a particular creative project, but to refuse to have anything to do with the person who created it? (See also JK Rowling.) What a spoilt, petulant bunch of idiots.

The theatre industry is one that is particularly 'captured' though. It won't just be the junior staff that will be out for Glinner and they will be a small team so all opinions will hold weight. For them, even if they're privately supportive the bad press and social media backlash (especially from other creatives) might be something they're not prepared to handle, especially given the state the industry's in.

However it would be great to be proved wrong. A big mainstream audience for this is there, and a theatre would be silly not to capitalise on that.

I recently went to see Fantastically Great Women Who Changed the World and the programme was full of 'she/hers'

[quote Apollo441]@glinner
Don't you dare remove yourself. You have 100 times the support of the TRAs. Are they seriously saying that Father Ted fans are woke and wouldn't go to the show? Fuck off with that. If you aren't involved I won't go and neither would any of my friends. Seriously most of the Father Ted generation are in their 40's now and have no truck with gender ideology. TRA wokesters in their early 20's are not your audience and I doubt they are the ones with the money to shell out £60 for a theatre ticket. I'd be happy to run a gauntlet of TRA supporters trying to picket the theatre. Infact it is sort of in the spirit of Father Ted. Stand your ground. This is bullshit.[/quote]
This. @glinner you have more support than you realise.

The theatre industry is one that is particularly 'captured' though. It won't just be the junior staff that will be out for Glinner and they will be a small team so all opinions will hold weight. For them, even if they're privately supportive the bad press and social media backlash (especially from other creatives) might be something they're not prepared to handle, especially given the state the industry's in.

Fair enough. But if they feel that strongly, then they should refuse to work on the project, not work on the project while pretending that it somehow created itself. I find the hypocrisy of that particularly enraging - if you have principles, at least have the decency to follow them through to the end. I suppose it's always been a feature of this ideology that the people who most support it are those who have least to lose. They're not going to do anything that might put their livelihoods at risk.

Totally agree RoyalCorgi. These are very convenient principles that allow the money making project to go ahead while punishing the originator so you can pretend to virtue. This is not principled behaviour in the least, it is sheer hypocrisy.

I disagree with what you say but I will defend to the death my right to profit from you…

@senua

“Graham, I have to tell you, there are some people in the office who won’t work for you." I feel very old. In my day the boss told you what to do (within the confines of the job description) and if you wanted to keep the job, you did it. Since when did employees get to pick and choose which bit of the job they feel like doing? Hattrick should be going down the improvement plan / disciplinary route.

They have

True, Corgi and Countess, suppose I'm just assuming the worst from looking at my local theatre scene (including venues that have supported Glinner in the past) and taking an educated guess at what would happen. Commercial theatres might be the answer - can't see anywhere dependent on Arts Council funding for example wanting to risk the bad press of protest or relentless online abuse.

That doesn't address the fact it shouldn't be happening, as you rightly point out. There's no way he should have to consider stepping back for the 'greater good' of the production and keeping people in work.