Schama vs Fry

Two big new TV series about America kicked off last weekend. First, was Simon Schama's four-part historical series, 'The American Future: A History' (BBC 2, Fridays at 9, reapeated on Sundays at 7) and then Stephen Fry's 6-part travelogue, 'Stephen Fry in America' (BBC 1, Sundays at 9, repeated on Saturdays on BBC 2).

The day of the big 13-part blockbuster is evidently over. There are several reasons for this. First, cost. A TV crew traveling around America for months doesn't come cheap. Second, risk. What if it bombs? Even sure-fire bets like Schama and Fry are not, well, sure-fire bets and then you're stuck with a very expensive turkey clogging up primetime for the whole Autumn. Third, Schama and Fry are busy men. Schama has two chairs at Columbia, books to write, articles to write as the election draws close. He hasn't got a year to spend just for the BBC. Fry has QI to present, books to endorse, Twinings to recommend. being a national institution takes time. So the question, then, is how do you cut the cake?



America, past and present, is a lot to fit into four or six episodes. Schama, working with Oxford Films, has come up with a very BBC 2 solution: four big themes, moving forward chronologically from the deep American past to the present and even into the future. Episode 1 avoided the big cliches (the W of independence, the Civil War, two World Wars, JFK). It was less Mt. Rushmore and more the Catskills. Clever, quirky, thoughtful. It was historical (from the 1830s to the present and beyond). It was polemical (what is it with the Americans and their refusal to acknowledge limits?). It covered big chunks of America (Manifest Destiny, the Frontier, the Thirties). And it wore its learning lightly (lots of the Okies in the Depression but no 'Grapes of Wrath' or 'Let Us Now Praise Famous Men', references to California running out of water but no 'Chinatown'). BBC 2 is clearly not what it was. This was smart and informed but not too erudite. More A/S Level than Oxbridge Common Room.

Where does that leave Fry's travelogue, 50 states in a London taxi? GCSE? SAT? Who thought Fry could be so uninteresting, so unfunny? Was it him or was it the production team or the dead hand of some nameless BBC 1executive ('dumb it down, Stephen')? It sucked. Why start in Maine? And if you're going to start in Maine, why start with lobster? I know this was BBC1, but already the cliches were piling up. Then Fry on a deer hunt... The second problem looms large: Fry is at his best doing clever (QI, Blackadder, Fry and Laurie). He's not great with ordinary people. So why stick him with a format that doesn't suit his talents? Hadn't they heard about McGovern, Dukakis and Kerry -- those liberal brainiacs who coudn't click with middle America? 'Fry on America' is 1972 all over again. And then even when they hit on a good idea -- The Gettysburg Address -- how about getting a good actor to read it over shots of the battlefield? No, let's go with some ham actor in shot mangling the lines... Now we know why it's only a 6-parter. Fry's agent saved him from a series that might have ruined his career. Next time, cut the cake better and don't listen to the fool from BBC 1.