The Reckoning - Savile

. . . everybody who knew even a bit of what was going on and did nothing should hang their head in shame.

I agree. But why didn't that apply to Russell Brand and others? Savile was never tried and found guilty - do we always have to wait until someone dies before they can be accused of things that happened in private so can't be proven? How many victims have to come forward before they are taken seriously?

I did wonder how true that scene with his mother was - in confession she was afraid she didn’t love her son (or not enough) - she sensed a ‘darkness’ in him.

I thought Steve Coogan was extraordinary in the part.

I agree with Luckygirl3 that the programme is a sobering warning about the ‘rich and famous’ who assume they’ll get away with it - and all too often have - because nobody’s going to believe ‘little’ people, are they?

Luckygirl3

I think it is more than voyeurism. It is very important that we grasp how people get away with things when they are well-known - especially in our current "celebrity" culture - with social media now thrown in.

Well said.
I will watch it when I have time.I think Steve Coogan is a really good actor, and he interviewed Savile I believe at one time but found him incredibly evasive.What a swine Savile was, everybody who knew even a bit of what was going on and did nothing should hang their head in shame.

henetha

I think it's good that people, especially the young, know about the likes of Jimmy Savile and hopefully learn to be wary of people. Steve Googan is brilliant as always.

So do I. One way to do it would be an ad before films at the cinema - a reminder that people online may not be who they say they are; that going in a car to meet up with someone your parents do not know or when your parents do not know is a recipe for disaster; etc. there are enough examples of unsafe practice and what they need to to make a full trailer before the main film, or mid film. It may not be suitable for teens, but if as parents, you’ve decided your child is old enough to go then they’re old enough to learn it. If they’re going and parents don’t know that they’re definitely old enough to need to know.

I forgot to comment on the programme - I think Coogan did an excellent job. It was very disturbing, but I do feel that dramatisations of things like this are important. As people have said, younger generations won't know about him, and it is important that all of us understand what can happen if people don't speak up. I also think it's important that those in authority know that they will be called to account if they don't protect people - if there isn't enough evidence they should do more to find it, and listen to those who report abuse rather than demanding proof which is often impossible to provide.

I'm not sure about the psychology aspect - the implication that Savile's crimes were a result of his mother's relationship with him. It's possible, and I believe the research for the programme was meticulous, but I'd have liked to know more about how that conclusion was reached. There was mention at the start of how his mother used to beat him as a child - probably not uncommon in the 20s and 30s, but I can see how that could lead to a belief that children and young people have no say over what happens to their bodies. That wasn't really explored though, and I take Caravansera's point that blaming a woman for a man's crimes is depressingly common.

Otherwise, I think it was very well done.

Parsley3

^she was told she wouldn’t be believed.^
This is why Saville and others like him get away with it. Even today, women who disclose sexual abuse by famous men have to run a gauntlet of criticism.
I watched the first episode and will stick with it as I want to see how he became so cosy with some members of the RF.

Exactly this.

We have seen recently what happens when women come forward, or when anyone tries to act on rumours. They are accused of lying, of instigating witch hunts and so on, which is exactly what happened in the case of Savile, then the same people are blamed for not doing anything.

Given that it appears that Savile had the police eating out of his hand too, what would you (any of us) have done had we been able to at the time? I don't have the first idea, personally.

I watched the programme with great misgivings. I am not able to leave the house at present as I am recovering from surgery, and thought I'd see what all the fuss was about. As it happened, I felt almost physically sick, and will not be watching any further episodes.

she was told she wouldn’t be believed.
This is why Saville and others like him get away with it. Even today, women who disclose sexual abuse by famous men have to run a gauntlet of criticism.
I watched the first episode and will stick with it as I want to see how he became so cosy with some members of the RF.

I spent a number of years living in Scarborough and I can remember a work colleague telling me not to allow my boy's to work for Jaconelli (both were looking for Saturday jobs at the time).

Stories about both him and Saville were widespread. It's such a shame that they weren't acted upon!

Years ago I had a colleague in the bank where I worked and her “claim to fame” was she had a Jim’ll Fix It badge. Oddly she wrote to him when she was a young girl for him to fix it for her to Rob a bank. I think she was lucky as she never mentioned any inappropriate behaviour- but perhaps she wouldn’t.
I think it’s true what they said in last night’s programme that he almost groomed a nation. Now I think what a creepy horrible depraved man he was but although I didn’t particularly like him I thought he was doing good work for charities - little did we know.
In my early twenties myself and friends did meet another popular Radio 1 DJ a few times in a local nightclub who was equally creepy and we knew a girl who said she was raped by him and that it was covered up by his management possibly the BBC she was told she wouldn’t be believed. He used to send his management/minders to bring young girls he had picked out to go and meet him. I was pleased to see about 10 years ago as part of the Yewtree Operation that investigated Jimmy Saville he was investigated and went through a few court cases for sexual assault and rape and did receive a prison sentence.

I think it's good that people, especially the young, know about the likes of Jimmy Savile and hopefully learn to be wary of people. Steve Googan is brilliant as always.

Mollygo

BlueBelle,
I think it’s important, but how many teenagers/young people do you think were watching it? I asked all my DGC stretching from early teens to early twenties, if they’d seen Steve Coogan in the programme about JS.
Responses
Youngest said Who’s Steve Coogan? Who’s JS? No she didn’t watch the programme. Yes she had heard about creepy men, you shouldn’t be alone with them or go places where they can trick you into sex.
Yes they were taught about grooming at school.
Middle teens didn’t watch it-^we get told about different ways of grooming at school and that’s quite enough.^
Did I know that some girls still do it even when they know?
The oldest one had heard of JS, but didn’t watch it and nor did her friends.
The only one who did watch it was one of the late teens DGS. He said it was interesting because it happened in history when you were young Grandma. Which put me in my place!
He thought it was appalling and couldn’t understand why adults had not done anything about it, but ^didn’t believe the children would have listened back then because they still don’t now.^

I don't think we should worry if today's teenagers are not watching it. Once something has been made it will be around for ever, so they may watch it 10 or even 20 years from now and then realise what it was all about. There are many things which are of no interest to teenagers but which they will find out about when older.

I think it is more than voyeurism. It is very important that we grasp how people get away with things when they are well-known - especially in our current "celebrity" culture - with social media now thrown in.

I watched all episodes on iplayer, I thought the acting was superb.
I felt I needed to watch because I found it hard to believe anyone could be so depraved.
DC used to watch Jim'll fix it, yes I used to think he was a bit strange but not a clue he was a sexual predator.

Last year’s two part Netflix documentary was more than enough. I watched about 15 minutes of this new drama and switched off. Reading the reviews afterwards, it doesn’t sound as though this new production adds any more to what we already know. It just feels like voyeurism.

Lucy Mangan in The Guardian:

But The Reckoning does exist in a context. And that context is a world already full of dramas and documentaries – including one very recent very thorough and harrowing one about Savile – that mine trauma, particularly female trauma, for content. To justify adding to that pile, you have to be adding something really valuable to the subject. It is here that The Reckoning falls down. It is a careful recounting of what we already know, and posits no more explanation of how Savile came to be and how he managed to operate untrammelled for so long than we have already learned or would intuit alone. The suggestion, based on scant evidence, that his predilections were due to “the duchess” not loving him enough, as an unwanted seventh child, is to indulge our worst impulses to blame the nearest, easiest person – the mother.

www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2023/oct/09/the-reckoning-review-steve-coogan-is-chillingly-brilliant-as-jimmy-savile-bbc

I heard rumours about JS long before there was any general acknowledgment of his faults. I didn’t take it very seriously - he was just another weird showbiz person who we were never likely to come in contact with. My children did watch his programmes.

DDF = DD

One of my DDFs wrote to him - I am very glad she got no reply. I thought he was a creep, but let her write in as I assumed (wrongly) that there would be protections in place for participants.

Incidentally it did cause us some amusement as she wrote "Dear Jim'll" - she thought that was his first name and "Fixit" his second.

The acting yesterday was superb. Coogan had him down to a T.

I felt very angry with the Theroux programmes on him. It was clear Theroux could see that things were seriously wrong but on he ploughed to earn his crust. And his squirming attempts to justify his actions in his autobiography were not edifying reading.

How did this dreadful man get away with it all? - not just the sexual abuse but the general invading of personal space with everyone, and flouting rules unchallenged.

I think it is important that this programme has been made, challenging though it is, as we should never forget how easily a forceful/?charismatic person can charm us into submission. We need to be on our guard.

BlueBelle,
I think it’s important, but how many teenagers/young people do you think were watching it? I asked all my DGC stretching from early teens to early twenties, if they’d seen Steve Coogan in the programme about JS.
Responses
Youngest said Who’s Steve Coogan? Who’s JS? No she didn’t watch the programme. Yes she had heard about creepy men, you shouldn’t be alone with them or go places where they can trick you into sex.
Yes they were taught about grooming at school.
Middle teens didn’t watch it-^we get told about different ways of grooming at school and that’s quite enough.^
Did I know that some girls still do it even when they know?
The oldest one had heard of JS, but didn’t watch it and nor did her friends.
The only one who did watch it was one of the late teens DGS. He said it was interesting because it happened in history when you were young Grandma. Which put me in my place!
He thought it was appalling and couldn’t understand why adults had not done anything about it, but didn’t believe the children would have listened back then because they still don’t now.

Although I agree it should be made for the benefit of those who don't remember, I'm not sure I can cope with watching him again so might give it a miss. Apart from all his many TV appearances there was a programme about him and I remember Louis Theroux interviewing him in some detail so I've had quite enough.

The BBC are getting a lot of criticism for making it, having turned a blind eye to him while he was earning them money.

It was interesting to see that even his mother sensed a darkness in him and couldn't bring herself to feel any love for him. Didn't she say to the priest in the confessional that he'd been her seventh child and she hadn't wanted him when he was born. Strangely though, he seems to have cared a lot for her.

Steve Coogan is a good actor and has talked in interviews about the conflicted feelings he had when offered this part.

I haven’t watched the drama but I will do. I was warned by older girls when going to a Manchester club where he DJ’d to keep away from him. They thought I’d be safe because as a tall just 16 year old, I wasn’t his type. He liked the 12 and 13 year olds, they were the ones he played records for and invited back to his room. 1964.
He always made my flesh crawl.

The other thing to remember is how little we knew and understood about child sex abuse 30 or more years ago.

Do you remember all those jokes about vicars and choir boys, bishops and actresses? We warned our children not to go off with strange men and I can remeember saying to my children that if any body did anything that made them feel uncomfortable, even if it was their father or grandfather or close friend - I had no reason - to think they would, they should always tell me, but it was more just saying what was recommended.

Jimmy Saville's behaviour dated back well before then, as long as he wasn't doing it in the street and frightening the horses, people would rather ignore the issue, because few of us then realised the extent or the serious of what was happening, nor the effect it had on the child victime.

I actually gave up but will go back to it.
Perhaps it’s testament to the acting, the production values, or what but it left such a bad taste in my mouth, bringing it all back.
I too let the girls write in to “Jim’ll Fix It” - thank god they got no reply, but I shared in the gullibility of so many at the time.
Unsettling to know what we know now and think of the lucky escapes for some.