Free Did You Really Shoot the Television? by Max Hastings Page A

columnist whose pieces about – for instance – the merits of cocktails and changing women’s hairstyles would fit as readily into the feature pages of a modern newspaper as they did into those of the 1920s. At that time also, he published a bad novel entitled The Faithful Philanderer , but we should not hold that against him.
    I am a shade doubtful about the quality of Basil’s judgement. He opposed the mooted creation of a National Theatre, on the grounds that such an institution would encourage endless productions of Shakespeare, an author whom he thought better read than performed: ‘All the world’s worst actors, the offspring of what is known as Shakespearean experience, would flock to the stage door.’ When he was theatre reviewer of the Daily Express , he incurred the wrath of Arnold Bennett, a director of the Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith. Basildismissed a Chekhov production at the Lyric as ‘fatuous drivel’, and described its author as ‘a great writer of stories, but a paltry dramatist’. In similar vein, Basil listened to some 1926 radio broadcasts by Winston Churchill, then commented: ‘I hope political hopefuls do not listen in when Mr Churchill broadcasts. He speaks clearly and powerfully, and every word, I am sure, could be heard in Tattersall’s in the five minutes before the start of a big race, but his pauses between sentences – and even between words – suggest an Olympian contempt for the value of time. How often must listeners have shouted out the word he was groping for!’
    Yet Basil’s verdicts were perhaps no worse advised than those of many newspaper pundits of the past century, including others named Hastings. He understood that a good columnist must be a professional controversialist, seeking to tease and provoke. At home as well as in print, though essentially benign, he liked to play the part of the irascible grumbler. At Christmas, he hung a sign in the hall of the family house in Holland Road, West London, proclaiming ‘Peace and goodwill to all men, with the following exceptions:’. He appended a pencil, with which visitors were invited to make their own additions to his list.
    In that clubbable age, he loved the Savage, whose members were almost all writers, painters, actors, musical hall stars. He was a regular performer, sometimes producer, at the club’s smoking concerts. Poems were recited, songs sung, turns rehearsed by some of the great comics of the day, including George Robey and Wee Georgie Wood – who lived long enough for me to be introduced to him at the Savage. Though Basil was a Londoner by upbringing and instincts, he professed a devotion for rural life, which caused him to rent a country cottage, tend his vegetable garden, and enthuse about the superiority of Sussex pubs to London ones. He organised a regular Savage ‘Country Members’ Night’, at which his friends dressed in yokels’ smocks and sang jolly rustic songs. Keenly gregarious, Basil was never happier than when chattering in the club bar with a cluster of theatrical friends
    He never made a fortune, but achieved a comfortable living bythe standards of the day. His account books, meticulously kept by his wife Billie, who also typed his manuscripts, show him earning £1,333 in 1912; £870 in 1914; £815 in 1915; £1,100 in 1916. In 1922, his most successful year, largely because of back royalties, he received £2,550. It is interesting to notice the scale of payments for journalism at the period. In 1905, Basil received a guinea apiece for occasional contributions to newspapers; by 1915 this had risen to seven guineas a time from the Evening Standard and four guineas from Punch . His books earned tiny sums, and theatrical royalties were never large, but he was well paid for Victory .
    His 1923 adaptation of A.S.M. Hutchinson’s novel If Winter Comes failed in London, but Basil cherished high hopes for its New York production. For its opening, he crossed the Atlantic on the Aquitania , which he