It's Only a Movie: Reel Life Adventures of a Film Obsessive (16 page)

Alongside the prestige of appearing in print,
Time Out
was soon to open another door for me. One day, I was working in the office, filling in for Derek Adams who was taking a couple of weeks’ well-deserved leave. Derek, it turned out, was a drummer and for a while he and I had toyed with the idea of forming a garage band, bashing out old rockabilly standards and wondering whether the world was ready for a British answer to the Stray Cats, who were themselves an American answer to the Polecats. As I sat there methodically screwing up the listings (I had improved, but not that much) the phone rang and I answered it …

At which point, one of two things happened.

In the version of this story which I
remember
, and which
I have repeated ad infinitum to anyone who will listen, the voice on the other end of the phone asked for Derek Adams. I told them he was away for a fortnight but that I’d be happy to help.

‘Oh,’ said the voice.

‘Oh, what?’ I asked, politely.

‘Oh, it’s just that we need someone to do some video reviews for us this Sunday. On LBC Radio.’

There was a moment’s pause – probably not even that – before I leaped unbidden into the fray.

‘I’ll do it!’ I announced.

‘Really?’ said the voice, somewhat uncertain.’But we need someone with radio experience …’

‘Oh I’ve got that,’ I lied, ‘loads of it.’

‘Have you? Where from?’

‘Oh … Manchester,’ I answered vaguely, figuring that nobody who worked in the media in London would have any idea what happened north of Watford.

‘Right,’ said the voice.’Great. Well then, can you be here by eight o’clock on Sunday?’

‘No problem,’ I answered confidently.’8 p.m. Sunday I’ll be there. Incidentally, where is “there”. Or “here”?’

‘“Here” is our studios in Gough Square, up by fleet Street. And it’s not 8 p.m., it’s 8
a
.
m
. We’re a breakfast show.’

‘Great. No worries. I
love
breakfast,’ I babbled.’See you at 8 …
a
.
m
.!’

That’s the version of the story which would appear in the TV Movie of My Life, providing a wonderfully serendipitous moment in which my future as a radio broadcaster would be
sealed by being in the right place, at the right time – even if I was the
wrong
person.

However, the respected broadcaster Sarah Ward, who co-presented LBC’s weekend breakfast show with Ed Boyle back in the late eighties, assures me that this story is baloney. According to Sarah, someone from her programme called me after she and Ed read my reviews in
Time Out
and decided to give me a broadcasting break. Whatever the truth – whether they were looking for me or Derek – I
know
that I lied to them about having ‘radio experience’ because the awful consequences of that lie still haunt me to this day.

For reasons which I have never fully understood, I had a pretty clear but utterly fanciful view of the way live radio worked. Here’s what I thought would happen: I would arrive at the studios at the appointed hour of eight o’clock to be met by a helpful assistant who would show me into a large boardroom generously furnished with coffee and croissants. Into this room would file the assembled team of broadcasters who would jointly present the breakfast show which probably kicked off around 9 a.m. Before the broadcast began, we would all be introduced to one another and swap a few casual niceties before settling down to discuss the business of what we would actually talk about ‘on-air’. To this end, I would bring along a large sheaf of notes with several suggestions of videos on release which may be of interest to the listener. We would discuss these possible candidates, with me probably flying the flag for more obscure fare like
Piranha Women
while the presenters would doubtless argue for some more mainstream titles. After an exchange of polite banter,
we would agree on a happy compromise, and I would retire to gather my thoughts (and my notes) before going ‘on-air’ at a leisurely pace sometime around ten o’clock.

Here’s what actually happened.

I arrived at the LBC studios in Gough Square at the appointed hour of 8 a.m. So far so good. I rang the doorbell. No answer. I rang it again. Again, no answer. I started to think I was in the wrong place. Then, just as I was preparing to leave, a voice on the intercom said: ‘What?’

‘Oh, hi,’ I replied, struggling to sound unflustered.’It’s me, Mark Kermode. From
Time Out
. I’m here to do the video reviews.’

No answer. Just a buzz. I pushed the door. It opened, and I stepped inside.

Nothing.

No one.

Then a noise. A door opening and closing. Someone running down a corridor. Another door banging. Then, suddenly, someone grabbed me by the arm and propelled me down the corridor whilst speaking very fast and somewhat agitatedly …

‘… news overran so we couldn’t come and get you, thought you’d make your own way to the studio, bit of a panic this morning, breaking news blah blah blah, that door there, yes yes yes,
that
door, blue mike, bye …’

And the next thing I knew I was in the studio. And on-air. Live.

Jeezly buggers!

‘And now,’ said a voice which was either in my head, or
out there in the ‘real world’ or both (I really couldn’t tell) ‘here’s Mark …
Commode
, with the video review. So Mark, what’s out …?’

You know that dream that everybody has (or at least I
assume
that everybody has) about waking up naked in the middle of your maths O-level exam (no? nobody else? Just me then …)? Well, it was like that, only LIVE ON-AIR and crucially
NOT A DREAM
. And faced with this frankly unforeseen circumstance, I did what I believe any other thoroughly unprepared person would do.

I panicked – vociferously.

With nothing but the sound of my own blood thrumming deafeningly in my ears I started to speak, to babble, to spew forth sounds which occasionally had meaning but equally often were just pure animal noise. You know the yelping sound that a dog makes when you accidentally trap its paw under the foot of your swivel chair while it attempts to warm itself around the electrical snug of your malfunctioning computer (no? just me again, then…)? It was like that, only
human
. Just about.

I started to talk about anything that came into my head, and a lot of stuff that just went straight to my mouth, entirely bypassing the higher cerebral cortexes. I held forth like a zealous worshipper suddenly moved by the spirits to speak in tongues in a Pentecostal church, vomiting fluent drivel which merely needed a divine interpreter to turn it into something comprehensible by carbon-based life forms. Somewhere in the middle of it all I think I mentioned some videos but to be honest I’m really not sure. For all I know I recited
The
Canterbury Tales
in original fruity Middle English. It was the closest I have ever come to experiencing demonic possession first-hand, although unlike Linda Blair I couldn’t claim afterwards that ‘the Devil made me do it’. The babbling went on for what seemed like hours, days, months, but was in fact only three and a half minutes of actual air time. At the end of which a light flashed in the centre of the room, the still unidentified presenter (who turned out to be Sarah) said something like ‘Thank you Mark. And now, sport …’ and a hand at my elbow guided me out of the studio, down a corridor, through a metal door, and out on to the street.

The door slammed shut.

It was all over.

It was seven minutes past eight.

I felt like I had been mugged.

I decided to ring my mum, who had been alerted to my radio debut with instructions to tune in. Apparently she had complied.

‘Hi Mum.’

‘Oh, hello.’

Nothing else. Just ‘hello’. No ‘That was nice’ or ‘Well done’ or ‘Oh you sounded so relaxed’ – all off-the-peg maternal compliments that everyone knows are utterly untrue but which somehow make you feel better about things which have gone really badly. Like when you come last in the sports day sack race or fall off the stage while trying to play the French horn in the school concert or fail your French exam for the
second time
. Everyone knows you’ve done rubbish – most of all yourself – but your mum is
allowed (nay
required
) to lavish you with well-meant but utterly undeserved praise before offering to buy you an ice cream and let you stay up late to watch
Star Trek
to make you feel better. But there was none of that. Clearly she’d forgotten about the broadcast. A blessing.

‘So, you missed it then?’ I said casually, planning to shrug the whole thing off safe in the knowledge that no one had been listening. It was, after all, only a local station.

‘Oh no,’ replied Mum, slightly indignantly.’I got up specially and listened to the whole programme from six o’clock onwards. I thought you might be on at any time and I didn’t want to miss it.’

‘So you did hear it then?’

‘Oh yes.’

Still nothing else. Blimey O’Reilly, it must have been bad.

‘So you heard it,
and
…?’ I prompted desperately.

‘Oh, the signal was very clear,’ said Mum, clearly putting on a brave face and struggling to accentuate the positive.’Yes,
very
clear. I was worried that I wasn’t going to be able to find it, because I only really listen to Radio Two usually. But I looked up the frequency in the newspaper and I found it quite easily. So that was good. And, as I said, very clear.’

Great. The signal was good and clear. This was even worse than I thought.

‘And what about
me
, Mum?’ I finally blabbed, unable to restrain myself, ‘How was
I
?’

‘Oh, very clear,’ she said again, brightly.’Yes, very clear indeed. I could hear every word. It was as if you were right here in the room. That’s how clear it was.’

‘But was I
any good
?’ I almost screamed. I
knew
that I had been utterly awful but the fact that not even my mother could bring herself to lie about the extent of the on-air catastrophe was really giving me the willies. Central London is a lonely place to be at ten past eight on a Sunday morning, and I was starting to feel as if my incompetence had somehow unleashed a seismic blast of destruction and despair which had cleared the streets (there were neither cars nor pedestrians in sight), leaving a pall of hopelessness hanging over the city. The only time I’ve ever known London so quiet was years later when
The Culture Show
decided to restage the post-apocalyptic opening to Danny Boyle’s
28 Days Later
and I got to walk through a deserted Trafalgar Square at 4.30 a.m. thinking that the capital was actually quite palatable as long as there weren’t any people in it. Standing around outside the radio station on that lonely Sunday morning, however, I would have been grateful for any sign of human life. There was none.

‘But, other than the clarity of the sound, which of course I am thrilled to hear about, was I actually
any good
?’

There was a brief but howlingly noticeable pause.

‘Oh, yes.’

Silence.

‘Really?’

‘Yes. If a bit … gabbly’

‘“Gabbly”?’

‘Yes, you know … you gabbled a bit.’

‘A
bit
?’

‘Well, a lot, actually. Since you ask. But it’s probably
just me, I’m not used to listening to people speaking so …’

‘Gabbly?’

‘Yes, as you say, gabbly. And fast. Fast and gabbly.’

This was terrible.

‘But the signal was very clear,’ Mum ventured again bravely. It was no use. Clearly the entire fleeting episode had been career-threateningly poor. I had learned an important lesson – I was absolutely
awful
at radio, and I wouldn’t be doing it again in a hurry.

Or so I thought. But a couple of weeks later I was back in the
Time Out
office, still answering the phones on Derek Adams’ behalf, when an uncomfortably familiar voice said, ‘Hello, is that Mark … Commode?’

‘Close enough,’ I replied, suspiciously. I recognised the speaker as someone from LBC; presumably there had been complaints and now they were ringing to offer an official reprimand. I deserved nothing else. But instead I got this: ‘Oh hi, look, it’s a short month this month and we need to do our video reviews a week early, which will be next Sunday. Same as before. Could you do it again?’

Clearly there had been a clerical oversight and no one had informed this person of my former foul-up. They couldn’t have actually
heard
it because if they had they wouldn’t be offering to let me repeat the offence. But that was exactly what they were doing. And even as every atom of my being screamed, ‘No no
noooo
, never again, never never never
not ever no
,’ my mouth blithely said ‘Yes’ and that was that.

But this time it would be
different
. This time I knew what to expect. This time I would be
prepared
. Indeed, this time
I would make amends for the previous tragedy and perhaps rescue my dignity in the process. It was a second chance, a last-minute reprieve, a stay of execution, an opportunity to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat …

That’s it – I’m all out of clichés. Just choose the one you find least trite and hackneyed (or insert one of your own) and that’s what it was.

So, over the next few days I ‘prepared’ myself for my forthcoming radio rematch. Having figured out exactly how long the slot would last (just under four minutes on the evidence of last time) and resolving to speak m-u-c-h s-l-o-o-o-o-o-w-e-r than before I calculated that it wouldn’t really be possible to talk about more than two videos – unlike the eight through which I appeared to have cantered on my debut. I duly chose two titles, both of which were reassuringly mainstream (no more
Piranha Women
this time, thank you very much) and I sat down to write a script which I timed, and rehearsed, then trimmed and edited and timed and rehearsed some more. It was amazing just how little you could actually say in four minutes if you were talking at the pace of the speaking clock, but I was determined to right the wrongs of yore and the most grievous wrongs were clearly the incomprehensible speed and unmanageable substance of my first outing. By the time Sunday rolled around, I was as practised, sonorous, and ponderously low-key as a churchgoer reading from the gospels at the lectern on Good Friday, desperate not to stumble over some hotly debated theological point, and determined that the deaf pensioners in the back rows would be able to hear every word.