The Leisure Review: La Flamme Rouge

La Flamme Rouge edition 1; dateline 6 February 2014

Thefts put police to the spelling test
The theft of two works by Damien Hirst from a gallery in London’s swinging Notting Hill has prompted intense speculation across the art world. Inspector Knacker suspects that the theft of the two dot paintings, titled Pyronin Y and Oleoylsarcosine, were lifted to order in light of the fact that no other works in the gallery or its storeroom were touched. Those familiar with Hirst’s production techniques are now wondering who paid the thieves to do the job on their behalf and who the police might employ to do the actual job of tracking them down.

Showing the way to influence
Andrew Sells is an investment banker and venture capitalist who has lived on a farm for 22 years. He has had a bit of a problem with rights of way on his land, which, the local Ramblers group and Open Spaces Society claim, have been hastily rectified after complaints dating back to 2008. New arrangements have removed some fences obstructing the paths in question but waymarking is alleged to be poorly placed, making direction-finding rather difficult. The haste may well have had something to do with the fact that Sells has been recently installed as chair of Natural England, the statutory adviser to the government on the natural environment. Less difficult to see than the waymarking on his land is the path by which Mr Sells came to his job. He has described his donations to the Tory party as “serious money”, which turns out to be around £140,000 over five years.

Some fond farewells
Since our last issue we have said a fond farewell Peter O’Toole, whom La Flamme Rouge saw in memorable production of Jeffrey Bernard is Unwell at the Old Vic in the company of a certain Mr Reeves, for whom Bernard, and for that matter O’Toole, were heroic figures of the alternative lifestyle to which most of us can only aspire and from which most of us are grateful to have escaped. We also said goodbye to Joan Fontaine, a celebrated actor who was a leading figure of an earlier age. LFR knows her best through the reference to her work in Blinded by the Light from a young Mr Springsteen’s first album. We can only hope that someone took out a full-page ad in the trades to announce the end of her arrival.

Good by comparison
The Lawn Tennis Association, whose achievement of appointing first female president in 100-plus years was reported recently in these pages, has been made to look like the exemplar of equity and balance we were always led to believe it is by Lloyds of London, which has appointed its first female chief exec in its 325-year history. Inga Beale commented, “I think the business is run differently if you have women around the decision-making table.”

Closed for private commemorations
Brown’s Hotel in Laugharne, south Wales has completed a major refurbishment of its premises in time for the Dylan Thomas 100 celebrations that will mark the centenary of the poet’s birth. Thomas was in the habit of writing, lounging and lingering in the hotel having put in a shift in his nearby writing shed and the hotel is preparing for an increase in visitor numbers. Contrast this piece of timing with the Imperial War Museum in London, which is marking the centenary of the outbreak of the first world war by closing for half the year. This goes on the list of great cultural planning events just behind the Dickens Museum, again in London, which marked the bicentenary of their eponymous hero’s birth by being closed for the whole year.

The game is afoot, at least
Almost 10 million people tuned in to see if they were right about the non-demise of the modern incarnation of the consulting detective Sherlock Holmes. The Leisure Review’s editor declared himself “almost right”, in other words wrong, in his prediction that Holmes escaped a terminal pavement-induced deceleration via the open laundry truck that passed at an opportune moment in the piece. No spoilers here, of course, so you will have to watch yourself if you are still in the dark but it seems even the explanation of events left many confused. It’s the modern way with television.

Taxi for Hammond
Should government ministers be obliged to use the services for which they are responsible for delivering? Transport minister Stephen Hammond is perhaps a case in point, having used the “top-up” government car pool, used when a departmental car is unavailable,138 times in a year. Rail unions have suggested that Mr Hammond might like to use public transport if only to see whether the increased prices for commuters seem value for money. The question is leant further spice by the fact that Mr Hammond lives just six miles from Westminster, an energetic 90-minute walk, half an hour on a bike or just two or three hours if using public transport.

Taxi for Grant
And speaking of ministers showing the way, under-minister for sport, Helen Grant, used this particular car system on 155 occasions, adding weight to the argument popular in some quarters that sport does not equate to physical activity.

From cradle to gravy train
Disquiet in the world of athletics as UK Athletics hands a £93,000 bonus to its chief executive, Niels de Vos. The sum, which sits atop his £164,000 basic, is in line with a four-year milestone within de Vos’s contract and according to UK Athletics reflects highly successful commercial negotiations that have increased UKA’s revenue streams. However, those a little further down the organisation’s hierarchy have described the bonus as a shock that has prompted fury among those operating at the grassroots. John Powell, a respected coach who has worked with a number of Olympians, said it was another kick in the teeth for those who work with little financial support. “That £93,000 could fund what I do with my athletes – the warm winter training and so on – for a decade,” he told members of the press. Even under-minister for sport, Helen Grant, was forced to have a view, commenting, “This is a matter for UK Athletics. However, I want sports governing bodies who receive public funding to be transparent and for good governance to be high on their agenda.”

Election 2015 countdown
The poverty of aspiration and ambition within our national politics has again been demonstrated most admirably by Boris Johnson. With the Westminster controls now firmly set for ‘election’, Boris has had his unruly mop shorn into a shape that suggests an expensive interpretation of the first-day-at-big-school short back and sides. La Flamme Rouge predicts that this represents the mayor of London’s big push for the job of prime minister and may be as close to coherent policy exposition as he gets.

Big buoy Boris
But buoyed by his haircut, the boy Boris has seen fit to wade into the debate on the redevelopment of the Southbank Centre, one of the most controversial cultural projects on the drawing board on his patch. His message is that the redevelopment has his full support, apart from the fact that the skaters’ haven in the undercroft should remain untouched, which now seems to have scuppered the whole plan as the mayor would have the final say on any planning application. With his work done, the Blond Bomber leaps on to his bike in search of other things to occupy his time.

Election watch
And speaking of an imminent election, those of a cultural persuasion preparing their Election 2014 Bullshit Bingo cards may have to include school sport alongside squares marked ‘departmental efficiencies’ and ‘returning power to local people’. The PM has opened the list of pre-election promises to include a pledge of £150 million a year for school sport if he gets re-elected [Surely, ‘elected’, seeing as he has no majority? Ed], a promise we can quickly file alongside his guarantee that there would be no restructuring of the NHS on his watch.

Matters of trust and spending
According to a study undertaken by a public relations firm, 42% of the public trust the government, a decline from the figure of 47% shown in a similar survey last year. While many began to wonder what sort of sample could be used to find that many people with a favourable opinion of the governmental process, others were recovering from the suggestion that trust in the media has grown to 43%. For leisure professionals the key metrics may well be the numbers that show only 12% of people expect to be better off in the next 12 months, while 82% said they would have the same or a lower standard of living.

Mrs Smith