This was my first experience of Dennis Potter. Subsequently I find he used similar themes in other works, notably the Singing Detective. Though that work is terrific, I find Karaoke and its sequel Cold Lazarus to be the total package. I am yet to see anything on the small screen which comes close to them. The incomparable Albert Finney leading a strong supporting cast, tight direction and a fascinating story. The characters are so believable, and ironically (as Potter was dying when he wrote this) they are mostly likable despite their many flaws. It is hard to find anyone likable in the Singing Detective My only question is why has the Beeb Beeb Ceeb not released this on DVD?
4 Reviews
Swan Song
Lejink14 August 2021
The first of two linked four-part series written by Dennis Potter for a joint BBC / Channel 4 production. It's well-known that Potter knew of his own terminal illness at the time of writing them and that he was racing against the clock to complete both works. I'll next move on to watch the succeeding four-parter, the more futuristic, science-fictiony, at least as I remember it, "Cold Lazarus" but have to say that even if Potter had left only this drama as his last statement, it would have made for a fine epitaph.
The premise is immediately intriguing. A wealthy, veteran writer, Daniel Feeld, played by Albert Finney, much-indulged by his alliterative-spoonerism quoting agent Roy Hudd and bend-over-backwards producer Anna Chancellor, is bedevilled by health problems which cause him excruciating internal pain and to occasionally black out. He tries to forget the pain with drink and cigarettes, but his main motivation is to complete his new work "Karaoke", the plot of which centres around a pretty young girl Sandra, played by Saffron Burrows, who works as a hostess in a sleazy karaoke bar run by its even sleazier boss, Hywel Bennett's Arthur "Pig" Malian. It turns out to be no accident that the young woman works for him as she has identified him as the selfish, cruel individual who years before got her mum pregnant, disfigured her in a drunken rage and abandoned the physically and mentally scarred woman to bring up her little girl alone. Sandra very much has the pig in her sights... Then, one night, at a posh restaurant, discussing the work with his publisher, Feeld thinks he hears his dialogue being spoken word for word by another young actress and her controlling boy-friend. Turns out Daniel has been having similar experiences of late and starts to think the unthinkable, that life is imitating his art and that the fateful ending of his fictional work will actually come to pass.
In an important sub-plot, the anxious director of the "Karaoke" production, Richard E Grant, along with his young Scottish editor, is trying to complete the programme, preferably without boozy old Daniel's interference. Married to money, he's been having an affair with the actress we saw earlier, Keeley Hawes, coincidentally in the actual employ of Pig Malian. Naturally this leads to blackmail as Malian has incriminating video evidence of the director's dalliance although the girl protests her complicity to Grant. These two stories come together and move apart under Potter's skilful exposition.
It's impossible not to perceive the valedictory tone to "Karaoke", with its references to sex, violence, death and music prevalent to Potter's work. It's no coincidence that Feeld gets to sing "Pennies From Heaven" perfectly in the karaoke bar just before the climax, "Pennies From Heaven" being the title of the successful BBC drama which really brought him to notice in the 70's. Then there's the mysterious old man played by Ian McDiarmid who almost exactly resembles the real-life Potter who we see in the background, observing the action.
Finney is brilliant as the tortured writer, who sees in Sandra an echo of his own young, thwarted love and determines to save her from the fate he thinks he's already written for her. Roy Hudd, perhaps better known as a comedian is good value as Feeld's put-upon manager, even if his verbal slips start to grate after a while, although I'm not quite sure what he ever did to deserve such a harpy of a mother, played by Liz Fraser, as he gets here. Then there's Sandra's mother, played by Alison Steadman, another near-grotesque with her disfigurement and psychologically disturbed persona.
Potter brilliantly interweaves the real and unreal as he moves inevitably towards his well-imagined climax, artfully setting up the cryogenic angle which will fuel the succeeding "Cold Lazarus". Even though it was made in the 90's I think it's one of the most imaginative and thought-provoking dramas I've seen on the small screen and only hope that "Cold Lazarus" is of the same high standard.
The premise is immediately intriguing. A wealthy, veteran writer, Daniel Feeld, played by Albert Finney, much-indulged by his alliterative-spoonerism quoting agent Roy Hudd and bend-over-backwards producer Anna Chancellor, is bedevilled by health problems which cause him excruciating internal pain and to occasionally black out. He tries to forget the pain with drink and cigarettes, but his main motivation is to complete his new work "Karaoke", the plot of which centres around a pretty young girl Sandra, played by Saffron Burrows, who works as a hostess in a sleazy karaoke bar run by its even sleazier boss, Hywel Bennett's Arthur "Pig" Malian. It turns out to be no accident that the young woman works for him as she has identified him as the selfish, cruel individual who years before got her mum pregnant, disfigured her in a drunken rage and abandoned the physically and mentally scarred woman to bring up her little girl alone. Sandra very much has the pig in her sights... Then, one night, at a posh restaurant, discussing the work with his publisher, Feeld thinks he hears his dialogue being spoken word for word by another young actress and her controlling boy-friend. Turns out Daniel has been having similar experiences of late and starts to think the unthinkable, that life is imitating his art and that the fateful ending of his fictional work will actually come to pass.
In an important sub-plot, the anxious director of the "Karaoke" production, Richard E Grant, along with his young Scottish editor, is trying to complete the programme, preferably without boozy old Daniel's interference. Married to money, he's been having an affair with the actress we saw earlier, Keeley Hawes, coincidentally in the actual employ of Pig Malian. Naturally this leads to blackmail as Malian has incriminating video evidence of the director's dalliance although the girl protests her complicity to Grant. These two stories come together and move apart under Potter's skilful exposition.
It's impossible not to perceive the valedictory tone to "Karaoke", with its references to sex, violence, death and music prevalent to Potter's work. It's no coincidence that Feeld gets to sing "Pennies From Heaven" perfectly in the karaoke bar just before the climax, "Pennies From Heaven" being the title of the successful BBC drama which really brought him to notice in the 70's. Then there's the mysterious old man played by Ian McDiarmid who almost exactly resembles the real-life Potter who we see in the background, observing the action.
Finney is brilliant as the tortured writer, who sees in Sandra an echo of his own young, thwarted love and determines to save her from the fate he thinks he's already written for her. Roy Hudd, perhaps better known as a comedian is good value as Feeld's put-upon manager, even if his verbal slips start to grate after a while, although I'm not quite sure what he ever did to deserve such a harpy of a mother, played by Liz Fraser, as he gets here. Then there's Sandra's mother, played by Alison Steadman, another near-grotesque with her disfigurement and psychologically disturbed persona.
Potter brilliantly interweaves the real and unreal as he moves inevitably towards his well-imagined climax, artfully setting up the cryogenic angle which will fuel the succeeding "Cold Lazarus". Even though it was made in the 90's I think it's one of the most imaginative and thought-provoking dramas I've seen on the small screen and only hope that "Cold Lazarus" is of the same high standard.
Breathtaking
McGonigle1 March 2003
Quite simply, this is a stunning example of how good writing for television can be. Or writing, period, for that matter. It doesn't hurt that the cast, led by the indomitable Albert Finney, give uniformly great performances, but as with all of Dennis Potter's work, it's the virtuosity of the writing that reels you in, making you laugh hysterically in between (or sometimes during) scenes of unbelieveable sadness or poignancy. He was a true gem. I taped this miniseries when it was on Bravo five or six years ago and just watched it again for only the second time, and once again, it took my breath away. Viva Potter!
where will the young reality tellers come?
ryokan-221 January 2000
Dennis Potter, who passes before these works, "Karaoke and Cold Lazarus" could be produced, asked in his last interview with Melvyn Bragg, "Where will the writers who want to tell stories about life as it truly is, beneath the hype and glitter, get their opportunity as I did in the 60's, in our current world of Rupert Murdoch sensibilities?" Karaoke is a tale of personal responsibility that reaches deeper than "E-network" can imagine in its most profoundly affected moments of easy sanctimony and sentimentality. This play should be at the peak of viewing assignments for all students of what TV can really do and be in a democracy that is real, not just a convenient platitude. Dennis Potter may have been the "Shakespeare" of our times. We will be lucky if such integrity and eloquence graces us again.
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