A Very Private Celebrity (15 page)

It almost didn't happen. Four days before the live transmission, Freeman and Peacock met with Foulkes in Broadcasting House to discuss the terms of the interview. Foulkes refuted the allegations of the previous Monday's
Panorama
and demanded a ‘conversation' rather than a ‘cross examination' in the studio follow-up, otherwise he would not appear. Freeman insisted that ‘on no account must he be placed in a position of being unable to ask the questions he wanted to put to Mr Foulkes', as Peacock reported to Leonard Miall. He added that Foulkes would not accept Freeman's terms because ‘he would have everything to lose and nothing to gain'. It had been ‘a difficult and sticky meeting'.
7

Eventually, to the surprise of the
Panorama
office, Foulkes did agree ‘to unrestricted questioning and answering'. The result was embarrassing to watch:

Peacock saw it unfold from the gallery:

Mary Crozier of
The Guardian
was mesmerised:

The next day, the interview made headlines in the
Daily Mail
: ‘ETU in the dock:
Why don't you sue us all?
Challenge on television to union chief Foulkes.'

It instantly became a cause célèbre. A group of Labour MPs wrote to
The Times
accusing Freeman of being ‘a self-appointed prosecutor coercing Foulkes by challenge to prove his innocence'. A counter-group of eminent journalists and politicians, like Malcolm Muggeridge, Francis Williams, Woodrow Wyatt, Christopher Chataway and Lord Boothby, retaliated:

Strictly speaking, it was not trial by television, for television has no legal authority. It took high-court action before the ballot rigging in the ETU was confirmed, and both Haxell (the general secretary) and Foulkes were removed.

John Freeman began his broadcasting career – as he did his journalism for the
New Statesman
– when he was still a Member of Parliament. He was an infrequent contributor from 1951 to the long-running
Week in Westminster
and
At Home and Abroad
, both discussion programmes on the BBC Radio Home Service. He also broadcast on the BBC World Service – his first paid contribution being an ‘unscripted discussion' with Wilfred Pickles for
London Calling Europe
, answering the question ‘What is socialism?' The date was 5 October 1952.

Following a six-week tour of eastern Europe in the summer of 1956 (see Chapter 7), Freeman became something of an expert on communism and delivered his ‘Impressions of Warsaw' and ‘The Iron Curtain' on
At Home and Abroad
.

A more adventurous programme was
Radio Link
, which connected speakers ‘live' in studios around Europe. He took part in the opening programme on 5 July 1956, when the subject was Khrushchev's speech denouncing Stalin at the 20th Party Congress, held the previous February in Moscow. The other speakers were Raymond Aron in Paris and Thomas Barman in Warsaw; Robert McKenzie was the chairman. Afterwards Freeman wrote to the producer: ‘Next time I shall be very much less scared of this hellish technique of headphones' – a curious admission for one with apparently steely nerves.

Freeman enjoyed radio and was keen for more work. If he had been asked why he worked hard to establish a broadcasting reputation, he
would have retorted, no doubt, that he needed the money. But there was more to it than that. Freeman was never interested in financial enrichment for its own sake, nor was he interested in social status or being an intellectual snob. Provided the subject interested him, he was keen to find out more about it and shape it into the report, interview or discussion form that the broadcast media required, whether for
Panorama
or schools radio. His interests were wide. Themes emerged: foreign affairs, particularly the United States, eastern Europe and South Africa; anything to do with crime and punishment and the law; the human mind, from brainwashing to beliefs; the stage and cinema. To BBC staff, he was always polite – even to his paymasters, as the many notes in his files indicate. Perhaps this was no more than was to be expected, but Freeman had been a senior soldier and government minister and was considerably older than most of the staff he dealt with.

From 1956, Freeman combined radio broadcasts with television appearances. His most regular programme before
Panorama
was
Press Conference
– a format taken from American television, in which three or four journalists questioned a public figure in the news. After his first two appearances, the producer Felicia Elwell spread the word:

Freeman soon graduated to ‘leading panel member' (his fee went up from 17 to 20 guineas) and it is easy to see why. His striking looks, authoritative manner and complete command of language made him the centre of attention whenever the camera allowed.

Watching
Press Conference
today, over half a century later, it is notable how cerebral and reasoned the arguments were. A good example was the appearance of Sir John Wolfenden on 6 September 1957, answering to his Report on Homosexual Offences and Prostitution. Apart from recommending that homosexual acts between consenting adults should no longer be illegal, the report recommended a crackdown on prostitutes soliciting in public and on pimps living off immoral earnings, but not a ban on prostitution itself. Freeman opened the 25-minute discussion by questioning Wolfenden about prostitution:

Between 1955 and 1960, Freeman's portfolio widened to include: schools programmes (television and radio); religious programmes like
Meeting Point
(television);
Woman's Hour
(radio);
Frankly Speaking, Commentary, Call from London
and
This is Britain
(all World Service);
Home
and
Abroad
(Home Service); and, of course, his first forays in the television talks department, like
Panorama, Press Conference
and
Face to Face
(see Chapter 6).

Even television light entertainment pursued him, with offers to appear on
What's My Line?
and
Ask Me Another
. These he declined, although he did accept the role of host on the
Chan Canasta
show. The truth was, unlike other Goldie boys, Freeman was keen to get away from politics. ‘Find something you like doing and get someone to pay you for it,' he told his stepdaughter Lizi. He obviously succeeded.

The
Chan Canasta
show – in which Chan (his stage name) carried out feats of ‘mental magic', displaying phenomenal memory and some telepathy – was of personal interest to Freeman, but it came to a bad end. Perceptive viewers told Freeman they could tell that the BBC production team was collaborating with Chan behind Freeman's back. Obviously, his credibility was at issue, and, as Freeman was a man of firm principle in his public life, he refused to host any further shows until a contract of trust was agreed; then he ended his association as soon as he could.

Occasionally, Freeman worked for the opposition. In its early years, ITV ran a popular discussion programme on Sunday afternoons called
Free Speech
. The regular panellists were the historian A. J. P. Taylor, independently minded politicians like Bob Boothby and Michael Foot, and the trade unionist W. J. Brown, who was known as ‘the rustic philosopher'.

The chairman, Edgar Lustgarten, and the producer, John Irwin, were both freelancers, which is significant because the whole team had originally been employed by BBC TV, making exactly the same programme but calling it
In the News
. In 1952, it had been hugely popular, with an audience of about 50 per cent of all TV owners.
Nevertheless, early in 1955, the BBC gave in to the politicians who wanted more orthodox spokesmen and women to argue party politics. An early suggestion from the Conservatives was Margaret Roberts (later Thatcher), who the BBC rejected because no one had heard of her. So, led by Taylor and Lustgarten, the iconoclastic team of
In the News
resigned before they were pushed, and took their programme to the Associated Broadcasting Company, later ATV. Tom Driberg had been a contributor, and now he introduced Freeman as an occasional contributor to
Free Speech
.

In
The Best of Both Worlds
, Driberg describes the pleasures and perils of this form of live broadcasting in those pioneering days. No wonder even Freeman said that in the last moments before transmission he would be ‘shaking with nerves'. After an expensive meal in a private room at A l'Ecu de France on Jermyn Street, Piccadilly, the
In the News
team was driven by Rolls-Royce to the studio in Shepherd's Bush for the rehearsal:

That still left lots of time before transmission. Time to wander the streets near the studio or sip a nervous half-pint at the British Prince pub at the top of Lime Grove, imagining the public in their scores of thousands settling down to watch the television. Then back to the studio:

At the end of December 1957, Freeman wrote to radio producer Leslie Smith, with whom he made several Home Service programmes on crime and criminals: ‘The affectionate letters I've had from a great many friends really have been a comfort at a time of utter misery.' Mima had died of cancer on 17 December. Although they had led very separate lives, her slow death caused him much grief. ‘I have not really left the hospital since I last saw you,' he wrote to TV producer Christopher Burstall on 12 December. ‘I am not easy to reach because I am sitting with my wife.' Lizi recalls ‘a lovely last holiday John planned for us':