Victor Lewis-Smith
Encyclopedia
Victor Lewis-Smith is a British
satirist, producer, critic and prankster. He is known for his sarcasm and biting criticism.
with contract employment on BBC
radio talk shows Rollercoaster, Start The Week and Midweek, during which he booked Arthur Mullard
as a stand-in presenter for Libby Purves
(interviewing Prof. A. J. Ayer). According to The Times
(26 February 1987) Lewis-Smith was replaced after ratings had fallen: "the department head, Alan Rogers, broke convention by admitting that the programme...had lost its way".
From 1983-5 he presented the Sunday morning programme Snooze Button for BBC Radio York
, featuring humorous but erudite conversations with local personalities (including John Scott Whiteley who later featured in his 21st-Century Bach series), music towards the more intelligent end of the pop spectrum, and some of his own interpretations including the now famous "York Minster Rap". This took the backing track of "Street Dance" by Break Machine
and overlaid a rap in which he claimed through his sexual prowess to have caused the York Minster
fire of 1984. For local radio, Snooze Button was, as he described it, "dangerous radio" and a precursor to, or rehearsal for, his later work.
In 1986 he became a freelance writer, a regular on BBC Radio 4
's Colour Supplement and a contributor on Loose Ends
. During this time, he won nine awards at the 1988 Independent Radio Advertising Awards (including the Gold) for his Midland Bank
student campaign.
He also made his first programme for BBC Radio 1
(producer: John Walters) under the name "Steve Nage", parodying the Simon Bates
style of Radio 1 disc jockey.
His company, (Associated-Rediffusion
), made two comedy series (Victor Lewis-Smith) for BBC Radio 1, for which he won a Best Comedy Radio Programme award in the 1990 British Comedy Awards.
In 1991, he released a CD and cassette entitled Tested on Humans for Irritancy, which was drawn from his broadcasts on Loose Ends and Radio 1. A second cassette Nuisance Calls (re-released on iTunes
in August 2006) was marketed by Associated Rediffusion. Some of these calls later appeared in TV Offal
.
Radiohaha, the online encyclopaedia of contemporary British radio comedy, describes Lewis-Smith as having been "almost entirely eclipsed by the rise of Chris Morris
, who tends to occupy similar ground". Morris (then working in BBC Radio Bristol) in fact sent a Lewis-Smith-style tape to Loose Ends in 1988, asking if he could be on the programme (doing something similar a couple of years later by writing to Time Out editor John Morrish, asking to take over Lewis-Smith's column when the latter was on holiday).
Lewis-Smith contributed an introduction to the composition "Towers of Dub" by The Orb
. It was released on 1992's U.F.Orb
. This introduction was in fact a sample taken from an episode of Lewis-Smith's first Radio 1 series. Another sample taken from this series ("not ripped to the tits on drink or drugs") turned up on the track "Plateau" from The Orb Live 93 album.
(4 July 2003) claimed that "Lewis-Smith, while still a student, climbed scaffolding on the front of York Minster and called the faithful to prayer muezzin
-style".
Lewis-Smith's prank phone calls include:
When re-released, a compilation of these calls peaked at No.1 on the iTunes comedy chart on 27 July 2006. At the time of their first broadcast, they attracted controversy: in The Sunday Times
(15 April 1990) Paul Donovan argued that Lewis-Smith's hoaxes are "repugnant". Donovan claims first that Lewis-Smith's company broke a "written undertaking that permission to broadcast would be obtained from all the people who had received the hoax calls" and that subsequently the BBC made illegal broadcasts in breach of their producers' guidelines ("Lewis-Smith was unavailable for comment"). Donovan then says that the material "invites us to snigger at what men and women, particularly those not blessed with Lewis-Smith's education, say when caught unawares". Yet the compilation has continued to be offered for sale.
He made contributions to other shows, such as BBC2's TV Hell theme night, and the Great Bore of the Year Awards.
Lewis-Smith is Chairman of a TV and radio production company called "Associated-Rediffusion" (the name being taken from the original Associated-Rediffusion - the first commercial TV station in Britain) and is executive producer of an ongoing collection of documentaries. Several were one-off programmes, including the BAFTA-winning, Dudley Moore
- After the Laughter, for BBC1
's Omnibus, which was the cause of a dispute as to whether Moore was dying or not (The Strange Saga of Dudley and the BBC). Also Scandal in the Bins, about Benjamin Pell
, a man who steals the garbage of public figures in order to find incriminating documents.
Other documentaries include The Man Who Ate His Archbishop's Liver? (Channel 4) about Idi Amin
; Alchemists of Sound, about the BBC Radiophonic Workshop
; a biography of clarinettist Artie Shaw
(nominated for a Grierson
award); one on singer/songwriter Jake Thackray
; and a BBC Four
programme about British experimental music
of the 1960s and 70s called Here's A Piano I Prepared Earlier (also nominated for a Grierson). Documentaries about British views on eschatology
, the Belgian chansonnier Jacques Brel
, the musical partnership of Dame Cleo Laine
& Sir John Dankworth
, and the harmonica
are completed and awaiting scheduling.
Lewis-Smith is currently writer and Executive Producer for Keith Allen's documentaries for Channel 4, which have so far included Little Lady Fauntleroy (2004) about Lauren Harries
and her family; You're Fayed, about businessman Mohamed Al-Fayed
; Michael Carroll
- King of Chav
s about the British lottery
winner known to the press as the "Lotto Lout" (a third Grierson nomination); Tourette de France following a group of young Tourette's Syndrome victims on their trip to Paris; and Keith Allen Will Burn In Hell, focussing on Allen's accompanying Westboro Baptist Church
on their mission. These documentaries have attracted comments covering a spectrum of opinions from The Guardian
, "It makes me want to declare Allen my new God" to The Scotsman
calling these films (22 June 2007) "an intermittent series of purposefully scrappy and deconstructive documentaries from Allen and director Victor Lewis-Smith, each hamstrung by the fact that the unctuous Allen isn't particularly amusing or likeable".
Lewis-Smith is the executive producer of a series of short TV programmes called 21st Century Bach - The Complete Organ Works, now completing the fourth series on BBC Two. These feature Johann Sebastian Bach
's organ
works, filmed in performance by John Scott Whiteley on, mainly, authentic instruments of the time. The televised recitals include both conventional coverage of the instruments, performer and buildings, and also shots of the organ mechanism at work (including filming within the wind-chests using an endoscope), cameras suspended from helium-filled balloons which range freely across the enormous Baroque
instruments, and close-ups of the player's face. The series started on BBC2 in June 2003, and a third tranche of programmes has just (July 2007) been completed and awaits scheduling. Reviewer Graeme Kay, commenting upon the programmes in "Choir and Organ" magazine in August 2006, praised the series, saying "the imaginative range of content in these well-crafted miniature programmes ... will withstand repeated viewing. I would certainly hope to see the series completed."
In June 2007 Lewis-Smith's company made a programme featuring an interview with Rupert Murdoch
, funded by Murdoch's Sky1 channel: How TV Changed Football Forever (Guardian Unlimited, 22 June 2007).
, the short-lived Sunday Correspondent
, and The Mail on Sunday
(where he often substituted for Burchill) as well as Esquire magazine. He has also written for The Independent
, and was Restaurant Critic for Harpers & Queen magazine from 1995 to 1998.
In 1992 he began a long association with the Evening Standard
, contributing daily television reviews along with other writers, as well as occasional restaurant reviews and travel articles. He frequently used his TV reviews, which he contributed most weeks over a 15-year period, to criticise the British Royal Family
, the importance of social class
in the United Kingdom
(particularly in the context of what he regards as a cynical, exploitative attitude to viewers by television executives), the Iraq War and other foreign policies of George W. Bush
and Tony Blair
, British cuisine
, and organic farming
. He supports Britain's involvement in Europe
(often condemning his own country as "America
Junior") and is a critic of what he terms "Little Englander
s". His critical targets also include celebrity chef
s, Jeremy Clarkson
, Vanessa Feltz
and, especially, Esther Rantzen. He was a vociferous critic of Director-General Greg Dyke
and BBC1 controller Lorraine Heggessey
, who he blamed for lowering the standards of
the BBC. He also appears to have a particular loathing of "Mockney
s" such as Jamie Oliver
, Nigel Kennedy
, Ben Elton
and Jo Brand
. His other pet hates include Endemol
, Peter Bazalgette
and Big Brother, and the general direction of Channel 4 since the 1990s.
It was announced in June 2007 that Lewis-Smith would be retiring from his daily television column. In The Observer
's Media Diary on June 17, 2007, a London Evening Standard spokeswoman was quoted as saying: "Victor is a wonderful writer, and he will continue to feature in the Standard". This came shortly after Lewis-Smith had used his columns to declare traditional television dead, and "narrowcasting" via such methods as YouTube
as the future.
Since 1993, he has edited the "Funny Old World" column of bizarre news stories in Private Eye
, and he wrote a weekly page for the Daily Mirror for some years until 2003. From autumn 2004 to April 2005 he was the resident restaurant critic of The Guardian's Saturday magazine supplement. His columns included reviews of a Little Chef
restaurant, an East End Pie and Mash Shop and (in his final column) a Bridlington Fish & Chip Shop.
His books include Buy-Gones and Inside the Magic Rectangle, a collection of his early Evening Standard TV reviews.
Keyboardist Dave Stewart provided a (straight) musical number for the second Radio 1 series, and later provided music for Lewis-Smith's TV projects. The originally cited producer for his programmes, one Anton Piller, is a joke, the name belonging to a real but unconnected person who gave his name to a particularly Draconian kind of court order. Another of his cover names is Harold Coltart, which he used in 1989 when he appeared on a Call the Controller phone-in on BBC Radio 4 condemning the station's controversial soap opera Citizens, fooling everyone in the studio. Other regular collaborator is producer/director Ned Parker.
Some years earlier The Independent had printed an apology (July 5, 1999) that the newspaper "accepts that there was no scuffle between them, and that Victor Lewis-Smith did not scream for security guards before legging it". However the same newspaper had previously run a story (which they did not retract), saying of his membership of the Groucho Club
"Victor Lewis-Smith sits in a corner and gets into fights" (28 November 1995).
In June 2006, Gordon Ramsay
, his production company, and his producer accepted an out-of-Court settlement of £75,000 from Associated Newspapers
, after an article written by Lewis-Smith which alleged that Ramsay had faked scenes and installed an incompetent chef appeared in London's Evening Standard.
On 28 July 2006, hypnotist Paul McKenna
successfully sued the Daily Mirror for libel over articles written by Lewis-Smith from 1997 alleging that Mr McKenna was in the possession of a false PhD, having obtained the qualification from a non-accredited institution in the United States, whose Principal has since been imprisoned for making misleading claims about the status of degrees he handed out to candidates.
When Lewis-Smith returned to writing in his Evening Standard column on 29 August 2006, he referred to himself as Dr Lewis-Smith, saying that he had received a PhD in the same manner as McKenna (by paying a non-accredited institution) and suing anybody who suggests his PhD is "bogus".
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
satirist, producer, critic and prankster. He is known for his sarcasm and biting criticism.
Radio and recordings
Lewis-Smith claimed in the Daily Mirror to have worked for the BBC at the age of 17, continuing after graduation from the University of YorkUniversity of York
The University of York , is an academic institution located in the city of York, England. Established in 1963, the campus university has expanded to more than thirty departments and centres, covering a wide range of subjects...
with contract employment on BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
radio talk shows Rollercoaster, Start The Week and Midweek, during which he booked Arthur Mullard
Arthur Mullard
Arthur Ernest Mullard, original surname Mullord was an English comedy actor.- Early life :...
as a stand-in presenter for Libby Purves
Libby Purves
Libby Purves OBE is a British radio presenter, journalist and author. A diplomat's daughter, she was educated at convent schools in Israel, Bangkok, South Africa and France, and then Beechwood Sacred Heart School in Tunbridge Wells.Purves won a scholarship to St Anne's College, Oxford, where she...
(interviewing Prof. A. J. Ayer). According to The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
(26 February 1987) Lewis-Smith was replaced after ratings had fallen: "the department head, Alan Rogers, broke convention by admitting that the programme...had lost its way".
From 1983-5 he presented the Sunday morning programme Snooze Button for BBC Radio York
BBC Radio York
BBC York is the BBC Local Radio service for the English county of North Yorkshire.- Early history :The station was launched at 6:30am on 4 July 1983 - a launch featured on the cover of the Radio Times...
, featuring humorous but erudite conversations with local personalities (including John Scott Whiteley who later featured in his 21st-Century Bach series), music towards the more intelligent end of the pop spectrum, and some of his own interpretations including the now famous "York Minster Rap". This took the backing track of "Street Dance" by Break Machine
Break Machine
Break Machine was the name of a 1980s rap act, fronted by Keith Rodgers and produced by Jacques Morali and Henri Belolo; the team behind the Village People.-Career:...
and overlaid a rap in which he claimed through his sexual prowess to have caused the York Minster
York Minster
York Minster is a Gothic cathedral in York, England and is one of the largest of its kind in Northern Europe alongside Cologne Cathedral. The minster is the seat of the Archbishop of York, the second-highest office of the Church of England, and is the cathedral for the Diocese of York; it is run by...
fire of 1984. For local radio, Snooze Button was, as he described it, "dangerous radio" and a precursor to, or rehearsal for, his later work.
In 1986 he became a freelance writer, a regular on BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4 is a British domestic radio station, operated and owned by the BBC, that broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history. It replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. The station controller is currently Gwyneth Williams, and the...
's Colour Supplement and a contributor on Loose Ends
Loose Ends (radio)
Loose Ends is a British radio programme originally broadcast on Saturday mornings, and then transmitted early Saturday evenings from 1998 by BBC Radio 4. It was hosted by Ned Sherrin until he became ill in late 2006 with a reported throat infection, and later throat cancer...
. During this time, he won nine awards at the 1988 Independent Radio Advertising Awards (including the Gold) for his Midland Bank
Midland Bank
Midland Bank Plc was one of the Big Four banking groups in the United Kingdom for most of the 20th century. It is now part of HSBC. The bank was founded as the Birmingham and Midland Bank in Union Street, Birmingham, England in August 1836...
student campaign.
He also made his first programme for BBC Radio 1
BBC Radio 1
BBC Radio 1 is a British national radio station operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation which also broadcasts internationally, specialising in current popular music and chart hits throughout the day. Radio 1 provides alternative genres after 7:00pm including electronic dance, hip hop, rock...
(producer: John Walters) under the name "Steve Nage", parodying the Simon Bates
Simon Bates
Simon Bates is a UK disc jockey and radio presenter. Between 1976 and 1993 he worked at BBC Radio 1, presenting the station's weekday mid-morning show for most of this period. He later became a regular presenter on Classic FM...
style of Radio 1 disc jockey.
His company, (Associated-Rediffusion
Associated-Rediffusion
Associated-Rediffusion, later Rediffusion, London, was the British ITV contractor for London and parts of the surrounding counties, on weekdays between 1954 and 29 July 1968. Transmissions started on 22 September 1955.-Formation:...
), made two comedy series (Victor Lewis-Smith) for BBC Radio 1, for which he won a Best Comedy Radio Programme award in the 1990 British Comedy Awards.
In 1991, he released a CD and cassette entitled Tested on Humans for Irritancy, which was drawn from his broadcasts on Loose Ends and Radio 1. A second cassette Nuisance Calls (re-released on iTunes
ITunes
iTunes is a media player computer program, used for playing, downloading, and organizing digital music and video files on desktop computers. It can also manage contents on iPod, iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad....
in August 2006) was marketed by Associated Rediffusion. Some of these calls later appeared in TV Offal
TV Offal
TV Offal was a British television comedy sketch/archive series that ran on Channel 4, from October 1997 to June 1998. It was written and narrated by comedian and writer Victor Lewis-Smith, who shared writing duties with Paul Sparks...
.
Radiohaha, the online encyclopaedia of contemporary British radio comedy, describes Lewis-Smith as having been "almost entirely eclipsed by the rise of Chris Morris
Chris Morris (satirist)
Christopher Morris is an English satirist, writer, director and actor. A former radio DJ, he is best known for anchoring the spoof news and current affairs television programmes The Day Today and Brass Eye, as well as his frequent engagement with controversial subject matter.In 2010 Morris...
, who tends to occupy similar ground". Morris (then working in BBC Radio Bristol) in fact sent a Lewis-Smith-style tape to Loose Ends in 1988, asking if he could be on the programme (doing something similar a couple of years later by writing to Time Out editor John Morrish, asking to take over Lewis-Smith's column when the latter was on holiday).
Lewis-Smith contributed an introduction to the composition "Towers of Dub" by The Orb
The Orb
Throughout 1989, the Orb, along with Martin Glover, developed the musical genre of ambient house through the use of a diverse array of samples and recordings. The culmination of its musical work came toward the end of the year when the group recorded a session for John Peel on BBC Radio 1...
. It was released on 1992's U.F.Orb
U.F.Orb
-Disc 1:# "O.O.B.E." – 12:51# "U.F.Orb" – 6:08# "Blue Room" – 17:34# "Towers of Dub" – 15:00# "Close Encounters" – 10:27# "Majestic" – 11:06# "Sticky End" – 0:49-Disc 2:# "Blue Room " - 3:09# "Blue Room " - 7:37...
. This introduction was in fact a sample taken from an episode of Lewis-Smith's first Radio 1 series. Another sample taken from this series ("not ripped to the tits on drink or drugs") turned up on the track "Plateau" from The Orb Live 93 album.
Pranks and hoax phone calls
The Times Higher Education SupplementThe Times Higher Education Supplement
The Times Higher Education , formerly Times Higher Education Supplement , is a weekly British magazine based in London reporting specifically on news and other issues related to higher education...
(4 July 2003) claimed that "Lewis-Smith, while still a student, climbed scaffolding on the front of York Minster and called the faithful to prayer muezzin
Muezzin
A muezzin , or muzim, is the chosen person at a mosque who leads the call to prayer at Friday services and the five daily times for prayer from one of the mosque's minarets; in most modern mosques, electronic amplification aids the muezzin in his task.The professional muezzin is chosen for his...
-style".
Lewis-Smith's prank phone calls include:
- Calling the office of That's Life!That's Life!That's Life! was a magazine-style television series on BBC1 between 26 May 1973 and 19 June 1994, presented by Esther Rantzen throughout the entire run, with various changes of co-presenters. The show was generally recorded about an hour prior to transmission, which was originally on Saturday...
, and speaking to Adrian MillsAdrian MillsAdrian Mills is a British television presenter. He appeared on That's Life! with Esther Rantzen for seven years until its demise in 1994. Since then he has presented talk show Central Weekend Live, reported for BBC viewer feedback programme Bite Back, appeared as a location reporter on Surprise,...
, pretending to be a euphonium player in a wheelchair, who then collapses while trying to play the "Sailor's Hornpipe" at extreme speed down the phone. (Lewis-Smith appears to have a particular loathing for Esther RantzenEsther RantzenEsther Louise Rantzen CBE is an English journalist and television presenter who is best known for presenting the BBC television series That's Life!, and for her work in various charitable causes. She is founder of the child protection charity ChildLine, and also advocates the work of the Burma...
.) - Telephoning the Monopolies and Mergers Commission and asking them why there was only one such organisation.
- Phoning HarrodsHarrodsHarrods is an upmarket department store located in Brompton Road in Brompton, in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, London. The Harrods brand also applies to other enterprises undertaken by the Harrods group of companies including Harrods Bank, Harrods Estates, Harrods Aviation and Air...
department store and asking if he had got through to the H.A. Rods shop, before enquiring about returning an allegedly faulty vacuum cleaner which he claimed (in a halting voice) to have bought "to suck dust off sausages". - Phoning a hotel in New YorkNew York CityNew York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
and asking the receptionist to announce over the hotel's loudspeaker system to ask "General Pinochet" if he could hold fire until reasonable discussions with NATO, which she unsuspectingly did. - Ringing the White HouseWhite HouseThe White House is the official residence and principal workplace of the president of the United States. Located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., the house was designed by Irish-born James Hoban, and built between 1792 and 1800 of white-painted Aquia sandstone in the Neoclassical...
, and using the synthesized speech system of a computer to impersonate Stephen HawkingStephen HawkingStephen William Hawking, CH, CBE, FRS, FRSA is an English theoretical physicist and cosmologist, whose scientific books and public appearances have made him an academic celebrity...
and demanding to speak to the PresidentPresident of the United StatesThe President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....
. Having been put through to the Oval OfficeOval OfficeThe Oval Office, located in the West Wing of the White House, is the official office of the President of the United States.The room features three large south-facing windows behind the president's desk, and a fireplace at the north end...
, 'Hawking' then introduces 'his friend' Victor Lewis-Smith's impression of a "baby turning into a pig". - Phoning This MorningThis Morning (TV series)This Morning is a British daytime television programme broadcast on ITV. As of September 2011, its main presenters are Phillip Schofield and Holly Willoughby, and Ruth Langsford and Eamonn Holmes, with various other presenters standing in for illness or contributing to sections of the programme.The...
live and pretending to have an injured back, then saying he phoned because "Richard and Judy are the biggest pain in the arse so they should know what to do". He was quickly cut off, and although Richard MadeleyRichard MadeleyRichard Madeley is a British television presenter and columnist. With his wife Judy Finnigan, Madeley has presented This Morning and later the weekday chat show Richard & Judy...
exclaimed that they did not care, there was a brief pause afterwards during which Judy Finnegan looked clearly upset. - Phoning BBC RadioBBC RadioBBC Radio is a service of the British Broadcasting Corporation which has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a Royal Charter since 1927. For a history of BBC radio prior to 1927 see British Broadcasting Company...
and applying to be a continuity announcer, while pretending to have Tourette's syndrome and reminding them of their equal opportunities policy. - Phoning ITN claiming to work for British Telecom and having knowledge of the whereabouts of Salman Rushdie. After a failed attempt to extract payment for the information he claims that Salman Rushdie is 'in Communicado', a small island in the Aegean.
- Phoning London Weekend TelevisionLondon Weekend TelevisionLondon Weekend Television was the name of the ITV network franchise holder for Greater London and the Home Counties including south Suffolk, middle and east Hampshire, Oxfordshire, south Bedfordshire, south Northamptonshire, parts of Herefordshire & Worcestershire, Warwickshire, east Dorset and...
posing as Marcus GarveyMarcus GarveyMarcus Mosiah Garvey, Jr., ONH was a Jamaican publisher, journalist, entrepreneur, and orator who was a staunch proponent of the Black Nationalism and Pan-Africanism movements, to which end he founded the Universal Negro Improvement Association and African Communities League...
and arranging to meet Haile Selassie in "Babylon an' ting." This particular call was sampled by The Orb for use in their song "Towers of Dub" which appears on U.F.Orb among other albums.
When re-released, a compilation of these calls peaked at No.1 on the iTunes comedy chart on 27 July 2006. At the time of their first broadcast, they attracted controversy: in The Sunday Times
The Sunday Times (UK)
The Sunday Times is a Sunday broadsheet newspaper, distributed in the United Kingdom. The Sunday Times is published by Times Newspapers Ltd, a subsidiary of News International, which is in turn owned by News Corporation. Times Newspapers also owns The Times, but the two papers were founded...
(15 April 1990) Paul Donovan argued that Lewis-Smith's hoaxes are "repugnant". Donovan claims first that Lewis-Smith's company broke a "written undertaking that permission to broadcast would be obtained from all the people who had received the hoax calls" and that subsequently the BBC made illegal broadcasts in breach of their producers' guidelines ("Lewis-Smith was unavailable for comment"). Donovan then says that the material "invites us to snigger at what men and women, particularly those not blessed with Lewis-Smith's education, say when caught unawares". Yet the compilation has continued to be offered for sale.
Television
Lewis-Smith has made a number of programmes for British television:- In 1989, he wrote and presented eighteen episodes of Buy-gones for Club XClub XClub X was a short-lived 1989 Channel 4 arts and music magazine programme that is often cited as an example of TV Hell.- Details :The production and presentation team was largely taken from the earlier Channel 4 success Network 7 and had the same editor Charlie Parsons...
on Channel 4Channel 4Channel 4 is a British public-service television broadcaster which began working on 2 November 1982. Although largely commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority , the station is now owned and operated by the Channel...
, and contributed scripts for CentralCentral Independent TelevisionCentral Independent Television, more commonly known as Central is the Independent Television contractor for the Midlands, created following the restructuring of ATV and commencing broadcast on 1 January 1982. The station is owned and operated by ITV plc, under the licensee of ITV Broadcasting...
's Spitting ImageSpitting ImageSpitting Image is a British satirical puppet show that aired on the ITV network from 1984 to 1996. It was produced by Spitting Image Productions for Central Television. The series was nominated for 10 BAFTA Awards, winning one for editing in 1989.... - Up Your Arts (compiled from his contributions to Channel 4 show Club X)
- Inside Victor Lewis-Smith (1993) (in which he is a virtually unseen characterUnseen characterIn fiction, an unseen character is a character that is never directly observed by the audience but is only described by other characters. They are a common device in drama and have been called "triumphs of theatrical invention". They are continuing characters — characters who are currently in...
). This BBC2 series purported to be based within the Frank BoughFrank BoughFrank Bough is a retired British television presenter who is best known as the former host of BBC sports and current affairs shows including Grandstand, Nationwide and Breakfast Time, which he fronted alongside Selina Scott.-Early life:...
Memorial Zip Injury Wing of St. Reith's, a BBC hospital for its fallen stars. The series takes place inside the head of a man completely saturated with television, and suffering from a hyperactive spleenSpleenThe spleen is an organ found in virtually all vertebrate animals with important roles in regard to red blood cells and the immune system. In humans, it is located in the left upper quadrant of the abdomen. It removes old red blood cells and holds a reserve of blood in case of hemorrhagic shock...
. - TV Offal on Channel 4 (pilot 1997; series 1998)
- Ads Infinitum for BBC2BBC TwoBBC Two is the second television channel operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It covers a wide range of subject matter, but tending towards more 'highbrow' programmes than the more mainstream and popular BBC One. Like the BBC's other domestic TV and radio...
(pilot 1996; two series, 1998 and 2000)
He made contributions to other shows, such as BBC2's TV Hell theme night, and the Great Bore of the Year Awards.
Lewis-Smith is Chairman of a TV and radio production company called "Associated-Rediffusion" (the name being taken from the original Associated-Rediffusion - the first commercial TV station in Britain) and is executive producer of an ongoing collection of documentaries. Several were one-off programmes, including the BAFTA-winning, Dudley Moore
Dudley Moore
Dudley Stuart John Moore, CBE was an English actor, comedian, composer and musician.Moore first came to prominence as one of the four writer-performers in the ground-breaking comedy revue Beyond the Fringe in the early 1960s, and then became famous as half of the highly popular television...
- After the Laughter, for BBC1
BBC One
BBC One is the flagship television channel of the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It was launched on 2 November 1936 as the BBC Television Service, and was the world's first regular television service with a high level of image resolution...
's Omnibus, which was the cause of a dispute as to whether Moore was dying or not (The Strange Saga of Dudley and the BBC). Also Scandal in the Bins, about Benjamin Pell
Benjamin Pell
Benjamin Pell is a British man who was noted for raking through the dustbins of law firms representing prominent people in search of incriminating or compromising documents that he could sell to the media....
, a man who steals the garbage of public figures in order to find incriminating documents.
Other documentaries include The Man Who Ate His Archbishop's Liver? (Channel 4) about Idi Amin
Idi Amin
Idi Amin Dada was a military leader and President of Uganda from 1971 to 1979. Amin joined the British colonial regiment, the King's African Rifles in 1946. Eventually he held the rank of Major General in the post-colonial Ugandan Army and became its Commander before seizing power in the military...
; Alchemists of Sound, about the BBC Radiophonic Workshop
BBC Radiophonic Workshop
The BBC Radiophonic Workshop, one of the sound effects units of the BBC, was created in 1958 to produce effects and new music for radio, and was closed in March 1998, although much of its traditional work had already been outsourced by 1995. It was based in the BBC's Maida Vale Studios in Delaware...
; a biography of clarinettist Artie Shaw
Artie Shaw
Arthur Jacob Arshawsky , better known as Artie Shaw, was an American jazz clarinetist, composer, and bandleader. He was also the author of both fiction and non-fiction writings....
(nominated for a Grierson
John Grierson
John Grierson was a pioneering Scottish documentary maker, often considered the father of British and Canadian documentary film. According to popular myth, in 1926, Grierson coined the term "documentary" to describe a non-fiction film.-Early life:Grierson was born in Deanston, near Doune, Scotland...
award); one on singer/songwriter Jake Thackray
Jake Thackray
John Philip "Jake" Thackray , was an English singer-songwriter, poet and journalist. Best known in the late 1960s and early 1970s for his topical comedy songs performed on British television, his work ranged from satirical to bawdy to sentimental to pastoral, with a strong emphasis on storytelling,...
; and a BBC Four
BBC Four
BBC Four is a British television network operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation and available to digital television viewers on Freeview, IPTV, satellite and cable....
programme about British experimental music
Experimental music
Experimental music refers, in the English-language literature, to a compositional tradition which arose in the mid-20th century, applied particularly in North America to music composed in such a way that its outcome is unforeseeable. Its most famous and influential exponent was John Cage...
of the 1960s and 70s called Here's A Piano I Prepared Earlier (also nominated for a Grierson). Documentaries about British views on eschatology
Eschatology
Eschatology is a part of theology, philosophy, and futurology concerned with what are believed to be the final events in history, or the ultimate destiny of humanity, commonly referred to as the end of the world or the World to Come...
, the Belgian chansonnier Jacques Brel
Jacques Brel
Jacques Brel was a Belgian singer-songwriter who composed and performed literate, thoughtful, and theatrical songs that generated a large, devoted following in France initially, and later throughout the world. He was widely considered a master of the modern chanson...
, the musical partnership of Dame Cleo Laine
Cleo Laine
Dame Cleo Laine, Lady Dankworth, DBE is a jazz singer and an actress, noted for her scat singing and vocal range...
& Sir John Dankworth
John Dankworth
Sir John Phillip William Dankworth, CBE , known in his early career as Johnny Dankworth, was an English jazz composer, saxophonist and clarinetist...
, and the harmonica
Harmonica
The harmonica, also called harp, French harp, blues harp, and mouth organ, is a free reed wind instrument used primarily in blues and American folk music, jazz, country, and rock and roll. It is played by blowing air into it or drawing air out by placing lips over individual holes or multiple holes...
are completed and awaiting scheduling.
Lewis-Smith is currently writer and Executive Producer for Keith Allen's documentaries for Channel 4, which have so far included Little Lady Fauntleroy (2004) about Lauren Harries
Lauren Harries
Lauren Charlotte Harries , is a British media personality. In childhood Harries was known as James, a purported "child prodigy" in the field of antiques, appearing on numerous television shows including Wogan...
and her family; You're Fayed, about businessman Mohamed Al-Fayed
Mohamed Al-Fayed
Mohamed Abdel Moneim Al-Fayed is an Egyptian businessman and billionaire. Amongst his business interests are ownership of the English Premiership football team Fulham Football Club, Hôtel Ritz Paris and formerly Harrods Department Store, Knightsbridge...
; Michael Carroll
Michael Carroll (lottery winner)
Michael Carroll , born in Swaffham, Norfolk, UK, is a former binman who won £9.7 million on the National Lottery in November 2002, aged 19. His biography written by Sean Boru, entitled Careful What You Wish For , was published by John Blake Publishing in October 2006...
- King of Chav
Chav
A chav is a term that is used in the United Kingdom to describe a stereotype of teenagers and young adults from an underclass background.-Etymology:...
s about the British lottery
National Lottery (United Kingdom)
The National Lottery is the state-franchised national lottery in the United Kingdom and the Isle of Man.It is operated by Camelot Group, to whom the licence was granted in 1994, 2001 and again in 2007. The lottery is regulated by the National Lottery Commission, and was established by the then...
winner known to the press as the "Lotto Lout" (a third Grierson nomination); Tourette de France following a group of young Tourette's Syndrome victims on their trip to Paris; and Keith Allen Will Burn In Hell, focussing on Allen's accompanying Westboro Baptist Church
Westboro Baptist Church
The Westboro Baptist Church is an independent Baptist church known for its extreme stance against homosexuality and its protest activities, which include picketing funerals and desecrating the American flag. The church is widely described as a hate group and is monitored as such by the...
on their mission. These documentaries have attracted comments covering a spectrum of opinions from The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
, "It makes me want to declare Allen my new God" to The Scotsman
The Scotsman
The Scotsman is a British newspaper, published in Edinburgh.As of August 2011 it had an audited circulation of 38,423, down from about 100,000 in the 1980s....
calling these films (22 June 2007) "an intermittent series of purposefully scrappy and deconstructive documentaries from Allen and director Victor Lewis-Smith, each hamstrung by the fact that the unctuous Allen isn't particularly amusing or likeable".
Lewis-Smith is the executive producer of a series of short TV programmes called 21st Century Bach - The Complete Organ Works, now completing the fourth series on BBC Two. These feature Johann Sebastian Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach was a German composer, organist, harpsichordist, violist, and violinist whose sacred and secular works for choir, orchestra, and solo instruments drew together the strands of the Baroque period and brought it to its ultimate maturity...
's organ
Pipe organ
The pipe organ is a musical instrument that produces sound by driving pressurized air through pipes selected via a keyboard. Because each organ pipe produces a single pitch, the pipes are provided in sets called ranks, each of which has a common timbre and volume throughout the keyboard compass...
works, filmed in performance by John Scott Whiteley on, mainly, authentic instruments of the time. The televised recitals include both conventional coverage of the instruments, performer and buildings, and also shots of the organ mechanism at work (including filming within the wind-chests using an endoscope), cameras suspended from helium-filled balloons which range freely across the enormous Baroque
Baroque
The Baroque is a period and the style that used exaggerated motion and clear, easily interpreted detail to produce drama, tension, exuberance, and grandeur in sculpture, painting, literature, dance, and music...
instruments, and close-ups of the player's face. The series started on BBC2 in June 2003, and a third tranche of programmes has just (July 2007) been completed and awaits scheduling. Reviewer Graeme Kay, commenting upon the programmes in "Choir and Organ" magazine in August 2006, praised the series, saying "the imaginative range of content in these well-crafted miniature programmes ... will withstand repeated viewing. I would certainly hope to see the series completed."
In June 2007 Lewis-Smith's company made a programme featuring an interview with Rupert Murdoch
Rupert Murdoch
Keith Rupert Murdoch, AC, KSG is an Australian-American business magnate. He is the founder and Chairman and CEO of , the world's second-largest media conglomerate....
, funded by Murdoch's Sky1 channel: How TV Changed Football Forever (Guardian Unlimited, 22 June 2007).
Writing
Lewis-Smith started his writing career in the late 1980s, with weekly columns in Time Out magazine where he took over from Julie BurchillJulie Burchill
Julie Burchill is an English writer and journalist. Beginning as a writer for the New Musical Express at the age of 17, she has written for newspapers such as The Sunday Times and The Guardian. She is a self-declared "militant feminist". She has several times been involved in legal action...
, the short-lived Sunday Correspondent
Sunday Correspondent
The Sunday Correspondent was a shortlived British weekly national broadsheet newspaper. Launched on 17 September 1989, it ceased publication on 25 November 1990. It was edited by Peter Cole....
, and The Mail on Sunday
The Mail on Sunday
The Mail on Sunday is a British conservative newspaper, currently published in a tabloid format. First published in 1982 by Lord Rothermere, it became Britain's biggest-selling Sunday newspaper following the closing of The News of the World in July 2011...
(where he often substituted for Burchill) as well as Esquire magazine. He has also written for The Independent
The Independent
The Independent is a British national morning newspaper published in London by Independent Print Limited, owned by Alexander Lebedev since 2010. It is nicknamed the Indy, while the Sunday edition, The Independent on Sunday, is the Sindy. Launched in 1986, it is one of the youngest UK national daily...
, and was Restaurant Critic for Harpers & Queen magazine from 1995 to 1998.
In 1992 he began a long association with the Evening Standard
Evening Standard
The Evening Standard, now styled the London Evening Standard, is a free local daily newspaper, published Monday–Friday in tabloid format in London. It is the dominant regional evening paper for London and the surrounding area, with coverage of national and international news and City of London...
, contributing daily television reviews along with other writers, as well as occasional restaurant reviews and travel articles. He frequently used his TV reviews, which he contributed most weeks over a 15-year period, to criticise the British Royal Family
British Royal Family
The British Royal Family is the group of close relatives of the monarch of the United Kingdom. The term is also commonly applied to the same group of people as the relations of the monarch in her or his role as sovereign of any of the other Commonwealth realms, thus sometimes at variance with...
, the importance of social class
Social class
Social classes are economic or cultural arrangements of groups in society. Class is an essential object of analysis for sociologists, political scientists, economists, anthropologists and social historians. In the social sciences, social class is often discussed in terms of 'social stratification'...
in the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
(particularly in the context of what he regards as a cynical, exploitative attitude to viewers by television executives), the Iraq War and other foreign policies of George W. Bush
George W. Bush
George Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....
and Tony Blair
Tony Blair
Anthony Charles Lynton Blair is a former British Labour Party politician who served as the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 2 May 1997 to 27 June 2007. He was the Member of Parliament for Sedgefield from 1983 to 2007 and Leader of the Labour Party from 1994 to 2007...
, British cuisine
British cuisine
English cuisine encompasses the cooking styles, traditions and recipes associated with England. It has distinctive attributes of its own, but also shares much with wider British cuisine, largely due to the importation of ingredients and ideas from places such as North America, China, and India...
, and organic farming
Organic farming
Organic farming is the form of agriculture that relies on techniques such as crop rotation, green manure, compost and biological pest control to maintain soil productivity and control pests on a farm...
. He supports Britain's involvement in Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
(often condemning his own country as "America
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
Junior") and is a critic of what he terms "Little Englander
Little Englander
Little Englander is an epithet applied in criticisms of English people who are regarded as "xenophobic" and/or overly nationalistic and are often accused of being "ignorant" and "boorish". It is applied to opponents of globalism; for instance those who are against membership of the European Union...
s". His critical targets also include celebrity chef
Celebrity chef
A celebrity chef is a kitchen chef who has become famous and well known. Today celebrity chefs often become celebrities by presenting cookery advice and demonstrations via mass media, especially television. Historically, celebrity chefs have included Antoine Carême and Martino da Como.-External...
s, Jeremy Clarkson
Jeremy Clarkson
Jeremy Charles Robert Clarkson is an English broadcaster, journalist and writer who specialises in motoring. He is best known for his role on the BBC TV show Top Gear along with co-presenters Richard Hammond and James May...
, Vanessa Feltz
Vanessa Feltz
Vanessa Jane Feltz is an English television personality, broadcaster and journalist. She currently presents an early morning radio show on BBC Radio 2, a mid morning phone-in show on BBC London 94.9. In 2011, she started hosting The Vanessa Show on Channel 5. The first series ended on June 24th...
and, especially, Esther Rantzen. He was a vociferous critic of Director-General Greg Dyke
Greg Dyke
Gregory "Greg" Dyke is a British media executive, journalist and broadcaster. Since the 1960s, Dyke has a long career in the UK in print and then broadcast journalism. He is credited with introducing 'tabloid' television to British broadcasting, and reviving the ratings of TV-am...
and BBC1 controller Lorraine Heggessey
Lorraine Heggessey
Lorraine Heggessey is a British television producer and former Chief Executive of the production company Talkback Thames...
, who he blamed for lowering the standards of
Dumbing down
Dumbing down is a pejorative term for a perceived trend to lower the intellectual content of literature, education, news, and other aspects of culture...
the BBC. He also appears to have a particular loathing of "Mockney
Mockney
Mockney is an affected accent and form of speech in imitation of Cockney or working class London speech, or a person with such an accent...
s" such as Jamie Oliver
Jamie Oliver
James "Jamie" Trevor Oliver, MBE , sometimes known as The Naked Chef, is an English chef, restaurateur and media personality, known for his food-focused television shows, cookbooks and more recently his campaign against the use of processed foods in national schools...
, Nigel Kennedy
Nigel Kennedy
Nigel Kennedy is a British born violinist and violist. He made his early career in the classical field, and he has performed and recorded most of the major violin concerti...
, Ben Elton
Ben Elton
Benjamin Charles "Ben" Elton is an English comedian, author, playwright and director. He was a leading figure in the British alternative comedy movement of the 1980s, as a writer on such cult series as The Young Ones and Blackadder, as well as also a successful stand-up comedian on stage and TV....
and Jo Brand
Jo Brand
Josephine Grace "Jo" Brand is a BAFTA winning British comedian, writer, and actor.- Early life :Jo Brand was born 23 July 1957 in Wandsworth, London. Her mother was a social worker. Brand is the middle of three children, with two brothers...
. His other pet hates include Endemol
Endemol
Endemol is an international television production and distribution company based in the Netherlands, with subsidiaries and joint ventures in 23 countries, including the United Kingdom, the United States, France, Mexico, Spain, Italy, Germany, Brazil, Chile, Argentina, Dominican Republic, Poland,...
, Peter Bazalgette
Peter Bazalgette
Peter "Baz" Bazalgette is a British media expert who helped create the independent TV production sector in the UK and went on to be the leading creative figure in the global TV company Endemol....
and Big Brother, and the general direction of Channel 4 since the 1990s.
It was announced in June 2007 that Lewis-Smith would be retiring from his daily television column. In The Observer
The Observer
The Observer is a British newspaper, published on Sundays. In the same place on the political spectrum as its daily sister paper The Guardian, which acquired it in 1993, it takes a liberal or social democratic line on most issues. It is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper.-Origins:The first issue,...
's Media Diary on June 17, 2007, a London Evening Standard spokeswoman was quoted as saying: "Victor is a wonderful writer, and he will continue to feature in the Standard". This came shortly after Lewis-Smith had used his columns to declare traditional television dead, and "narrowcasting" via such methods as YouTube
YouTube
YouTube is a video-sharing website, created by three former PayPal employees in February 2005, on which users can upload, view and share videos....
as the future.
Since 1993, he has edited the "Funny Old World" column of bizarre news stories in Private Eye
Private Eye
Private Eye is a fortnightly British satirical and current affairs magazine, edited by Ian Hislop.Since its first publication in 1961, Private Eye has been a prominent critic and lampooner of public figures and entities that it deemed guilty of any of the sins of incompetence, inefficiency,...
, and he wrote a weekly page for the Daily Mirror for some years until 2003. From autumn 2004 to April 2005 he was the resident restaurant critic of The Guardian's Saturday magazine supplement. His columns included reviews of a Little Chef
Little Chef
Little Chef is a chain of roadside restaurants in the United Kingdom, founded in 1958 and owned by the UK private equity group RCapital. Little Chef's previous owners were The People's Restaurant Group Ltd., a company belonging to British catering entrepreneurs Simon Heath and Lawrence Wosskow,...
restaurant, an East End Pie and Mash Shop and (in his final column) a Bridlington Fish & Chip Shop.
His books include Buy-Gones and Inside the Magic Rectangle, a collection of his early Evening Standard TV reviews.
Collaborators
Much of Lewis-Smith's work after 1987 can be co-credited to Paul Sparks, who is given a co-writing credit on Inside the Magic Rectangle and the BBC Radio 1 series as well as a co-producing credit on much of the TV work. The Independent newspaper (19 December 2000) commented Dr Sparks and Lewis-Smith evidently think alike. They even write alike and quoted two pieces of identical writing, one by Lewis-Smith and one by Sparks.Keyboardist Dave Stewart provided a (straight) musical number for the second Radio 1 series, and later provided music for Lewis-Smith's TV projects. The originally cited producer for his programmes, one Anton Piller, is a joke, the name belonging to a real but unconnected person who gave his name to a particularly Draconian kind of court order. Another of his cover names is Harold Coltart, which he used in 1989 when he appeared on a Call the Controller phone-in on BBC Radio 4 condemning the station's controversial soap opera Citizens, fooling everyone in the studio. Other regular collaborator is producer/director Ned Parker.
Legal
In 2005, Lewis-Smith took legal action against The Independent newspaper after they queried the impartiality of his television reviewing. On Oct 31, 2005, the newspaper published the following retraction: In an analysis of television critics it was suggested that some of Victor Lewis-Smith's reviews may be motivated by settling old scores with commissioning editors who have rejected his ideas. We accept that Mr Lewis-Smith's television criticism is not motivated by such a consideration and we apologise unreservedly to him. The same newspaper (Aug 11, 2005) claimed to quote a former colleague, whose name was never given, as saying "It's strange how someone who dishes it out every day can be so queeny when they're on the receiving end".Some years earlier The Independent had printed an apology (July 5, 1999) that the newspaper "accepts that there was no scuffle between them, and that Victor Lewis-Smith did not scream for security guards before legging it". However the same newspaper had previously run a story (which they did not retract), saying of his membership of the Groucho Club
Groucho Club
The Groucho Club is a well-known private social club located at Dean Street in Soho, London. Its members are mostly drawn from the media, entertainment, arts and fashion industries....
"Victor Lewis-Smith sits in a corner and gets into fights" (28 November 1995).
In June 2006, Gordon Ramsay
Gordon Ramsay
Gordon James Ramsay, OBE is a Scottish chef, television personality and restaurateur. He has been awarded 13 Michelin stars....
, his production company, and his producer accepted an out-of-Court settlement of £75,000 from Associated Newspapers
Associated Newspapers
Associated Newspapers is a large national newspaper publisher in the UK, which is a subsidiary of the Daily Mail and General Trust. The group was established in 1905 and is currently based at Northcliffe House in Kensington...
, after an article written by Lewis-Smith which alleged that Ramsay had faked scenes and installed an incompetent chef appeared in London's Evening Standard.
On 28 July 2006, hypnotist Paul McKenna
Paul McKenna
Paul McKenna is an English hypnotist and self-improvement author.McKenna has written and produced books and multimedia products, hosted self-improvement television shows and presents seminars in hypnosis, neuro-linguistic programming, weight loss and motivation.-Career:Paul McKenna started in...
successfully sued the Daily Mirror for libel over articles written by Lewis-Smith from 1997 alleging that Mr McKenna was in the possession of a false PhD, having obtained the qualification from a non-accredited institution in the United States, whose Principal has since been imprisoned for making misleading claims about the status of degrees he handed out to candidates.
When Lewis-Smith returned to writing in his Evening Standard column on 29 August 2006, he referred to himself as Dr Lewis-Smith, saying that he had received a PhD in the same manner as McKenna (by paying a non-accredited institution) and suing anybody who suggests his PhD is "bogus".