A Very English Scandal

[Maeght]

Agree with this and all your last few posts Maeght.Pointless & happens so often in so many threads. You're not the one derailing

Thanks Robbie.

[Rhiannon]

Some posts just become white noise.

[Nearly Sane]

Agree with this and all your last few posts Maeght.Pointless & happens so often in so many threads. You're not the one derailing.

I watched it and was quite fascinated.I remember it all being discussed by practically everyone at school & my parents who had always been great fans of Jeremy Thorpe because of the Anti-apartheid movement & other things. We all hoped it was a great misunderstanding, that seems naive now.

Fact remains that no-one was convicted of attempting to murder Scott despite verbal evidence. IIrc the judge was pro-Thorpe & directed the jury to acquit. We'll find out at the end, the series is based on a book said to be a true account but who knows?. We weren't there.

Hugh Grant is so good in that part, he's said to be over the moon to be playing someone like Jeremy Thorpe for a change. They're all good, Ben Whishaw plays Norman J-later-Scott as someone so fragile and needy I want to mother him.

Interesting as the story is it's quite sinister; I felt uneasy at the end of last night's episode when Thorpe spoke so easily about murdering someone, it was disturbing. Good dramatisation.

Can't wait to see Thorpe's formidable second wife, Marion.

Sorry disagree, since it was Maeght who raised the whole question of bickering rather than addressing posts but I like the idea of your post. We can't know, then no one has suggested we can. And yet we consider what is alkeged. So the idea that Thorpe suddenly thinks of murder seems odd to me - not impossible. Just a thing where I have to think about what I know and what I might think is likely.

[Maeght]

Nothing? So anything he said before hand, anything on record is shut off to you? And further you think that no one listened to his statements no idea be on here has any personal evidence? Seems a bold claim. And given people were in the main wondering about what could be known makes your whole 'stop bickering' stuff just seem bizarre

I don't know anything about Thorpe, the emphasis being on know. I have heard a little about him but I don't know him or know the truth about allegations or reports. No idea what your third sentence means. Your last sentence doesn't make a lot of sense either, could you clarify both please?

[Nearly Sane]

I don't know anything about Thorpe, the emphasis being on know. I have heard a little about him but I don't know him or know the truth about allegations or reports. No idea what your third sentence means. Your last sentence doesn't make a lot of sense either, could you clarify both please?

Yes, it wasn't the clearest post ever, so sorry, and while I'm apologising, a further sorry for my snotty reaction to your bickering comment. I can see where you might see it as bickering, while all I was attempting to do was draw out what people though, and I couldn't see how jeremyp's comment related to wigginhall's.


I don't think it's a question of knowledge as such but speculation based on what knowledge we do have. The TV prog and book are based on what people testified to, and I think that in both it seems to get to the idea of killing Scott in a way that seems an odd jump. That isn't to say that it didn't happen that way but one of the reasons the case was so shocking was that here was a 'pillar' of the establishment allegedly conspiring to have someone killed. I'd always assumed that it had been something that was got to gradually but it appears not.

[Maeght]

Yes, it wasn't the clearest post ever, so sorry, and while I'm apologising, a further sorry for my snotty reaction to your bickering comment. I can see where you might see it as bickering, while all I was attempting to do was draw out what people though, and I couldn't see how jeremyp's comment related to wigginhall's.

Apology accepted - thanks.

I don't think it's a question of knowledge as such but speculation based on what knowledge we do have. The TV prog and book are based on what people testified to, and I think that in both it seems to get to the idea of killing Scott in a way that seems an odd jump. That isn't to say that it didn't happen that way but one of the reasons the case was so shocking was that here was a 'pillar' of the establishment allegedly conspiring to have someone killed. I'd always assumed that it had been something that was got to gradually but it appears not.

I would agree that on face value it seems an odd situation, but without knowing about the true nature of Jeremy Thorpe it is very difficult to say if it is 'in character' or not. Who knows what really goes on in the minds of pillar of the establishments.

I haven't watched all the first episode yet but will aim to and to watch the rest. Maybe a clearer picture will emerge.

[Dicky Underpants]

I just stated the facts. The closest you are going to get to the truth of whether Thorpe really said that is that a witness in court said he did whilst under oath. On the other hand, Thorpe was acquitted so the jury clearly didn’t believe the witness or believed that Thorpe didn’t mean it seriously, otherwise he would have gone down.

I thought the doddery old establishment judge gave very strong suggestions to the jury that they should acquit Thorpe.

[Dicky Underpants]

Can't wait to see Thorpe's formidable second wife, Marion.

I can't help thinking that she was rather naive, though she no doubt thought she was on to a good thing by 'standing by her man'. I'm not going to deny that she was a remarkable and very gifted woman (brilliant pianist amidst much else). Oddly enough, she had a history of falling in love with homosexuals (Benjamin Britten being a previous object of her affections).
Jeremy Thorpe's homosexual promiscuity is pretty well documented, and is hard to deny. The valiant Marion did attempt to deny it - once famously when a journalist had enquired about Thorpe's past sexual history "Stand up and say that!!!" Standing up and saying it would have made precious little difference to the truth of the matter.
Still, many homosexuals have managed stable heterosexual relationships, and these two had music to bind them together (Thorpe having been a pretty skilled violinist).

As regards the drama - greatly impressed by Hugh Grant, whom I've never thought to be the one-trick pony he's often written off as. And Ben Wishaw, who is apparently nearly forty, yet managed to convey the image of a sensitive, naive teenager beautifully.

[Dicky Underpants]

I don't think it's a question of knowledge as such but speculation based on what knowledge we do have. The TV prog and book are based on what people testified to, and I think that in both it seems to get to the idea of killing Scott in a way that seems an odd jump. That isn't to say that it didn't happen that way but one of the reasons the case was so shocking was that here was a 'pillar' of the establishment allegedly conspiring to have someone killed. I'd always assumed that it had been something that was got to gradually but it appears not.

It does seem rather sudden, and an option one would think totally beyond considering for a high-profile politician. Nonetheless, there have been some pretty ruthless examples of the breed around. Thorpe was certainly hugely ambitious and recklessly promiscuous - almost as if there were two aspects of his personality that worked independently of each other. Well, most of us have known that sex can make us behave like lunatics.. I don't think it impossible that Thorpe would have contemplated such extreme action when the final implications of Scott's tenacity (which he'd underestimated) became apparent. No doubt the establishment rallied round to conceal his gay promiscuity, but that is not sufficient to make those other serious questions go away.
I hope the drama resolves some of them. definitely looking forward to next week's episode.

[Nearly Sane]

Yes, there is a hint of extreme in Thorpe but part of that is surely the produce of our perception of him following on the case?

[jeremyp]

Which was covered in wigginhall's post so what did you think your post added?

He asked a question. My post added the facts as we know them, in reply to his question.

What do you think your posts criticising my posts are adding to the thread?

[jeremyp]

Aw diddums!

What's this post adding to the thread, NS?

[Nearly Sane]

Extraordinary

https://www.itv.com/news/2018-06-02/jeremy-thorpe-probe-to-reopen-after-police-admit-suspect-may-still-be-alive/

[wigginhall]

Very weird development.  Not only has the existence of Newton come to the fore, but that journalist seems to have discovered a different hit-man, who came before Newton.   Also, 'there were as many as five different attempts on Scott's life'.   They weren't very good hit-men, were they?

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Very weird development.  Not only has the existence of Newton come to the fore, but that journalist seems to have discovered a different hit-man, who came before Newton.   Also, 'there were as many as five different attempts on Scott's life'.   They weren't very good hit-men, were they?

More like shit-men.

[Nearly Sane]

More like shit-men.

All hitpeople are shitpeople

[wigginhall]

There is an extra programme on at 10pm, dealing with some of this, (BBC4).

[Aruntraveller]

Interesting Opinion piece in The Observer:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/jun/03/very-english-scandal-timeless-portrayal-of-the-human-heart-jeremy-thorpe?CMP=fb_gu

[Anchorman]

Just finished watching Tom Mangold's banned Panorama doc on Beeb 4, after the three part play ended on BBC 1. My first thought was regret. Regret that Panorama no longer lasts an hour; Mangold's work shone through. My second thought is that the repeal of the double jeapordy law was far too late in coming; There should have been a second trial; the original seems a complete miscarriage of justice. My third thought is that I'm not one for conspiracy theories.....but in this instancwe I'll happily make an exception.

[Aruntraveller]

Yes AM I watched it too. The judge at the original trial clearly directing the jury in a completely disgusting and biased manner.

What was notable, to me at least, was the dignity of Norman Scott. A brave man.

[Robbie]

Indeed he was, he genuinely loved Jeremy Thorpe & if he'd been treated decently there might have been a different story. People who love & believe they are or were loved deserve consideration. I'm glad he still alive &well with a lovely home and a long term partner.

There was such a dichotomy in Thorpe's personality. Not excusing Jeremy Thorpe from plotting murder but if society hadn't been so hung up about homosexuality back then there may have been no scandal or trial. Even so, just contemplating murder is beyond the pale. Jeremy Thorpe was so popular and much admired, I remember my parents thought a lot of him & wanted to think well of him, when it all came out they could hardly credit it.I remember they both thought Norman Scott had been treated shabbily.

What an old boys club they all were! A right shower (I watched the last episode and the doc on BBC4).

Hugh Grant and Ben Wilshaw deserve the television equivalent of Oscars. BAFTAs I think.

[Anchorman]

I'm not belittling the gay thing - fr from it: it shows how iniquitous the law was. Norman Scott came across as a dignified, caring person who had overcome the hell of mental illness - to his credit. However, given the amount of affairs, liasons and 'indiscretions' in middle and high - in some cases very high - society in the fifties and sixties which was simply swept under the carpet by the old boys' club, I suspect Thorpe would have contemplated the same action were his partner straight. The kiss-and-tell mentallity of the scandal sheets of the seventies made it inevitable that the affair would surface....given Thorpe's stance on morality, his downfall would have been inevitable. II never knew Joe Grimmond, so simply don't know if he knew anything of the situation. I've met Steel a few times, and from what I know of him, he would have been truly appalled.

[wigginhall]

We were so taken with it, we watched it all again, also because I couldn't remember all the characters.   You notice some very droll lines second time around, maybe the best, 'cod in parsley sauce' (Thorpe's wife), also the lawyer, 'I'm dealing with a liar and a fantasist, and I'm not sure which is which', and of course, Thorpe's mother, on the balcony, as everybody is celebrating, 'of course, you realize you're ruined'. 

[Steve H]

What did Jeremy Thorpe and William the Conqueror have in common?
They were both fucking Normans.

[Maeght]

What did Jeremy Thorpe and William the Conqueror have in common?
They were both fucking Normans.

What made you post that?