Seven seconds of fame

Andy Warhol said that “Everyone will be world-famous for 15 minutes”. He was almost right.

It’s a nice quote. And, in my case, he was bang on. If you replace “world” with “North West of England”. And change “famous” to “briefly recognisable”. And swap “15 minutes” for “7 seconds”.

Yes, my shot at the big time occurred last week, when I popped up on BBC North West tonight, just before 7pm, and probably put many viewers off their dinner.

Whilst I had hoped to come across as intelligent and a bit dashing, I actually managed to pull off the far trickier ‘dishevelled and incoherent’. Result!

My brief moment in the limelight came about courtesy of my employer, Brathay Trust, who have their HQ in Ambleside. This is where I hang around during the week, pretending I know something about marketing, and generally making the place look untidy whilst drinking cappuccinos.

Brathay’s marvellous octogenarian archivist, Maurice Dybeck, showed us an amazing film from 1953, featuring young men doing all sorts of activities, and titled “Holiday Adventure – Brathay Hall is strenuous but exciting”. Transferred from a reel of film to DVD, we managed to get a version on to YouTube, and pushed it out to local media, hoping they would be as entertained as we were by the stirring music, posh-voiced commentary, and insights into the benefits of a Brathay programme from over 60 years ago.

Local press and websites picked up on it, and BBC Radio Cumbria ran with it too. Then on the Tuesday I got a call saying North West Tonight wanted to come and film a group of young people doing activities, chat to someone who was around at the time of the original film, and run a piece on Wednesday.

Some frantic organisation, and four hours of escorting them around to get footage and interviews the next morning (including Maurice kindly rearranging his car service and a lost cameraman), and a lovely piece about the film, and Brathay then and now, appeared that evening.

Maurice rightly took the starring role, whilst my unexpected interview was edited down to 7 seconds. If you ignore a superfluous ‘a’, three ‘er’ and an unnecessary ‘you know’, 27 of my poorly organised words beamed out across the region.

Still, it was a distinct thrill for me to see myself on the TV, whilst eating some microwaved leftovers for my tea. I played it again, and realised I hadn’t rearranged what’s left of my hair after taking my woolly hat off.

And does my mouth really look like that when I talk? Do I really say ‘er’ that much?

Excluding people that I excitedly sent a link to, a massive two people have said “We saw you on TV”, before politely saying I was good, despite evidence to the contrary marking me out as a gibbering simpleton.

My laptop got much more screen time than me. Still, it is a nice laptop.

I’d probably better stick to writing stuff.

This post first appeared as my 'Thank grumpy it's Friday' column, in the North West Evening Mail, on the 24th of February 2017. You can view the version published on their website here, which included a bonus "My" at the front of the title.

I did talk about what Brathay does now, and the vital work we do to improve the life chances of children and young people, but I was edited down to focus on the film (which was sort of the point, really). I'm not a particularly confident speaker and (I now know) not the most eloquent either, so I'm not expecting a phone call from someone wanting me to present their show just yet.

Still - quite an experience. Appear in newspaper? Tick. Appear on TV? Tick. Just need a hit single now...

(CD A-Z: The Best The Move. Groovy!)