Alan Whicker

Alan Whicker was interviewed at the National Film Theatre on 30 September 2002 by Michael Parkinson.

The small screen's globetrotting telejournalist dropped in to the NFT to discuss his career with chat show host Michael Parkinson. From his days as a roving reporter on news magazine show Tonight, Alan Whicker graduated to his own series, Whicker's World, and travelled the globe seeking out fascinating stories and memorable characters and to capture these on film for posterity From Papa Doc to Peter Sellers, from Butch Cassidy's sister to Sean Connery. Whicker has met and grilled them all.

• Tonight
• Social Worker
• Papa Doc
• Wagga Wagga

Interview © BFI 2002

Tonight

Michael Parkinson: Good evening. Thanks for joining us on this special occasion. I'm delighted to be here tonight, because not only is Alan Whicker a friend of mine, he's my hero. In the 1950s I saw a programme called 'Tonight'. I was a young journalist working in Fleet Street, and I thought if television has any kind of allure for me, it's this kind of programme. He set the standard; he set the style. Many have tried to emulate him; none have equalled him and nobody has surpassed him at all. Words are useless to go on and describe exactly what he's done. He's done more miles around the world than a second-hand Boeing. He's known to everyone in the business; he's revered by people like myself, journalists in the trade, as being the master interviewer and master TV journalist. Welcome, please, Mr Alan Whicker....

One of the things that strikes me about you, and always has done ­ it's as true now as the day I first saw you ­ you have this extraordinary enthusiasm for the job. There's a great sense of enjoyment, and a great sense also of the job being the hobby, and the hobby the job.

Alan Whicker: True, yes. I think one's enthusiasm is never gone. I mean I'm always excited at the prospect of another programme; always. I think one reason we're both happy in our jobs is because we're desperate to do what we enjoy doing.

MP: On 'Desert Island Discs' many years ago, you actually said your choice of reading on your desert island would be an airline timetable. I wondered if you were asked the same question today, whether that would be the answer?

AW: I think for the book, yes. Because you'd be on that desert island and you'd plan a journey from Dubrovnik to Guatemala on a Sunday; and that would take care of the rest of the evening. I love airlines, actually, which is very useful. I'm one of these people who quite likes airline food. So I enjoy the prospect of plotting and planning; and when one's setting off again, I quite enjoy working out the schedule. So if you're interested in places ­ maps and places ­ you're a natural. The filming is a sort of anti-climax.

MP: When were you first aware of the fact that you wanted to travel, and to write at the same time? How young were you?

AW: I was about, I suppose, twelve or thirteen. I can remember sending off for travel-agent brochures, and what struck me then ­ and still does today ­ were the pictures of these far-away places in the brochures: the sea is always so cobalt, and so gorgeous, and the sky is always blue, blue, blue. So one felt that the exotic places they were trying to sell ­ which were places like Ostend ­ were so enticing, and so exciting, that one thought, 'Oh, gosh, one day I'll get there ­ Calais, even, I might get there...'

MP: The Army obviously had a very big influence on your career. Because you joined the Army as a proper soldier ­ in the sense that you were in the infantry as an officer ­ and then you were allocated to the Army Film Unit. I guess that would have given you the first taste of your future career?

AW: It did. Everything fell into place. It's quite extraordinary how everything converged into 'Whicker's World' without any planning, really. Because I'd started writing; that was one thing. Then, through some friends, it was suggested that I be moved to the Army Film and Photo Unit, which was about to set off for the invasion of Italy and Sicily. They wanted some sort of camera fodder, and even at that age ­ I was then about 18, I suppose ­ I seemed willing to go, seemed willing to take risks, and I knew a little about writing, and would soon learn a little bit about cameras. So one set off... And one had a very exciting war, because first of all there was the invasion of Sicily and Italy, then little spin-offs like the landing at Anzio, behind the German lines, and one or two little expeditions like that, and one was co-operating with some marvellous people. My sergeants, all cameramen and skilled men, who knew far more about the business than I did, stills men and cine men in particular, were great. So by the time I got out of the Army, I'd got quite a background. The Army had taught me that the way to do it was learning by doing, which is what I did again when I went to television.

MP: Let's go back to the Army days, briefly. Because it's a dangerous job, in wartime particularly, and of course the equipment you were using in those days was primitive. I mean there weren't such things as zoom lenses in those days. You had to put your camera on the front line, didn't you?

AW: Absolutely. We did have some small telephoto lenses of no consequence, but the stills men were using a Super Ikonta camera, which any Box Brownie enthusiast would spurn today, and our little DeVries camera was so ineffective. The Americans had Eyemos ­ we were very jealous of that. So they were shooting, these cameramen, without the benefit of being able to sit in a trench and see a close-up half a mile away. They had to be there. One of my sergeants in Sicily went into battle on the back of a tank. The rest of the crew were inside, but he was on the back because he wanted to be there to get the pictures when things happened.

MP: But apart from teaching you the rudiments, the basics of filming that were to stand you in such good stead later on, did the war have a lasting effect on you? You saw batttle ­ did it change your perspective?

AW: I think not, to be honest. You never expect you're going to die, that's the first thing... You know you're invulnerable, and you know you're taking pictures, so you're not really a combatant. This persisted ­ I know it's quite ludicrous ­ but, jumping ahead to the war in Korea, when I was a war correspondent, I simply assumed I was neutral. Nobody's going to kill me: I've got a notebook, and I've got a pencil...

MP: I'm a hack, don't shoot me...

AW: Yes. it would be quite impossible for anything to happen, because I'm just a spectator, really.

MP: Yet, having said that, you're one of the few men I know who's actually read his own obituary.

AW: That is true. And very small it was, too, actually. Not half as stricken as I thought it ought to have been. I was going one day to get a story with some aerial spotters who were in Aztec Cubs. They used to fly these little, tiny planes behind the lines to find targets for our gunners, and they took me up. I was working with a map next to the pilot, and we did our job and got back, and I immediately went to Tokyo to get rid of my story, so I was out of action for about two days. And it appeared that on the day I'd been doing it, another plane had taken off and been shot down, and they believed that this correspondent was on board, and it was my name they came up with. So the paper then printed my obit: Alan Whicker, war correspondent of Exchange Telegraph, unfortunately was shot down. And then a little bit about my lack of achievement.

MP: Not fulsome... But let's move on to that very important period in your life ­ and in the history of television, too ­ that was the 'Tonight' programme. It was an extraordinary programme, in that it created something that had not been there before. It created a new form of television; a new form of interviewing. As I said, it set the standard; it set the style. How did that happen? Again, we're talking about 1957, primitive cameras ­ cameras as big as houses in the studios ­ no auto-cues... So what was it that gelled, that made the show so influential?

AW: I always assume it was luck; that it was natural chemistry. It may well have been, though, that the very clever producers saw in people qualities and characters that we didn't know about ourselves. Donald Baverstock, the producer, a little Welsh terrier, was absolutely brilliant; helped by Alastair Milne, his Number Two, who went on to become Director general [of the BBC] years afterwards, and Anthony Jay ­ an absolutely brilliant scriptwriter, as he afterwards proved by writing the 'Yes, Minister' series. So we were fortunate, or they were clever in picking people who worked, like Fyfe Robertson, a marvellous Scot, who went round belabouring councillors all round the country, finding out what was wrong with them. I was 'Tonight's man around the world because I'd travelled quite a bit, I knew about cameras, and I enjoyed going out and seeing what was happening everywhere else. Of course, 'Tonight' was operating on a blank canvas, really. As I had in the Army, we learned by doing. One never knew as we went out what was going to happen that day, but you did the best you could, and if it didn't work, you were lucky enough to be able to try again tomorrow. It wasn't a case of a one-off, where if it doesn't work, it's curtains. We were going back again and having another try the next day.

MP: But also what you changed was the manner of interviewing. I remember doing a programme about that period in radio, and they used to have scripted interviews. 'How are you?' 'Oh, I am very well, thank you very much...' It was like that, wasn't it?

AW: Absolutely. After I'd been in Fleet Street for a number of years, I shifted first to radio. And I was there when there was a newspaper strike, and the BBC in its wisdom decided that if people couldn't buy the evening papers ­ the Star, News and Standard ­ then they'd want to hear something instead. So they started a sort of gossip programme, called 'Going Places, Meeting People', which was run by a very clever guy called Ronnie Gibson ­ a sort of outrageous, delightful man who the BBC instantly fired because he was very successful, and he got across all sorrts of executives who didn't want ripples, or to be disturbed. On that we had tape recorders, L2's, about this size, and about the weight of two portable typewriters, so we could go out and interview. But at the same time, if the BBC wanted to interview, say, someone arriving at London Airport at Northolt, they would send this Humber Super Snipe with recording apparatus in the back, and would record onto discs. So mobile it wasn't. Back to 'Tonight', though: the BBC was then going in for maximisation, rather than miniaturisation, because the double camera they used to use, that had been specially built for the BBC, took two men to lift, and had tripod legs thicker than my arm. And swearing men would lift up this enormous thing. That was their idea of filming...

MP: Immobility... Let's just see an example now of the style that you developed. What you did, it seemed to me, was that you researched, then spent a lot of time composing an interview in your head, getting the structure of it exactly right. Anyone who's ever interviewed knows that's the key to it; that you don't wing it, you actually have the structure there in your head. It might not always work out that way, but you have to have it. Now this is an interview you did with Mr Getty, then the richest man in the world, and a very famous interview it was, too...

[Clip]

MP: What was compelling about that interview was the way you actually got stuck into him. You were actually very relentless. Later on there's a very staccato exchange where he's giving nothing and you're really pursuing him on his meanness, his anti-social behaviour, and particularly his lack of ability to relate to women. I suppose nowadays they might get up and walk out, but that's really what was different. We hadn't seen that kind of approach on television before.

AW: No, certainly not. And what one hadn't seen ­ this is 40 years ago ­ was a programme in depth about an individual, whether he was a lavatory attendant or a mega-millionaire; that sort of concentration on someone. Afterwards I was being criticised for being a bit too hard on him, really. Especially by American papers, who thought I was full of chutzpah, and criticising one of the finest products of their private enterprise. Which in a way I was, I suppose.

MP: Did you like him?

AW: I did like him very much, actually.

MP: Because in the interview, what you got was a combative interview. You put down your marker, and he did his, and that was what was new about it.

AW: I think it indicated quite early on in television that you can ask any question, really, as long as it's asked pleasantly. Hopefully, with a smile you can say almost anything to anyone, whether it's a Ton Ton Macoute or a solitary billionaire. And dear old Paul, who became a very good friend of mine after this, was not affronted in any way by the programme. In fact he was very pleased. He wrote me a sweet letter afterwards, which nobody would do these days, saying, 'I must tell you that I enjoyed my 'ordeal' very much; though unfortunately I received 25,000 begging letters afterwards...' This was mainly because, in America, the programme went out twice within a week, which was unheard of on American television. So he said that if I ever needed to in the future, I could give him as a reference. In fact, many years later, he invited me to Annabel's in Berkeley Square, and while we were having dinner I noticed that at our table he had four duchesses. I said to him during the meal, 'Paul, you don't often entertain, but when you do, you do it in some style.' He gave me one of those bleak little smiles of his, and afterwards I discovered that someone else whas picking up the bill. So Paul was being careful right up to the very end. Which may be why he was the richest man in the world.

Social Worker

MP: It's interesting that you say that you can ask anyone anything so long as you're courteous, and you smile. But the other thing I've admired you for, and that all interviewers could learn a lot from, are silences. You're very good at silences. The amount you get from that secondary response... They look at you, then you nod, and you wait. Because they're more nervous than you are, the secondary response is often the one you want, isn't it?

AW: Yes.

MP: It's a very clever ploy; we could all learn from that. Let's now see another clip. If I had a favourite 'Whicker', this would come in the top five or six. This is an extraordinary man called Percy Shaw. Would you just set him up for us before we actually see this excerpt from 'Whicker's World'?

AW: Percy Shaw was a real Yorkshireman; a certain age; he appreciated cash, and ladies, and all those good things; but he lived this extraordinary life in Halifax. He'd invented reflecting studs ­ cats' eyes ­ and in fact saved thousands and thousands of lives. Pre-war, he'd been driving home from his local pub and hit some sort of fog or mist, and had to slow down until his headlights hit some roadside advertising sign and reflected. From that he came up with the idea of putting glass into a rubber-capped attachment that would be buried in the road, and would pick up and reflect light, and that would have its glass cleaned every time a car rode over it. During wartime, they were absolutely imperative, these cats' eyes. Anyway, Percy lived by himself, never married, and actually lived in a room almost as big as this theatre, and had his old friends in every night. He'd have crates of beer stacked up, and he had four television sets. In those days there were three channels, I think, and he had one for spares, and these would be on around the room, but silently, with no sound. Only if there was something he thought really needed sound, like a wrestling match, he'd turn the sound up and they'd all watch that. Every night they did this, drank the beer and watched television, and he was totally happy. He also had, just tucked away in his garage, a Phantom 3, a Rolls Royce, the biggest and most luxurious car on the road. He had all the money off cats' eyes. Because they were patented, and because he was a careful Yorkshireman, he wouldn't let anyone else produce them even under licence. He insisted that everything stay with him; so he wasn't half as rich as he might have been. But at least he knew he hadn't been diddled by anybody...

[Clip]

MP: What happened to Percy? Died of eating meat with all that fat on it, I should think....

AW: He lived for quite a few years after that. The thing that endeared him to me was when he explained to me that the finest time of his life, he thought, had been when he and his friends had travelled from Halifax to London by bicycle. They'd cycled as long as they could, and finally reached some place in the Midlands, and there they stayed the night in some sort of boarding house. He was saying how marvellously generous it was. Because they'd had an evening meal, and breakfast, and before they left they'd filled their pockets with plums; but best of all they'd had the daughter of the housekeeper to sleep with. And, he said, it was all for one-and-six. So I asked him what the plums were like....

MP: He was a gift to a storyteller like yourself, wasn't he? It's interesting that that when you read about you now, you're always associated with being a travel journalist. But you're not that at all; you're a journalist who travels ­ a different thing altogether.

AW: Yes, exactly. One goes to a place to do the story; and you have to travel to get there.

MP: But why the confusion? Is it because you don't exist anymore?

AW: My programmes are signed documentaries, really. There's someone there who's a familiar face. Or, in my case, a familiar back. Normally on my programmes you only saw the back of my head, which I always say is my best side. These days, people want to talk to camera all the time, and I've had to do that too, I'm doing that now, but in those days one was rarely seen on camera. I think that's the way it should be, and one reason I survived for 45 years. I haven't imposed myself on the viewers too much.

MP: It's an interesting lesson again, watching you remove your ego from what you do; which is again quite contrary to what happens nowadays. But the more important point is that kind of journalism you practised: where is it now? It isn't there.

AW: They don't do signed documentaries, do they? I know when I started 'Whicker's World' on BBC2, with David Attenborough, who'd just joined, I produced as many as I could, which was about one a month. Because it was very hard to do, if you were filming, say, a story about James Bond in Tokyo, and at the same time writing about an Italian private eye, and then at the same time recce-ing somewhere else. It's hard to keep all those balls in the air, and I found the most I could do was about one a month. So then they employed some magnificent chaps to fill in the other weeks. The first one was James Cameron, a brilliant writer, and he did 'Cameron's Country' ­ all the titles after 'Whicker's World' became alliterative ­ and then my old friend Trevor Philpott did 'The Philpott File'. So one had then a mélange of signed documentaries, of people like myself going out and doing the best we could, and standing up ready to be blamed if something wasn't right, or the critics didn't like it.

MP: But they last, too. If you look at the stuff we've got tonight, and the other stuff of yours I've been viewing, it's everlasting. It stands up even now because what it is is very good journalism. It stands, therefore, as a record of that particular person or that particular time. And it's sad that's missing these days.

AW: I think, to take your point, Michael, the fact is that all the people I've mentioned: we could all write. Nowadays it doesn't seem necessary to be able to write. If you can shout a bit, it helps... But to be able to write like James Cameron, who could write like an angel, that definitely helped. And now it doesn't seem so necessary if you're doing a documentary; so the signed documentary seems to have disappeared. I don't honestly know who's doing it ­ Julian Pettifer carried on for a while, but he's stopped now.

MP: No, no-one at all. It's gone now. And one doubts it'll ever be revived again, because the nature of the beast has changed so much... What is the fascination that rich people have for you? Getty, we've seen already, and we've got three more examples coming up. Fiona Thyssen, the Indian princess, and the Sultan of Brunei . You don't get much richer than him, do you? Are you fascinated by the wealth?

AW: I think that's immaterial if someone's interesting; though to be fair Paul Getty was not a particularly interesting man as a person. I think if you looked into him in depth, then he was fascinating. But for an hour-long show, it was hard to make him fascinating. What I discovered afterwards about Paul was that everything he said was thoughtful, but he was slow and rather mournful; and the possession of great wealth doesn't lead, it seems, to cheerfulness. The wealthy often have a rather hangdog look. So he certainly wasn't a bubble-boy, old Paul. But what he said was enormously sensible, and afterwards, when I looked at a transcript of our interview, it was so good, what he had said, that I could have put it between hard covers. But watching it was sometimes a bit of hard going. Then I followed that programme with one I think you've selected, Michael; about Fiona Thyssen. She was a very successful model in those days, and had then married Heini Thyssen. I went out to see her in Switzerland and filmed her around St Moritz, where she was living, and she was a bubble-girl and absolutely enchanting. We filmed her, and I interviewed her, while she was preparing to go out for the evening. She was having her hair done, putting on her jewellery, and deciding what to wear; all these great diamonds and rocks and things. Then afterwards, when I looked at the transcript of that programme, she was so superficial, it was pointless, there was nothing. Yet when you saw the programme, it was wonderful, because she was so beautiful, so natural, so carefree, so amusing. So, it's not what you say, it's the way that you say it.

MP: It's like politics in a sense. Those who are votable, who are camera-friendly, and those who are not.

[Clips]

AW: The lovely thing about Fiona was what she told me afterwards. One day in Switzerland there, before her divorce, Heini was away and she had some friends over, and they decided to go to the cinema after dinner. So she went down to the gate and discovered that she didn't know how to get out of her own home; because she was so looked after, and everyone took care of her. One of her guests said he'd climb over and try to open the gate from the other side, and of course set off the burglar alarm. The police arrived and arrested her; they didn't know her; despite her saying, 'I own the place, it's my house'. So she said that was an example of how isolated she was from reality, from life.

MP: You're a social worker, really; that's how you should regard yourself. I was just thinking as we watched that, that it was a precursor of 'Lifestyles of the Rich and famous', wasn't it? Tonight on the BBC [as part of a broadcast tribute to Whicker] they have this shot of her where she's putting all these jewels on, and in a sense you wouldn't dare put that out today for the reaction you'd get from the public ­ 'Who is that stupid person, that horrible woman?'

AW: Yes, we're in an envious, covetous and dangerous age now, I suppose. Watching her preen in front of the mirror and put all this jewellery on, I agree she couldn't do it today.

MP: Now what about the Sultan of Brunei, who's next up?

AW: The Sultan of Brunei was a very difficult interview to do. It was a little like trying to have a chat with God. He's an absolute monarch, and has total power over life and death. He's in London ­ he owns the Dorchester, of course, and a few little places like that, and he would set off in his Mini with its dark glass and go speeding round Hyde Park Corner, and that sort of thing. I mean he was that sort of chap; on his own and enjoying himself. Indeed, when I was going out to Brunei, and mentioned him to the deputy manager of the Dorchester, I asked, 'Well, how is the Sultan?', and the deputy manager said, 'Oh, he's a nice little fellow; no trouble at all.' When I got out to Brunei, I discovered that his own people would never approach him; they were on their knees or on their stomachs. He was treated with such awe and reverence, it was very hard to do an interview with him.

MP: Were you under instructions from the people around him about what you could do, what you couldn't do, what you could ask?

AW: No, I had no instructions. It was very curious. I remember interviewing him in one of these golden chambers of his, and behind my sofa were two of his staff on their stomachs, lying there while this conversation was going on. I couldn't think what they were there for, except to bite my ankle if I asked the wrong sort of question.

[Clip]

MP: That's a brilliant piece to camera.

AW: The situation was good. I'm sorry we haven't heard the Sultan talk, actually. It's a programme about the Sultan, and you haven't seen him there. You haven't missed an awful lot, though. He was very charming, very good looking, and he was a sort of action man. We're used to effete royalty these days, are we not; and mystical royalty, and odd royalty. This guy, he pilots airbuses, flies himself around in his own chopper, he drives ­ as we know, he's a Bentley nut ­ at 150mph on his own roads. He's a great action man. He's been married twice ­ he hasn't taken his full complement of wives ­ and he married when he was 19, then the last one was an ex-air hostess on Royal Brunei Airlines. So he was a delightful man, but he was a little bit worried about his English; thought his English wasn't good enough. It was quite OK, really; but he worried about it. The trouble was, on our first interview, you couldn't ask him anything very pertinent, or very thoughtful, or at all complicated, because he wouldn't understand. So in the end, far from being an interviewer shaking him by the throat, and getting all the facts out of him, one was sort of encouraging him to say anything ­ rather like talking to Papa Doc, who was also a bit slow. But if these people are courteous enough to speak in my language, then it's beholden that I should be correct with them, too, and try to show them in their best light. So it was rather hard, but anyway we went through the first long interview, and at the end of it he was rather pleased, because he'd done quite well, he'd certainly looked good, and he said, 'Now tomorrow, you want to do it again?' 'Of course, yes, I want to do it again.' 'OK, but tomorrow more informal.' And I said, 'You're singing my song.' That's exactly what I wanted rather than these stilted interviews on golden chairs in golden rooms, where even the tissue boxes are gold; this is going to be wonderful. Then of course that night he went out and tore his ligaments playing polo, so we never got another interview. The interview I was going to use for mute was in fact all we got, sadly.

MP: We saw there, though, a demonstration of the second part of your talent. We've already seen you interviewing, but that was useful just to demonstrate the piece to camera, which is terribly important. That was all one shot, with just one cutaway at the end ­ whas that one take?

AW: Yes

MP: It would have had to have been, because of the situation. So did you script it and learn it, or did you have a framework, and then work within the framework?

AW: I think a framework, really. Often they work; sometimes they don't. I mean, at the start of our 'Round the World' programme, I did about a five-minute piece which said everything I wanted to say, and said it the way I wanted to say it, and did it in one take ­ which was very satisfactory. But other times you can take ten takes to do 40 words, if it doesn't go right, if the picture's wrong, or you stumble, or something.

MP: But again, it's the training you had on 'Tonight'. I remember one marvellous bit of film from 'Tonight'... Do you remember that street in Durham, where all the numbers are out of sequence, and you did this extraordinary single take, with you going up and down this street, pointing out that this is No 15, that's not No 13, it's 9... and it was extraordinary. Just one take.

AW: It's strange how a wonderful professional like Michael remembers a little programme like that...

MP: Because it defined a kind of journalism that fascinated me.

AW: Yes, that's very gratifying, I must say.

MP: Listen, you are responsible for me, so you carry an awful burden.

AW: That's the nicest thing that's been said to me tonight.

Papa Doc

MP: It's true. But OK, now we're sitting here like two boring farts saying, 'Do you remember this, do you remember that...?' Let's have a look at a clip I'd like you to lead us into. It's about the Indian princess, and I'd like you to tell us why she was chosen, and what the story was.

AW: Kitten Mohendra. I'd heard about her and drove a long way to find her, and she was very welcoming and let me feed her elephant, and then we settled in an old Lanchester car ­ which is worth the price of admission in itself, a magical car. Kitten Mohendra was a Rajput widow, who was very gentle and soft-spoken, and pretty, and charming; absolutely delightful. Her husband knew he was going to be arrested by Mrs Gandhi, paraded around his country estate, then put in jail. So he'd instructed his valet to shoot him; which he did... 'Thank you sir...' ­ bang. That left Kitten Mohendra as a Rajput widow. Now she didn't commit suttee, she didn't throw herself on her husband's pyre, although it was suggested to her that it might be suitable if she did. She decided not to do that, so she was slightly criticised by the relatives... She was living alone, in a modest palace, and she talked to me about the fact that she was followed and watched; that she couldn't do this, and couldn't do that, couldn't talk to anybody. This young woman was living like a prisoner. I must say it made throwing herself on the funeral pyre seem less awful; because she didn't have a happy life then, at all. But I hope we've got a nice clip of her, she was so delightful.

[Clip]

MP: It makes the point, as do several of the other clips we're seeing where you're interviewing rich and powerful people, that they're not very happy with what they've got.

AW: Well, this one's different, it's a special case, a religious case. But then the Sultan of Brunei seems quite happy enough to me. The thing about the Sultan of Brunei that I really lked was that when we first arrived there, for the first of three visits, we found the streets were full of signs saying AWAS. Now as everybody knows, AWAS is an acronym for the Alan Whicker Appreciation Society. So we were really quite enchanted by this; they really shouldn't have gone to so much trouble. Anyway, we kept seeing these signs, only to find eventually that they simply said 'Beware'. But AWAS was actually going strongly... and we may even have the chairman here tonight... John Ferdinand, good to see you, John... moustache and glasses, I hope...

MP: How many of these Societies are there around? They are all over the world, aren't they? Kuala Lumpur, and Australia...

AW: I hope so. In an evangelical way, one wants to set a good example.

MP: You're flattered by it?

AW: Yes, of course. We get a very high level of membership, the quality of these chaps is very good. When it first happened, I thought they were going to be very flaky guys, I was very frightened, so I had nothing to do with it. Then, when they did a 'This Is Your Life' on me, John and his merry men were absolutely the stars of the show. Their Whickeric was far better than mine, and their moustaches were darker, they looked more handsome, and they were an enormous success. So after that, we met more often.

MP: What about the Pythons, and the famous sketch 'Whicker Island'? Where they were all there because they couldn't find enough millionaires to interview. A wonderful sketch...

AW: Well, I fell about. I thought it was tremendously funny, and I still do, really. Especially the second half of it, where they're walking back and forwards across the screen. I wrote to John Cleese afterwards, saying, 'Very funny; really enjoyed it; you'll be hearing from my solicitors.' He then sent me signed photographs of all the Pythons posturing under these property palms on Folkestone beach, or wherever it was, and put in a little note saying, 'Here's some evidence for you.'

MP: You've chosen a clip now which is rather cryptically called 'Sea Urchins'. Why did you choose this particular clip?

AW: One reason I didn't do 'Around the World in 80 Days' when I was originally offered it, was because I thought it would be a bit too much of an ego-trip to be talking all the time to camera. I like to show people, talk to people, and have the people I'm talking to take over the screen. I didn't really feel it was right for me, so I avoided it. Then I did four programmes flying round the world, and we called it 'The Ultimate Package'. We were in a chartered plane, which belonged to us for about 30-35 days. Whenever we wanted it, it was there on the runway with its engines humming and its flag down, ready to take off when we wanted to.

MP: And this clip?

AW: Well, this clip is an example of how you can be proved wrong. I proved myself wrong. Because I just couldn't keep interviewing these people who'd paid £30,000 to go arround the world. Imagine, you've paid all that money, to have a lovely holiday, and this bloody man keeps turning up, talking to you all the time. I thought that would have been too cruel; I'll have to do it myself. So I started a diary... When we arrived in Tahiti, my crew ­ normally you don't see them either, because we have this thing that they don't exist, that I'm there alone with the camera somehow managing to take pictures ­ went out for a midnight swim, and this what happened....

[Clip]

MP: What's interesting about that is the sense of the 'other' Alan Whicker. I'm talking to you now, and we had lunch today and chatted, and you're quiet and self-effacing. And then we have that guy up there who projects like mad, like a front-of-cloth comic.

AW: I'm sorry...

MP: No. Because You can't just do straight forward journalism. You've got to give it something else, haven't you? A bit of showbiz.

AW: Yes, but you wouldn't want that every day of 30 days, would you? I did about two or three of those; most of them were quieter and more refined.

MP: Could you just tell us about the very first trip around the world that you did ­ what the BBC got out of it and what you got out of it? Just in case people thought that when you were interviewing all these rich people you were doing it on an equal footing.

AW: When I was with 'Tonight', I set off around the world with a crew of two ­ Frank Pocklington and Terry Ricketts, marvellous chaps ­ and we spent three months away. We did all of the Pacific Rim; we did Singapore, Bangkok, Hong Kong, Philippines, Tokyo, Hawaii, then Mexico City to Dallas, Texas. All this, and we produced about eight hours of cut film. These were about 10-minute, 15-minute, 20-minute pieces, but at the end of the day the BBC got seven or eight hours of programming out of it. And my fee for the three months was £400. So the BBC did fairly well out of that deal.

MP: Have you ever worked out just how many miles you've done?

AW: No. A lot.

MP: The next clip's about Papa Doc, so we'll talk a little about it first. It's one of the most famous interviews you did. Nobody had ever got on the island before. He was an evil man, a dictator, surrounded by these awful people the Ton Ton Macoute. So first of all, therefore, how did you manage to get in, how did you get permission to talk to the guy?

AW: We went through the normal routes, actually. He had a Chargé d'Affaires here, who happened to watch 'Whicker's World' and actually quite liked it, and could see we'd do a fairly serious programme on him. So we got a reasonable chit. Then, of course, nobody could say yes or no; it was like the Sultan of Brunei again. Papa Doc was another absolute ruler. Nothing at all was going to happen until he said yes. So, really on spec, we flew out. We were doing a tour in South America, and finished up in Port-au-Prince. They let us in, and on the very first day ­ it's Whicker's luck, really ­ Papa Doc was leaving his palace. Because although he had created terror amongst his people, he was also terrified. People were trying to shoot him, and former presidents had bought old bombers and were flying over trying to bomb his palace. People who create fear, live fearfully. Anyway on the very first day, he was leaving his palace, travelling about 400 yards to open a little Red Cross building. Haiti was the most abjectly poverty-stricken place in the world, I suppose, but he came out in his bullet-proof Mercedes 600. I and this brilliant researcher, an Australian called Ted Moresby, followed Papa Doc and pushed our way through the Ton Ton Macoute ­ which you can do if you don't speak the language and are sufficiently cheeky. You know, 'Excuse me, do you mind, could you stand back, sorry, just one moment ...'. We got to Papa Doc and he was rather flattered, I think, by this television crew which had travelled round the world to take his picture. He agreed and said, 'You'll come and see me tomorrow.' Which, with great difficulty, we did. And, after a while, he began to like having his picture taken.

[Clip]

MP: You said there, 'the most feared man'. Was he also the most fearsome man you ever met? Was he evil?

AW: Yes, he was totally evil. Yet nobody is 100% anything. I mean, he was a doctor before he became President, or before he shot his way into the palace. He'd been looking after his people, trying to get rid of malaria in his area of the country. And he also wrote poems. He gave me a book of poetry he'd written, he inscribed it to me. So he had that side, but he was monstrous. The whole country had no ideology but avarice, and he was sending his money out to Switzerland, of course, leaving the people in terrible poverty. He had his charm; he told me that he'd never stopped reading, that 'books were the morphine of Doctor Duvalier'. He couldn't go to sleep without reading. But he was absolutely ruthless. He threw everybody out that he didn't like. He threw the American ambassador out, and the American ambassador was his paymaster. The archbishop was kicked out in the middle of the night, so fast that he didn't have time to pick up his false teeth. He just didn't care. He'd be criticised by people abroad, people he couldn't reach, and he'd turn round and ban the Boy Scouts. That was the worry about filming there, that you had absolutely no-one to turn to. The British ambassador had long gone. When I did that programme, I hadn't read or seen Graham Greene's 'The Comedians'. If I had, I probably wouldn't have gone. It was a brilliant depiction of the place.

MP: Was he the most unpleasant man you'd ever met?

AW: No, as you saw, in his own way, he almost told jokes against himself. He'd say that his should be the most favourite nation of America, because he was so right-wing. 'Instead of which', he'd say, 'they see me as a black sheep'. And then this terrible laugh...

Wagga Wagga

[Opened to audience questions]

Q: .... about the danger of humanising a demon.

AW: You have a point, of course. But I don't think it's a good one, because it suggests we mustn't know more about anyone, in case we find we don't like them.

Q: ... worrying about the limitations of the 'softly, softly' approach.

AW: As you'll understand, three minutes out of a 50-minute documentary doesn't quite show what came across, and one did talk to him at great length about what he was doing, and why he was doing it. About why he had the Ton Ton Macoute instead of his own army to protect him. He had noticed, quite rightly, that most dictators end up being overthrown by their own army, often by the chief of their own palace guard. So before his army could throw him out, he threw his army out; and that's why he had the Ton Ton Macoute. I don't hold with what you're suggesting. I think the people who saw what Papa Doc was like in that programme would build up their own defences against a man of his calibre.

MP: Isn't also one of the values of seeing somebody like that, who you've not seen before, and one of the virtues of television, that you can look at them and make your own opinion of them. The camera's very revealing of what they are, whether the questions are particularly tough or not. I suppose today that the man you'd want to interview in that situation would be Saddam Hussein, wouldn't it?

AW: Yes, of course.

MP: But if you're going to interview Saddam hussein, you're not going straight in, boots and all. Not if you want to stay there and get the interview you want.

Q: ... commenting that the Papa Doc programme inspired questioner to become a journalist.

MP: Yes, it had a tremendous impact. In fact it won several awards, didn't it?

AW: Yes, it won the Dumont Award from UCLA, up against 70 or 80 documentaries from all over the world.

Q: ... querying constant use of English language; wondering if a different impact would be achieved by utilising interpreters.

AW: An interpreter devalues it, really. I think it's better to put up with a great deal of hesitation, as I had to do with the Sultan of Brunei for example, rather than have someone sitting alongside repeating everything. That's my feeling.

Q: .... to both AW and MP about their views on the modern trend for interviewers to assume superiority to their subjects.

MP: We both think it's a very good question, but we're not sure you're going to get a good answer.

AW: I think it's obvious that if you're doing a programme about someone, or interviewing someone, you owe them a certain amount of respect. Even if they're a gangster, as we've just seen, you owe it to them to treat them with adequate respect. You should show what they've done, or what they're doing, or ask them what they're capable of doing. But you don't want to take the mickey out of people; there's no satisfaction in that. That's yah-boo television. I don't think any responsible reporter would be doing that. Although I grant you it does happen.

MP: I think in the talk-show area, what's happened is that the source of the interviewer has changed. The source used to be journalists ­ Alan came from that, and he mentioned Jimmy Cameron, Trevor Philpott, Fyfe Robertson, Kenny Alsop, all those people. That great batch of reporters were writers, who'd come from Fleet Street or 'Picture Post' or wherever; and I was part of that generation as well. We approached the job differently, it was our training. Nowadays, they follow the American example, whereby you want a stand-up comic, who doesn't do so much an interview as a comedy act. There's nothing wrong in that at all; but it's not an interview, it's something else, it's a comedy show. They use the person that comes on as merely a butt for their wit or whatever. It's perfectly acceptable that that works, but don't call it an interview; it's not. That's the difference. They've got their place, but sadly I think you're going to lose that conversational aspect of television, that journalism that brought into being such programmes as we've tasted tonight. On a personal level, I'm going to miss that, too. I'm not being big-headed or anything, but I do know that when the 'Parkinson' show goes, that kind of conversational show ­ which is what it is ­ will be no more. Because where are they going to get the person from? I said to Alan earlier tonight that he was my hero, he inspired me into television, for better or worse, because I wanted to be like that. If I was a 26-year-old journalist now, as I was when I saw Alan and his compatriots for the first time, what would I look at on television that I'd want to do? Where would I fit? Would I do 'Celebrity Island'? Would I do 'Big Brother'? They've got their place, but not for me. Not for journalists like me who came from a different background. That's really what has happened.

Q: .... as to whether AW always choose his subjects, or if they sometimes chose him?

AW: I think generally I chose them, I must say. I, or my producers or directors. I've been very fortunate to have worked with some marvellous people. For instance the Getty and Fiona programmes were directed by Jack Gold ­ a 'Naked Civil Servant' type of chap, a fine director, like our mutual friend Mike Tuchner. I was lucky to follow them around the world.

Q: ... about the recognisable assets of voice and accent, and whether they were specially worked on.

AW: I certainly haven't worked on it, obviously. Otherwise I'd have done something better... I'm told it's a bit different... I always remember watching a Clive James programme, when he was talking to the lovely 'AbFab' girl, Joanna Lumley, and holding up my accent as something quite extraordinary, something inexplicable, and discussing it. And I'm sitting there thinking, well here is Clive James, the authentic voice of Wagga Wagga, criticising my voice... So no, I haven't worked on it, as you can tell. Whether it's been any help or not, I don't know.

MP: The voice and the style were there at the very beginning, and the thing about that generation we were talking about before was that you didn't have anyone to learn from, did you?

AW: Exactly. That's probably why I got away with it.

Q: .... as to whether there's anyone AW still has burning ambition to interview.

AW: Well, most of the people I wanted to do have gone, in one way or another. I wanted to do Howard Hughes at one time. Cubby Broccoli, the James Bond producer who was a great friend of mine, and who had once worked for Howard Hughes, was going to get me to him, as he wandered round his penthouse in Las Vegas wearing Kleenex boxes on his feet, and with his nails eight inches long, and that sort of thing. I thought he'd be a very interesting chap to talk to. But unfortunately he died before we made any approaches. I've had all sorts of ideas; I have a file six inches thick of people that I want to talk to. But of course the people one wants to talk to are not always famous. One of the luxuries of a 'Whicker's World', with 50 minutes of film, is that you can devote ten minutes to a guy who cleans statues on the Albert Memorial, as it were. You don't have to have somebody of everyday significance.

MP: Percy Shaw was a classic example of that...

AW: Solid diamond.

Q: ... as to whether it was correct that someone once asked AW to make a programme for private consumption only.

AW: It's true; but for a rather sad reason, actually. He was a marvellous man called Karl Hyman. He'd arrived in England from his native Denmark almost penniless, having spent almost all his money on his fare, and he was directed to some sort of doss-house where he could sleep, and when he woke up someone had stolen both the little money he had left, and his trousers. So his first night in England he was without money or trousers, or much English, yet he went on to become the boss of Mecca ­ bingo halls and entertainment places and so on. He married quite late in life, and had a son. He saw the Getty programme, and after that he said that what he wanted, for his son, was to be interviewed by me. So that when he died ­ he'd had one heart attack and he thought he was going to have another ­ his son would have something of him to look at, to know. Which struck me as eminently sensible, I must say. So we did this; Jack Gold directed it. we did a sort of 'Whicker's World', a tight version of it. After a few months, he did indeed die, and his son, who I've met, has this memento of his father, can hear his father talking, and see what he was like, and how he reacted, and that sort of thing. I thought, well, it might be a business, that... I was going to call it Memorials Inc, or something. I never did another one, but I'm surprised no-one else has taken up the idea.

Q: ... about the most difficult interviews AW and MP ever had.

AW: Very few people are enormously difficult. If you're in a studio, as Mike's people are, then it's sometimes slightly different, but seeing people on their own home ground, as I've filmed people, they have no reason not to be normal. Though I do always remember Ayisha Jaipur, now the Queen Mother of Jaipur, who was a great, great beauty before the war. She'd written a book about her life, and while I was in India doing a series, I asked if she would do an interview. So we set up in a wonderful mini-palace in the gardens, and there she was, looking very beautiful and statuesque, and very imperious and grand. I'd spent days reading the autobiography she'd just written, so I started off, 'Your mother was a noted gambler, and indeed used to gamble with a jewel-studded tortoise on the gaming table in front of her...' And she said, 'No; that's just nonsense; nothing like that happened...' 'Well, it's in your autobiography.' 'No, it's not'. That's the way it went, and everything I brought up, she'd say, 'Rubbish'. That's only happened to me the once, but I do remember it. Because you prepare for the direction of an interview, you go to an interview with a hundred questions. You're only going to use six or seven, but they're all there. This time I used them all ­ we got through the lot, and we still only just had enough for a few minutes of her. I decided afterwards, or at least it was my supposition, that she'd actually been preoccupied by this little cold-sore on her lip, and really didn't want to do the interview. I should really have gone away and come back another day.

MP: I once interviewed Sam Peckinpah, who did the same to me. I said to him, 'You started your life as a director...' 'No'. I said, 'What as?' 'As a screenwriter'. 'OK, we'll start again. You started your life as a screenwriter...' 'Whatever gave you that idea?', he said. He was pissed at the time... and so was I, shortly afterwards.

Q: .... mentioning an anecdotal sequence in a Venetian gondola in 'The Ultimate Package', and asking what place in the world AW had enjoyed most.

AW: Thanks for rembering that; that was the start of my bits to camera, my diary bits, so one was raking up one's own reactions and one's own memory. I'd been at the end of the war in Venice, editing the 8th Army paper, The Union Jack. It was wonderful ­ Venice is so beautiful of course, most of the Army had gone and the crowds hadn't yet arrived, so it was a perfect year, really. We were all still alive, we'd come through the terrible time of the war, and the future was unrolling and was going to be marvellous, and I personally had all sorts of hidden joys. I'd been in uniform, and suddenly could have some civilian clothes made, and could wear them. There was Harry's Bar, and I had an account there. I was then about 19, felt very grand at the idea of signing something and walking out of the bar without vulgar money changing hands. I felt very significant at that time. We went back on this trip you were mentioning, we were only in Venice for two days, and I thought I must go back to see if my account is still valid after all this time, or even if I still owed them money. So I went back on a very nostalgic moment, with tears in the corner of my eye. And it was a Monday, and it was closed.

Q: ... as to whether had ever interviewed Field-Marshal Montgomery.

AW: No. I spent some time with him, but this was long before I was in television. I was a very junior officer; certainly not in a position to interview him. I did take pictures of him on occasion, such as when we went by very fast speedboat to film the link-up of the 5th and 8th armies in Italy, when Montgomery met General Mark Clark for the first time. So I filmed him, but certainly didn't interview him.

Q: ... as to whether there were any other people in English national life he'd like to interview.

AW: I suppose one would have to settle down and think about it. To be honest, I certainly wouldn't want to interview politicians. You get a gut-full of politicians, don't you? But every time I sit down to watch a 'Parkinson' show, there are people you'd like to interview as well as he does.

MP: But the Queen would be good, wouldn't she?

AW: I don't know about good. But interesting.

MP: That would be a fitting finale to your career: By Royal Appointment.

AW: There goes the knighthood.

[Thanks and wrap up]