Unbeaten, unbowed

“Fox-trot leader to Tango Charlie……….”

Strictly Come Dancing – the furore

So the Eddie The Eagle of dance has crashed and burned. Samurai Sergeant has chosen dancing death with honour, rather than fall into the hands of his increasing legion of enemies. And there is no more potent enemy than the fickle British public who with the curious self-hatred that often defines them, having loved too much, save their deepest hostility for their own exaggerated heros. I guess a surreal BBC press conference with Paxo stuffing his old mate with mock accusations of cowardice in the face of the Cha Cha; pusillanimity before the Paso Doble; and surrender to the mortal threat of the Salsa, is more seemly, more English, than a televised disembowelment. Though if we had a chance to vote for a few ritual suicides the phones would run hot enough to melt. It is a priori that top of this self-immolation list of people trying to ride Jonjo’s elegant coat-tails for a bit of self-publicity would be Mambo Mandy the aspirant Lord of the Dance. Macabre.

John Sergeant is clearly the only sane person left on Planet Strictly where the relative merits of a whisky Waltz or a Tantric Tango are weighed with all the solemnity of a UN resolution on world peace. To paraphrase Bill Shankly “some people appear to think Strictly Come Dancing is a matter of life and death – it is in fact far more important than that.” Ballroom dancing has superceded Sport as the ‘conduct of war by other means’.

Picture the scene: this Saturday night Jonjo and Kristy are waiting to go in for their final low level run before the judges’ aptly named Pom Pom guns. Last words of encouragement are sent to the daring pair from the desperate, unfit, two-left footed British public – “go on you two, you’re our last chance to bust those damned know-alls”

And what better tune for the plucky Jonjo and Kristy to end with than the Dambusters March: after all Jonjo has made the March all his own – whatever the music.

Da da da da dada da da, da da da da dada da da…………………

“Roger, Wilco. Calling Tango Charlie and Fox-Trot leader………..we’re going in! This is Jonjo Jive Five signing off. Over.” …………………………………………………………………………..
………………………………….silence.

You wish.

(Zettel)

Filed under: Television