COLUMNIST – KATHY CLUGSTON

Kathy Clugston

Kathy Clugston is a freelance radio presenter. She chairs the long-running BBC Radio 4 programme ‘Gardeners’ Question Time’ and presents the weekly entertainment show ‘The Ticket’ on BBC Radio Ulster.

LIFE BEGINS AT 50

This month, Kathy Clugston discusses how middle age isn’t what it used to be, and how the media should embrace the ageing population.

I have just turned 52 and, if I say so myself, I don’t think I look it. But nobody looks their age any more, do they? Not that long ago, hitting 50 was basically the end of days. The Beige Fairy would come in the night to take away your nice clothes and leave you with a perm and a sudden interest in bridge. Thankfully, attitudes, expectations and style have all changed. When I was in my 20s, there weren’t many women over 50 in plum roles on television, in music, in films, in popular culture generally to aspire to become one day. And while there are many things still to rage about as regards equal representation and remuneration, middle age is no longer a one-way ticket to the scrap heap.

We are often told that we are an aging population. According to data from NISRA, the number of over-65s here is expected to nearly double by 2041 (to around 24%). However, our media is, as ever, obsessed with attracting younger people, even more so now their entertainment choices are almost infinite. The idea of gathering around the wireless to listen to a radio drama or having just three television channels must seem to younger folk the way a party line or putting clothes through a mangle seemed to me. Wait a whole week to see the next episode of a TV show? What’s that all about? And while the under-35s are big consumers of podcasts, I wonder how many of them could switch on an actual radio, should they ever come into contact with one. The TV and radio landscape has changed beyond all recognition. The (for now) publicly-funded BBC, who used to be able to count on a lifetime’s loyalty, is understandably panicky about losing millennials and Gen Z-ers to American streaming services, YouTube and TikTok, and finds itself on a constant quest to find sexier, shoutier ways of luring them in.

It is extremely cheering, therefore, to note the success of two services that couldn’t give a flying fig roll about what’s cool, dope, fire or trending on Twitter. The TV channel Talking Pictures, which lurks among the channels selling stuff for making your own Christmas cards, is unashamedly nostalgic, showing a mix of vintage TV series, screwball comedies and old black-and-white films. Their superstars are the likes of Alistair Sim, Dulcie Gray and Sir Donald Wolfit. My mum and I recently had a ball watching Gideon of Scotland Yard from 1958, directed by John Ford and starring Jack Hawkins and a young Anna Massey. A quick glance at today’s schedule reveals Peter Cushing in Twins of Evil from 1971, The June Allyson Show from 1959 and John Hurt in The Naked Civil Servant from 1975. Who wouldn’t want to watch any of those? The popularity of Talking Pictures, which soared during the pandemic, is all the more pleasing when you discover the whole operation is run from a back garden near Watford by a man called Noel and his daughter Sarah. Noel puts the schedule together using a notepad and pen, while Sarah answers

Illustration by Rebecca Elliott.

phone calls from film fans. ‘Shedflix’, as it has been dubbed, now attracts about 6 million viewers a week.

Another passion project that took off is Boom Radio. Commercial radio stalwarts Phil Riley and David Lloyd felt that Radio 2’s efforts to target an ever more youthful audience were alienating their age group, and decided to do something about it. The playlist specifically targets the baby boomer generation (roughly, the over-55s); gracing the airwaves today were Connie Francis, The Monkees, Ruby Murray and The Stylistics. It was initially available in just a few regions but proved so popular it soon went national on DAB digital radio, with presenters well-known to that age group - ‘Diddy’ David Hamilton, Esther Rantzen, Kid Jensen, Jenny Hanley - all, modernly, broadcasting from home.

These ventures may or may not make a serious dent in the mainstream, but how lovely that someone is bearing the more mature in mind. And as commercial enterprises, advertising to possibly the last generation of people with full pensions and paid-off mortgages, the future may well turn out to be paved with silver.

THIS MONTH’S OBSESSIONS:

Chilli Oil – Ever since I discovered this in my local Asian supermarket I’ve been having it with almost everything. You can marinade or dip with it, but I like it best sprinkled over vegetables or fried eggs. Fake Heiress - BBC Sounds podcast about the rise and fall of Anna Delvey, who scammed hotels, financial institutions and New York society into believing she was a multi-millionairess. The Bold Type - Netflix series, loosely based on the life of the former editor-in-chief of Cosmopolitan Joanna Coles, about three millennial New Yorkers. Corny but moreish. Four seasons are available with the final one hopefully due soon.