Life of a salesman
Lew Grade took risks, sold new ideas and changed the face of TV, says his nephew Michael Grade
Evening Standard/Hulton Archive/Getty Images
- Caroline Frost
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Michael Grade has done more than most to shape the past half-century of British TV. The man who stole Bruce Forsyth for ITV, commissioned The South Bank Show, brought Neighbours to these shores for BBC1 and controversially binned off Doctor Who is currently at the helm of regulator Ofcom. But as he tells it, everything he knows, he learnt at the knee of his family of theatrical agents: his father Leslie, Uncle Bernie (later Lord Delfont) and his singular Uncle Lew. Later Lord Grade, Lew was a Russian refugee turned world amateur charleston champion turned impresario and mogul. Short, bald, armed always with a cigar and an idea, he was an irrepressible showman for whom the term “larger than life” could have been coined.
“I was very lucky. There were three brothers and, in a way, I had three fathers,” remembers Michael. “Lew was exactly as you would expect – kind, tough in negotiating, but a very gentle soul. He was a showman in the Hollywood Sam Goldwyn sense. He was the world’s best salesman and he was selling himself and his product.”
As Radio 4 tells the story of how Lew Grade brought about an entertainment revolution with his Incorporated Television Company (ITC) and shows such as The Saint, The Persuaders!, Man in a Suitcase, Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased) and The Muppet Show, we are reminded of just how pioneering it all was. I wonder, did Lew love television or rather the art of the deal?
My Uncle Lew knew what popular entertainment was
Michael Grade
“He loved entertaining the public,” confirms his nephew. “He had done something not many had done in the 1950s, which was to fly to America to book acts for the Palladium in the UK. He saw commercial TV when he was there, and what was possible. He was up against the very patrician BBC, whose idea of an entertainment show was a night out at the Savoy with all the men in white tie and tails and the women in long gloves. Lew knew what popular entertainment really was.”
Given the chance to create content for the relatively youthful ITV, Lew swung into action, first with black-and-white drama The Adventures of Robin Hood and primetime stalwart Sunday Night at the London Palladium, then with the increasingly ambitious, colourful slate we have come to associate with ITC’s golden age.
With big-name actors telling big stories heavy on action and adventure in deceptively lush settings, split-screen title sequences with catchy theme tunes, shows like The Persuaders! dazzled British audiences. Former knitwear model Roger Moore turned in a pre-Bond prototype as The Saint, and Patrick McGoohan followed his success in Danger Man with the less conventional but equally hypnotic The Prisoner. How did Lew pull off such world-class fare on British budgets?
“He was very lucky in the early days,” remembers Michael. “A lot of fabulous Hollywood talent couldn’t work there because of McCarthyite restrictions. They came to the UK, where they wanted to write scripts and produce. Their skills opened everybody’s eyes.”
Equally skilled were Gerry Anderson and his team, the creative forces behind a whole world of “Supermarionation” puppetry, including Thunderbirds, Stingray, Captain Scarlet and co – what cultural historian Matthew Sweet in the documentary delights in calling “families of rich people on strings saving us all from international catastrophes”.
For Michael, Lew’s greatest skill was “taking risks, backing talent, going with his instincts –always”. Cut to 2025, and I wonder where the modern-day equivalent of ITC is to be found. “Doesn’t exist,” replies Michael. “There’s too much competition, so it’s very hard to take the risks that he took. Everybody’s so risk-averse.”
Does Michael, now Lord Grade himself, have a favourite show from his uncle’s time? He muses. “I thought The Saint was ground-breaking, but the real legacy is The Muppets. When no one in America would touch them, Lew took the risk, then like a true salesman sold them back to where they came from.”
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No ITC, no Kermit. That really would be an international catastrophe.
Authors
Caroline Frost
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