Patrick Freyne: Britain’s Got Talent is back, its name now less a triumphalist boast than a pleading sales pitch from a waning superpower
is back . The X Factor in its pomp was Leni Riefenstahl does pop. Britain’s Got Talent is Leni Riefenstahl does English end-of-the-pier vaudeville. The title is less of a triumphalist boast nowadays and more a pleading sales pitch from a waning superpower. “Look at our workforce,” say chortling British enterprise tsars Ant and Dec. “Behold our dog acts, our puppeteers, our mimes, our jugglers, our child dance troupes. We’re not just about weapons manufacturing and financial services.
More recently top scientists have discovered that crushing people’s spirit is a bad thing, so now Cowell seems a little bit lost, forced to temper most of his dream-crushing instincts in deference to nurturing appreciation. Sometimes beneath his little red sunglasses I see confusion about his status. “I have lived so long. Why am I still here?” his beady little eyes seem to say, caught in a vice between the apple cheeks and the Stickle Brick hair.
The former Strictly Come Dancing judge Bruno Tonioli is a relative newcomer. He is capable of doing all of the emojis with his body and head , and of the four judges he turns most frequently to the audience for gratification. This is because he can still recall what it’s like to be among the messy throng of rough-hewn humanity, something that is but a distant memory to his deathless companions.
There’s a troupe of child dancers who make me reflect on how, if child labour were legal, it might be entertaining. And then some Korean taekwondo aficionados fly around the stage, smashing wood with their fists and bare feet. Their talent is, basically, breaking stuff, so it’s a good metaphor for 15 years of Tory rule.
Simon-Cowell Amanda-Holden Alesha-Dixon Bruno-Tonioli Ant-Mcpartlin Declan-Donnelly For-You
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