Chapter 3: The Late Review Show

Lazabel makes supper, which they all eat sitting at the table in the kitchen. Yarra’s face looks angry, still. Lazabel tries to lighten the mood, but while Taudren seems happy, Yarra just sulks.

Taudren goes to bed at nine o’clock - before his normal bed time. Lazabel looks puzzled, but she doesn’t ask why.

Molcum watches Popular’s nine thirty news. There’s an item near the end about the Billy Hall Show getting a lot of complaints. The announcer says that Popular Arts, their once-a-week arts strand magazine show, will feature a discussion about the show at ten o’clock.

“Shall we watch it?” Molcum asks his wife.

“You always watch what you want anyway,” says his daughter, who’s back on her end of the sofa, feet up and curled tight under her.

Molcum’s wife Lazabel shrugs and says, “If you want.”

Once the weather is done and some adverts have run, the Popular Arts theme tune sounds. The presenter, Simin Lankland, says there’ll be a review of a new play, Colonia, by up-and-coming writer Torvis Booker, a review of a film by the famous director Timmart Scoldt, then adds, “And, perhaps unusually for this programme, we’ll be talking about the brand-new season of the Billy Hall Show, which aired tonight, on this channel, at seven PM. Famous for slapstick, for mocking politicians, for its comedy striptease and belittling and comic sexualisation of its female characters, tonight the Billy Hall Show featured an extended hospital sketch in which four women, dressed as nurses, were subjected to what some viewers have variously labelled crass, exploitative, cruel, crude, graphic and even sadistic treatment, all in the name of so-called comedy. In reflection of the complete reset to the DR government’s in-flagrante watershed rules, repealed in short order last year by the newly elected LC government, the Billy Hall production crew seem to be deliberately pushing televisual boundaries. And all this with a seven PM start time, a primetime family viewing slot if ever there was one. But first, Torvis Booker’s Colonia.

On the panel are a female newspaper columnist, a film critic and a radio phone-in talk show host. The woman he’s seen before, she was a big supporter of the ousted DR government. The talk-show host Molcum knows already. He’s a loud-mouthed, opinionated shit-stirrer. The film critic he doesn’t know. They review the play, which Molcum barely pays attention to, since he’s still picturing that last scene from the Billy Hall Show. Then the film critic gives a rousing argument in support of the film, called Softer Focus by the famous Timmart Scoldt, which the others seem to hate. Molcum watches, feeling bored.

Then finally, a section from the early part of the hospital sketch is shown on screen, featuring the opening with just the first nurse, played by Molcum’s favourite Jeneela Clooper with the tiny waist and great big breasts, through to Hall giving her her very first wedgie.

The screen dissolves to Simin Lankland, who, to camera, says, “The sketch, which we’ve timed, lasts a full seven minutes, before cutting away to Hall having his male parts stamped on by one of his regulars dressed as a woman wearing DR Party colours. The editing suggests that Hall has been dreaming and he’s now being taken to a lunatic asylum. Then the dream returns for the final two minutes of the program, featuring the original nurse and three others from the sketch having their extra-large breasts squeezed and, without putting too fine a point on it, pulled and perhaps even tugged about, with lingering close-ups of their nether regions being, as the term is, wedgied. The girls’ faces are also shown in what complaining viewers think looks like genuine pain and distress.”

He turns to the panel, all seated in curving black chairs.

“Anneste Lizquith, as the only women here, I’ll come to you first. Your reaction?”

The fifty year old woman, Anneste, with a face that looks severe and disapproving, says, “Shock value. The section we just viewed, shocking though it is, was decidedly tame compared to how this so-called comedy sketch developed. I know our televisions can feature some stunningly low-brow content - late-night, half-clothed weather girls being drenched or frozen or blown about by wind machines comes to mind - but I honestly can’t remember ever having watched anything quite so gratuitously unfunny and desperately sexist. I pitied those girls. And at seven PM! My God, all those families tuning in to watch what they think will be a simple comedy sketch show!”

“Billy Hall has never been a simple comedy sketch show,” growls Tobber Clanck, the radio shock jock.

Simin Lankland says in a more reasonable voice to the woman, “There were over seven thousand complaints, a record for Popular. But the breakdown of complainants was twenty four percent male, seventy six percent female. It seems that men were markedly less put off by Hall’s content than were women.”

“Well that’s men all over,” Lizquith says. “They’ll obviously be for the LC’s fantasy of a return to a good-old-days, fictional, male-dominated status quo.”

“But that’s part of the point,” says Lankland. “This isn’t the status quo. It seems to be making a calculated statement, that the status quo of old is no more. Home and Education Secretary Sardo Joinard was on FIRST!’s Political Roundup, being interviewed by Jott Daltum, just before the Hall Show aired. He was talking about stoppered bottles being uncorked and pendulums swinging back further than than before. This seems to be a perfect demonstration. Riller Fingest, your thoughts.”

The tall, gaunt film critic says, “It was ... gratuitous, yes. I don’t think anyone could argue against that. And it was probably far too early, and could have done with a content warning showing first, I have no doubt. I think families, as Anneste says, could have been spared the shock. And it’s calculated, obviously. I imagine Hall’s ratings will go through the roof.”

“Disgusting,” says Lizquith.

“Too gratuitous?” Lankland asks. “Or merely too gratuitous for seven PM?”

“It encourages domestic violence,” says Lizquith. “It was shocking what those women had to suffer.”