2007-09-09 A sad story

Donald Spoto's biography of Alan Bates starts off well, but disintegrates into a boring catalogue of his stage, film and television appearances (who cares if he appeared in twelve plays by Simon Gray?), and a seemingly endless list of reassurances from family and friends that Bates was a kind, lovely chap. In reality, like most actors, Bates put his career ahead of his ethics. After finishing the book, my overriding memory was his twin sons, as small boys, neglected and half-starved, existing on a diet of beans and cabbage leaves with an unhappy, unwashed Mummy, and a Daddy who prefers to play Chekhov or Ibsen than footie with his boys in the park. No wonder one of the twins tragically died from a drugs overdose at the age of nineteen. The worst moment in the book is Spoto's description of a dinner party in the 1970s with Bates, his male lover Nickolas Grace, and the weird film director Lindsay Anderson. Bates's mentally unstable and vulnerable wife Victoria (who is the real subject of the book) is also at the party, hiding under the table, and yet Spoto expects the reader to sympathise with Bates. If I'd come from Victoria's messed up background, married a handsome, charismatic and famous chap like Bates, ignored the fact that he is gay, and ended up at a dinner party with him, one of his male lovers and Lindsay Anderson, then I would definitely hide under the table! Though Spoto goes to great lengths to be inclusive, by mentioning or interviewing a succession of Bates's male lovers, I am deeply disappointed the author makes no mention of Bates's reluctance to 'come out' publicly during the years of Gay Liberation and gay politics. No mention of the Wolfenden Report or the 1967 Sexual Act Act when homosexuality was partially decriminalised. In short, the book lacks a gay historical context. To conclude, this biography reinforces the view I've always had about Britain's middle-classes: that they keep their secrets firmly behind closed doors, and when biographers attempt to bring them out into the open, they rally round and call the shots. Bates's family and friends call the shots here. They agree to interviews, but only if the mythical Bates is reinforced. The neglect of his young sons was child abuse, nothing more, nothing less.