Tension, greed, forced humour – this auction house has the lot! ROLAND WHITE reviews last night’s TV

The Greatest Auction 

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The Many Faces of Les Dawson 

Rating:

When star striker Alan Shearer won the Premier League title with Blackburn Rovers in 1995, he famously celebrated by helping his father-in-law to creosote a fence.

The Greatest Auction (Ch4) has uncovered a kindred spirit: an art collector called Eva, who sold an Anish Kapoor sculpture for £2,500. 

What did she plan to do with the money? ‘I’ll be able to fix my cupboard door handle,’ she said.

Auctions are great television. It’s almost impossible not to be swept up in the drama of a saleroom — the tension, the greed, the crushing disappointment, and the auctioneers showing off for all they’re worth.   

The trouble with The Greatest Auction is the stuff in between. Some of the interviews were awkward and forced.

The most expensive item to be sold yesterday was a pair of shoes. ‘Well, what have we here?’ asked AJ Odudu in her best chirpy television manner.

‘A pair of shoes,’ said the seller.

Let’s be fair to AJ. They weren’t just any old pair of shoes. They were smart Air Jordan 1 trainers, which eventually sold for £4,000.

‘How do you keep them so clean?’ wondered receptionist Lauren Dickenson. 

‘Not stepping in dirty stuff,’ said the slightly bemused owner, who admitted stashing his trainer collection in the attic to keep his hobby a secret from his parents. Let’s hope they weren’t watching.

Perhaps the most unusual item was a sheet ripped out of an A4 spiral notebook by Oasis star Noel Gallagher. 

On the sheet, in neat capital letters, he’d written the lyrics of Slide Away, an early hit, for his brother Liam to sing in the studio. 

Book dealer Adam used to hang out with ‘clever, self-effacing Noel’ and was prepared to pay up to £1,200. 

Unfortunately for Adam, the piece of paper went to a phone bidder from Manchester for £1,900.

It was Les Dawson Night on BBC4, which scheduled three programmes to mark 30 years since the death of the much-loved comedian and slightly off-key pianist.

The Many Faces Of Les Dawson (BBC4) recalled how Les, born into a working-class Manchester family, was in his mid-thirties and working as a vacuum cleaner salesman before he got his big break on Opportunity Knocks. 

The show had certainly hoovered up some of his best gags. ‘All my family was sporting,’ he said. ‘My father used to put the shot. He was in line for the Olympics until they saw where he was putting it.’

He was perhaps best known for his mother-in-law jokes. Now deeply unfashionable, they were pluckily defended by comedian Russell Kane: ‘Normal, functional human beings can pick up when there’s nastiness at the core,’ he said, ‘Les Dawson was loved because it was never malicious.’

How depressing that this actually needs explaining.

In fact, mothers-in-law loved the attention. When he stopped telling the jokes after the death of his own wife’s mother, letters from outraged mothers-in-law poured in, demanding to know what had happened.

Perhaps the final word should go to Cissie And Ada, played by Dawson and Ray Barraclough in the days when men dressing up as women was not an act of political defiance.

Cissie: ‘When you went to Blackpool for your honeymoon, were you [embarrassed pause, lowers voice to confidential whisper] virgo intacta?’

Ada (with puzzled look): ‘No, it were just bed and breakfast.’