| I have to admit of all the many twists and turns The Childminder's may take you on, it saves its most malign spectre for last – that of the disgraced celebrity chef Gregg Wallace: who – like OJ signing photos in jail – now makes most of his money through recording jarringly charismatic birthday messages for his 'fans' online. What, if anything, is there to make of this bizarre and culturally unwelcome presence? It is as if the Childminders are cursed by a knowledge that the soul of a conflict that raged in this country from John Ball to Ian Ball, may now be so dormant and hopeless as to play out largely in the domain of daytime television. What are we to think of ourselves living on this rainy fascist island? We are soulless! Floundering in the bad karma of bad empire: England is no longer a nation that produces dissidents, our avant-garde lie dormant in the ground, and we gave up on poets 500 years ago. And yet, we still hold onto something of a global eminence when it comes to producing the most insufferably megalomaniacal light entertainers to ever walk the earth. Whilst certainly controversial, it is on some deeper level Gregg Wallace's presence that epitomises the perverse, almost voyeuristic, estrangement from the present that allows 'Jesus Christ is from North Yorkshire' to feel like you are listening to something of a truly authentic document of contemporary England. Or maybe it's just something they did for a laugh, who bloody knows … Whatever it all adds up to, I urge you this much: go sit on a park bench, smoke something nice, and let The Childminders take care of the rest… |