S.P.C.A.

AUGUSTUS: What a gift you Greeks have. Incidentally, the battle, you know: it wasn’t like that. No, not at all. But you described it poetically, I understand that. It was poetic licence. I’m used to that.

— I, Claudius, Episode 1, “A Touch of Murder”

Watching I, Claudius for the first time recently was a surprising experience.

It wasn’t surprising because it was great. Of course it was great. Of course it was one of the greatest television shows ever made. I’d been told that for years, I just had to get round to watching it. No, the surprise was in how damn funny it was, an aspect of the show I had somehow managed to avoid being informed about. Which I guess is fairly ignorant regardless; even iPlayer describes it as an “acclaimed blackly comic historical drama series”.

LIVIA: These games are being degraded by the increasing use of professional tricks to stay alive, and I won’t have it. So put on a good show, and there will be plenty of money for the living and a decent burial for the dead.

Brilliant though the show is, initial reviews of the series were predictably mixed. And one review in particular has become somewhat notorious. I first became aware of it from Wikipedia:

“The initial reception of the show in the UK was negative, with The Guardian commenting sarcastically in its first review that ‘there should be a society for the prevention of cruelty to actors.'”

This isn’t just an unsourced piece of Wikipedia nonsense; the citation seems reasonable enough. It comes from a November 2012 article in The New York Times, “Imperial Rome Writ Large and Perverse”:

“But looking back wryly weeks ago on the original production, [director] Mr. Wise recalled that it did not seem destined for greatness. In Britain, The Guardian review of “I Claudius,” he said, began, ‘There should be a society for the prevention of cruelty to actors.'”

That article thankfully gives the source for all of its quotes from Herbert Wise: “a documentary that accompanies the 35th-anniversary I, Claudius DVD set”. It isn’t too difficult to work out exactly which documentary: it’s I, Claudius: A Television Epic, which was made for the 2002 DVD release of the series.

Certainly The New York Times is quoting Wise more-or-less correctly; here’s what he says in that documentary verbatim:

HERBERT WISE: I remember The Guardian critic – whose name I remember but I won’t quote it now – starting his criticism by saying: “There ought to be a Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Actors.”

This single quote is responsible for all the repeated anecdotes surrounding our supposed Guardian review. The New York Times article itself is syndicated everywhere for a start, but it’s spread well beyond that. For instance, in April 2022, The New European ran a piece called “The show that started a TV toga party”:¹

“The show was a modest ratings hit for BBC2 (averaging an audience of around 2.5 million an episode), but reviews were initially dismissive, with The Guardian snottily proclaiming: “There should be a society for the prevention of cruelty to actors.” But I, Claudius was soon re-evaluated and won greater popularity with repeat transmissions, as well as three Baftas.”

The line has also started to make into books; Arthur J. Pomeroy’s A Companion to Ancient Greece and Rome on Screen (Wiley, 2017) directly quotes Wise:

“Herbert Wise remembered the Guardian critic “starting his criticism by saying ‘There ought to be a society for the prevention of cruelty to actors'” (I, Claudius: A Television Epic, 2002).”

And coming right up to date, in August 2023 the Socialist Worker published the article “Roman history made into classic TV viewing”:

“Initially critics tore it apart. “It was so badly received in its first two weeks,” recalled Sian Phillips, who played Livia, “because it was so different.” The Guardian – which now says it is a masterpiece – ­loftily proclaimed, ‘There should be a society for the prevention of cruelty to actors.'”

Here’s the problem: The Guardian said nothing of the damn sort.

*   *   *

It’s true. I’ve searched right through The Guardian‘s archives. Unless I’m even more foolish than Messalina herself, Herbert Wise’s recollection simply doesn’t check out.

The Guardian did review the show, of course. And the first real piece of writing about I, Claudius in the paper was by no less a person than Nancy Banks-Smith. Her review was published on the 21st September 1976, the day after the first episode of the show aired.

The review is fascinating as an insight into the early reaction to the series, and so seems worth quoting in full:

I, CLAUDIUS is really I, Claudius II. The first I, Claudius was the abandoned Korda version of which a few magnificent scenes remain, as evocative as the scraps of Marilyn Monroe’s last unfinished film.²

Charles Laughton, that tormented and tormenting man, limping down endless steps, jeered by the mob grinning like a dog. Laughton who could not come to grips with stammering Claudius until, oddly, he saw him as Edward VIII, another reluctant, lisping emperor. Emlyn Williams as Caligula with his epicene sheen and Merle Oberon as Messalina, flickering past in soft focus giggling madly.

The new BBC-2 series I, Claudius evidently expects the comparison, and counter-attacks at once with an exchange about “acting is not what it was”… “and I’ll tell you another thing, it never was.”

But I saw the BBC’s documentary on Korda’s Claudius and remember it well. I saw the television version four days ago and it is fading fast. Forty years on, I, Claudius is an altogether more journeyman job. Workmanlike, if you prefer that. It depends how you feel about workmen.

The book by Robert Graves (which I enthusiastically commend to you) made Roman history funny and familiar. In the television series this sometimes turns out comic and common. I do not myself greatly care for lines like “It must have been something he ate”… “there’s a lot of it about”… “goodness has nothing to do with it,” and “you wait till my husband gets home” (this last spoken by the Empress Livia to the mob).

If mob is the word for such an economical crowd. A slice, a sliver of malcontents, each one waving an arm half-heartedly, they looked like strap hangers in a rush hour train. It is, in its way, a very contemporary Claudius. Derek Jacobi as Claudius, looking older than God, hardly got into his stride in this episode. Brian Blessed played Augustus entertainingly as bluff, good company – I expect his friends called him Gus. Personally I liked the snake doing figures of eight across mosaic in the opening shots, then the baby who bawled like a trooper when laid beside his dead father, then a slave because he was played by an actor with the resounding name of Sheridan Earl Russell.

I, Claudius is the story of murder and madness told by an idiot and signifying, I should have thought, quite a lot. It cannot be altogether accidental that Graves broke this story in 1936. From Augustus to Nero, two Caesars were mad, three were mass murderers, two were married to murderesses, or were murdered. Among those monsters, Claudius is the child taking notes.

It is a disinfectingly funny look at hell on earth as a scene in the first episode suggests. The Emperor Claudius, running the occupational risk of poison used a food taster who treated his unpalatable job with great sangfroid, appreciating the wine, criticising the cook. Speaking as a food taster myself, I, Claudius goes down very easily. I think you will be amused by this child’s eye view of Chicago.

You can, I think, fairly accuse that review of hedging its bets, although there are worse crimes for reviewers to commit when dealing with the first part of a 12-part epic.

Most interesting to me in the above is Banks-Smith’s criticism of the “economical crowd”, which proves that questions about the small nature of the production of I, Claudius have been present from the very beginning. I don’t agree with them, and could bore you for several millennia as to why.³ But I think there is an assumption that it’s simply experience of modern television which creates reservations in some about the production of the show. Nancy Banks-Smith was doing it the day after it transmitted.

The other long review of the show in The Guardian on its first broadcast was by Peter Fiddick. It was published on the 19th October, the day after the fifth episode, “Some Justice” aired. I’m afraid I find it rather indigestible compared to Nancy Banks-Smith:

“While they are changing the law about not being able to do MPs for corruption, and in the spirit of the growing feeling that lawyers, accountants and builders of bridges should be more accountable for the outcome of their advice, I hereby offer up to the wolves another occupation group as having power without responsibility. Take a bow – preferably on your knees – actors’ agents.

The 10 per cent men are not the only ones to blame, of course. But at least BBC TV’s head of drama, head of serials, writer (Jack Pulman), producer (Martin Lisemore), and director (Herbert Wise) were only doing the honest thing and offering people money to appear in I, Claudius (BBC-2). One reason the more established members of Equity employ agents, as I understand it, is to tell them when to say No. Which most of them should certainly have done, just as most of the people listed above, and especially Mr Pulman, who has an honourable record, should have recognised that a Roman lady turning to her threatened husband in the moment of crisis and crying “They’re bluffing!” evokes not so much the shades of Plancina, wife of Piso, as of Olivia De Haviland, wife of Stewart Granger.

The trouble with critics is that they knock all the time. Why can’t they be constructive? True, true. I hereby vow to say not a word more till the ides of December when, Zeus willing, it will be all over. If then. Indeed, I will dish out the prizes now. There are certain roles in the dramatic canon which fools reckon actor-proof; my prizes go to the performers who are proving themselves foolproof. Sian Phillips leads them. While all around is village hall, she – greyed, aged, sardonic – makes Livia magnetic. Derek Jacobi, Claudius himself, stammers manfully, and his elder self at beginning and end promise that the best is to come, if only we could wait for it. My sympathies to Fiona Walker as Agrippina, for getting the worst camera angles and lighting since 1925, thanks to Mr Wise’s insistence that Romans always lay down to talk; my congratulations to Patrick Stewart, who doesn’t need good close ups, but made the most of them. And a suspended silver medal (Ms Phillips gets the gold) to Stratford Johns, for a guest appearance that didn’t quite find time to fly clear of the script, but showed a power (and a profile) that the telly can do with. To make use of it, however, would involve an oath of positively Roman proportions, he, and we, must be rid of Charlie Barlow.”

I wouldn’t have bothered quoting the screed above if it wasn’t for one thing. While at no point does Fiddick use the line “Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Actors”, he does use most of his review to talk about the actors in show, and express sympathy for them. Could it be that Wise was misremembering Fiddick’s review, and attaching an existing joke to it?

Because let’s be clear: it really was an existing joke. I cannot claim exactly when it was first used, but we can certainly find some early examples.⁴ On the 14th January 1886 The Boston Globe published the following, under the title “The Life of an Actress Not a Happy One”:

“The Madison Square management is no better, no easier. It sends ladies to Jersey City in this brutal weather unprotected by escort and as best they can go, at their own expense, to a theatre colder than any New England barn, where water literally freezes in the dressing rooms. A society for the prevention of cruelty to actors would be a good scheme.”

The above is whimsical use of the phrase, sure, but is also a serious-minded piece. Indeed, most early uses of it seem to be intended at least somewhat seriously. The first British paper to use the phrase which I can find is the Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News on the 1st April 1893:

“Everything attested to the satisfactory progress of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Actors at the second annual meeting of the Actors’ Association held on Monday after noon. The members now number nearly 1,000, fresh premises have been taken in St. Martins Lane, and war is being carried on merrily against the insanitary dressing-room and the bogus manager. So far, under the astute guidance of Mr. Bolton as legal adviser, the warfare has been waged with discretion as well as with zeal and every one who cares for the stage will rejoice to see the accomplishment of objects so eminently desirable.”

But the phrase was too self-consciously amusing to be merely used for actors in real, genuine distress. On the 14th June 1934, the Evening Dispatch ran the following, under “Mr Fairbanks, Junior, Defines Speechmaking”. It concerns a speech given by Douglas Fairbanks at an R.S.P.C.A. garden fete:

“Mr Fairbanks said he had a small menagerie of his own. He had every conceivable kind of animal, with a few actors thrown in, he added, amid laughter.

‘I am thinking of starting an R.S.P.C.A. of my own,’ he went on. ‘It will be a Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Actors, and the first thing I will have to do will be to see that that actors do not have to make speeches.'”

But really, you can’t expect critics to exercise self-control forever. A typical example is on the 6th August 1963, where the Manchester Evening News reviewed the Oldham Rep production of The House on the Cliff:

“There ought to be a society for the prevention of cruelty to supporting actors. Playwright George Bateson gives all the worthwhile lines to one character in this comedy-thriller and saddles the rest with some of the most melodramatic mush imaginable.”

And the year before I, Claudius aired, on the 18th April 1975, the Daily Mirror published this in their film column:

“There ought to be a society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Actors. Four who could qualify for aid are Warren Mitchell, Lionel Jeffries, Hayley Mills and Doug McClure.

They appear in ‘What Changed Charley Farthing?’ (A, Studio Two), a British comedy which is about as funny as a trip to the torture museum.”

The above review crystallises the problem with the phrase: it’s not a useful analysis of any given piece of work when used by a critic. It’s a cookie cutter insult: relatively amusing in itself, at least the first time round, but not in any way insightful. By the time of the Daily Mirror piece, it had just become another way of saying “pity the poor actors who have to appear in this tripe”. The telling part of that review is that it also uses the line “about as funny as a trip to the torture museum”, a similar phrase which absolves the critic of having to do some real work and analyse something properly.

I think this is implicit in everyone’s quoting of the phrase, to be fair. It’s heralded as a lazy piece of criticism. Herbert Wise himself lets it stand with a metaphorical raised eyebrow, but The New European has The Guardian “snottily proclaiming”, and even Wikipedia allows itself a “sarcastically”. The Socialist Worker goes further, and takes the opportunity to link to a piece about how The Guardian “has always sided with the establishment”. You’d think instead of getting into all that, it might have been rather more relevant to do some research about whether the quote was actually accurate.

As for Wise’s recollection itself, there are two possible explanations for it. The first is what I suggested above: that Wise simply misremembered Peter Fiddick’s burblings. The second is that a reviewer really did use the stock phrase “Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Actors” in relation to the show, and it just wasn’t published in The Guardian. Indeed, this was my working theory for a while, and I was sure that if I searched hard enough, I would come up with the smoking gun review.

Sadly, this has not proved to be the case. I can’t find the phrase linked with I, Claudius in any contemporary review of the show. That doesn’t mean to say it isn’t out there, somewhere; but my research skills have finally failed me. If anybody manages to find it, please let me know in the comments.

One thing is for sure, though: The Guardian didn’t publish it. Save your ire for more worthwhile things. After all, there’s years of Sam Wollaston reviews to get annoyed about.

1. Though the URL seems to indicate it was originally called “How I, Claudius Kickstarted Game of Thrones”. The original headline is better. ↩

2. Nancy Banks-Smith is referring here to the unfinished 1937 film, the full tale of which was told in the 1965 BBC documentary The Epic That Never Was. This documentary is also included on various DVD releases of the television I, Claudius. ↩

3. In fact, when I, Claudius has the occasional more expansive shots later on in the serial, it felt odd to me. The true power of the programme is in the close-up. ↩

4. The following is a selection of appearances of the phrase, and is not intended to be exhaustive. ↩

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