A Life Less Smug

I read ‘Stuart – A Life Backwards’ by Alexander Masters a couple of years ago and was both moved and impressed by it. At the same time, I was also angered and saddened by the wretched waste of a young person’s life through such abuse and neglect. It is rare for me to make an appointment with television (except in the case of Hollyoaks where the standard of writing and acting is, of course, unsurpassable), but last night I cancelled everything so that I could watch the televised version of this book. It was extremely well done and, although it fell short on some of the detail that Alexander Masters included in his narrative, it nevertheless contained enough of the frustration and pathos of Stuart Shorter’s tragic story to make us all sit up and take notice of how failure and heartbreak comes so easily to youngsters such as this young man. I’d gleaned enough of a sense from the book about how Masters felt about Stuart during their unexpected friendship, but the televised version confirmed it and – because Masters wrote the screenplay himself – it was clear from this that he truly, truly cared deeply for that troubled and disheartened man. Cynics might say that Masters viewed Shorter as nothing more than a cash-cow, and it’s true that ‘A Life Backwards’ certainly did no harm to his writing career at all, but there was more: There was love and respect in that relationship too.

Benedict Cumberbatch (as Masters) did very well in his role, but I suspect it will be Tom Hardy (as the frustrated and resilient Stuart) who will walk away with any awards for this drama. His portrayal of the stumbling, mumbling, grumbling (yet strangely articulate and witty) Stuart Shorter was a masterwork, a tour de force. Yes, the programme made uncomfortable viewing – and I felt rather disgraced for earlier having bemoaned my fate because the antibiotics were preventing me from having a drink - but it was a warm and funny programme too. However, the line with most bathos and pathos in the entire story was this: “What murdered the little boy that I was?"

When I think of my small stray cat, that line chills me.