Everything is material in the writing game, or so legend has it. The same applies to filmmaking in Nick Broomfield’s experience. The director drew on one particular moment in his past when making his latest documentary, The Stones and Brian Jones (BBC2, Monday, 9pm).
One day in the early Sixties, Broomfield was on a train when who should he see but Brian Jones, then arguably the coolest guy in what was fast becoming the hippest band of the day, the Rolling Stones.
Broomfield, 14, approached and they got talking. “I was surprised how open and friendly he was.” Jones said he was a trainspotter. Given his solidly middle class upbringing in Cheltenham he might well have been.
It was a dear diary moment for Broomfield, helmer of The Leader, his Driver, and the Driver’s Wife, Ghosts and dozens more titles. But as he says, most people today haven’t heard of Jones, who died in 1969 aged just 27. He’s probably correct in that. Fans of the Stones will be familiar with the story, while for others it will be ancient pop history. It’s still a tale worth telling, as Broomfield’s deftly drawn film shows.
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With contributions from Bill Wyman of the Stones (a “historical consultant” on the film) and others, including past girlfriends, the film takes the story back to the time when Jones met Mick Jagger and Keith Richards and a band was formed.
Jones considered himself the founder of the Stones, but from the start there was friction with Jagger over who was in control. The situation grew worse as Jagger and Richards got into their songwriting stride and became the voice of the band. Jones, not a songwriter, would accuse them of shutting him out and belittling him. Neither Jagger nor Richards makes a contemporary contribution to the film, and are seen in past interviews only.
The only Stone we hear from in the present day is Wyman. He recalls a mostly sweet guy, a real musical talent, but there was a cruel streak to him as well, as Wyman found out to his cost.
The pressure on Jones grew as the Stones became more famous and the fans increasingly hysterical. Included in the terrific footage are scenes from their early gigs, with women launching themselves at Jagger and co and bouncers flinging the stage invaders back into the crowd. (Top tip: such is the eardrum-battering intensity of the screaming you might want to keep a finger poised over the volume control during these scenes.) Jones increasingly took refuge in booze and drugs to deal with his demons, disappearing and not turning up for gigs. Eventually he was asked to leave the band. Three weeks later he was found dead in his swimming pool.
Broomfield’s cautionary but never judgmental tale ends with the concert in Hyde Park the Stones staged as a tribute to Jones. Jagger read Shelley and released butterflies.
Stand by your superking beds and get ready to karate chop a cushion, it’s time for a new series of Scotland's Home of the Year (BBC1 Scotland, Monday, 8.30pm, repeated BBC Scotland, Thursday, 7.30pm).
Though the original format has its roots in Denmark, Scotland has embraced the show as its own since it appeared here four years ago. Proving that you can’t keep a good idea down, there is now a Wales’ Home of the Year to add to the collection.
READ MORE: Endeavour signs off in style
The fifth series opens in the east with the Old Train House in Edinburgh, a former station transformed into a family home. Next is Alexandra Apartment, a refurbished Victorian property in Kirkcaldy, followed by Mount Frost in Fife, which is described as a home where the Seventies meets the Nineties. Can’t wait to see that.
On judging duty are Banjo Beale (who now has his own interior design series), designer Anna Campbell Jones, and architect Michael Angus. As announced last week, there will be a change in the line-up for the next series, with Glasgow architect Danny Campbell taking over from Michael Angus. Big shoes to fill.
If there is any doubt about viewers' appetite for all things forensic, see the 26-series-and-counting Silent Witness. But that’s drama. What of the real-life scientists and the police working alongside them? For that, look no further than Forensics: the Real CSI (BBC2, Tuesday, 9pm).
Now in its third series, the new run continues in the quiet, steady style of its predecessors. The first episode centres on the rape of a woman by a stranger. Through interviews and reconstructions the case is followed from her initial approach to the police through to the questioning of a suspect.
It is gripping viewing, but never sensationalist. Being the stories of real victims it does not need to be. What is striking is how much criminals now know about forensics, altering their behaviour accordingly. But science is still ahead of them, and long may that continue.
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