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Until the mid-1990s, the behind-the-scenes documentary was a relatively
prestige television format, purporting to offer genuine insights into a hidden
world. The form could be controversial, as in The Police (BBC, 1982), but
critics generally accepted the producers' serious intent. 1996's The House
(BBC), which lifted the lid on the Royal Opera House, saw the beginning of a
transition, with a deliberate foregrounding of personalities, and especially
personal conflicts, for their dramatic effect; audiences were hooked. Airport,
screened later the same year, saw the balance tip still further in favour of
entertainment.
In the highly competitive multi-channel environment of 1990s television, the
discovery that docusoaps, as Airport and its successors came to be described,
could generate large audiences in peak-time for a fraction of the cost of the
comedy or drama that conventionally occupied that slot, was a revelation for
broadcasters. The schedules were soon bulging with docusoaps of all
kinds.
Airports can be desolate and uncomfortable places. Passengers are transformed
into lost, stateless refugees, their identities locked in their tickets and
destinations. Airports are the scenes of countless mini-dramas - lovers and
families divided and reunited, lives abandoned and new lives begun, tempers
stretched to breaking point - as well as issues with wider implications - the
smuggling of drugs and other contraband, illegal immigrants, refugees seeking
asylum.
While Airport gladly laps up such opportunities for drama, for the most part
Heathrow offers a stage for entertainment rather than a subject for
investigative inquiry. It is on the performances of its characters that the
series really depends, and its soap-like narrative structure provides a platform
for the creation of genuine stars. Airport gives us the magnificently camp
Jeremy Spake, the Aeroflot supervisor, just as Driving School (BBC, 1997) later
introduced the irrepressible Maureen, and Vets in Practice (BBC, 1997-2002) gave
us the dashing Steve the status of eligible bachelor.
The best docusoaps present an eye on a world we can usually only glimpse, and
vicarious experience of glamorous or extraordinary jobs: a celebrity
photographer snapping Mick Jagger, a security officer coping with drunken
passengers and the combined problems of tens of millions of passengers a year,
airport staff handling the Queen's travel arrangements. Despite accusations of
triviality and superficiality, not least from infuriated documentarists, Airport
has not only endured but spawned a subgenre of its own, alongside imitators
Airline (ITV, 2004-) and Bristol Airport (ITV West, 2004-05).
Anamaria Boschi
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1. President Clinton (2:24)
