The look of love … Simon Schama in The Face of Britain. Photograph: Unknown/BBC/Oxford Film and TVView image in fullscreenThe look of love … Simon Schama in The Face of Britain. Photograph:

Unknown/BBC/Oxford Film and TVTV reviewTelevision This article is more than 9 years oldReviewThe Face of Britain by Simon Schama review – a fine look at ego, satire and power from art

history’s Mr BombasticThis article is more than 9 years old

First episode in the seductive historian’s six-part exploration of portraiture is a rollicking good watch

readers of faces: “We scan the world for connections and make snap judgments: friend or foe, cruel or kind, an innocent glance or the look of love?” That’s the look, that’s the look, the

look of love …

Sadly, Schama doesn’t break into 80s hit The Look of Love by ABC. But he does pause and lower his voice, adding a little masculine gravel: the look of love. Oh my, I bet you know a thing or

two about how to give – or recognise – a look of love, Simon; how is anyone supposed to concentrate on the art history lesson with you going all Mr Lover Lover on us (to be honest I’ve

always thought of Schama as more Shaggy than ABC’s Martin Fry). It was only a matter of time before he got love into this. Less than a minute in fact.

This first episode in his six-part exploration of portraiture is not about love, though: it’s about power. Starting with the sad story of a tug of egos between Winston Churchill (we shall

fight in the studios) and the artist Graham Sutherland. It was a battle that ended badly for everyone: public humiliation for Sutherland; Winston comes out of it as a bit of an arse; and the

picture – a brilliant portrait up there with Holbein, Velázquez and Rembrandt, says Schama – doesn’t come out of it at all, it was burnt.

And to the Reformation – the break with the Roman Catholic church, not the song by Spandau Ballet (how has 80s pop nostalgia even got in here?). In portraiture, Christ in majesty was

replaced by King Henry VIII in majesty. And then his daughter. “Exit the Virgin Mary,” says Schama … and I think I know where this is going. “Enter the Virgin Queen.”

I did know! And you did that on purpose didn’t you Simon, said “enter the virgin”, to be a little bit naughty, and to remind everyone what a sexy beast you are.

My favourite Schamaism comes later, when he’s talking about the caricaturist James Gillray and his caricature of William Pitt, which shows the PM as a fungus, “with the kind of weak,

disappearing, toffish chin, the nose, besides which Pinocchio’s nose is merely retroussé …” And Schama is so pleased with his Pinocchio reference or perhaps with his use of the word

retroussé, that he does a sharp intake of breath and a little “ha”, a sort of self-congratulatory snort. And the irony of it is that it kind of shouts “lampoon me”, and makes you wonder, if

Gillray was around today, would he have had some fun with Simon Schama as well?

Oh, it’s easy to mock the delivery – Mr Bombastic, say me fantastic (back to Shaggy, somehow). But it’s a brilliant lecture, “combing through the family album of our nation”, picking out a

painting here, a cartoon, a photograph to dwell on, because of what it says about the subject, the artist, the age, the country. Maybe it says something about you too.

It’s dead clever, but not clever-clever, even if you (I) did have to look up retroussé. Simon Schama doesn’t just know a thing or two about history and about art (as well as love), he’s a

storyteller, too, and this is more of a rollicking good watch than homework. The exuberance, of language, intonation, mannerism, the gasps and the perfectly judged pauses, the sexy talk,

might make excellent spoof fodder. But they are also what make him uniquely, Simon Schama. Schamarama, it ain’t what you do it’s the way that you do it … stop it! And it is seductive.

He steers it neatly and expertly back to where he began, Churchill. Homburg, bowtie, stogie stuck in the side of the mouth? Close, but (literally) no cigar. The picture Schama ends with is

Yousuf Karsh’s famous photograph, a portrait that says, “over and over, we will never surrender”. Or appears to say, because in fact Churchill had done just that, surrendered, his cigar.

Karsh had taken it, Winnie was cross, the look was less about bulldog defiance and more about give me back my bloody cigar. But it was, Karsh knew, what the people needed.

They – the people – are the theme of next week’s show. Episode four’s the one to look forward to though: Schama on love. That’s the look, that’s the look.

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